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diff --git a/old/68175-0.txt b/old/68175-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 0001321..0000000 --- a/old/68175-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7120 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Cornhill Magazine, February, 1860 -(Vol. I, No. 2), by Various - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: The Cornhill Magazine, February, 1860 (Vol. I, No. 2) - -Author: Various - -Release Date: May 26, 2022 [eBook #68175] - -Language: English - -Produced by: hekula03, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was - produced from images made available by the HathiTrust - Digital Library.) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CORNHILL MAGAZINE, -FEBRUARY, 1860 (VOL. I, NO. 2) *** - - - - - -THE - -CORNHILL MAGAZINE. - -FEBRUARY, 1860. - - - - -CONTENTS. - - - PAGE - NIL NISI BONUM 129 - - INVASION PANICS 135 - - TO GOLDENHAIR (FROM HORACE). By THOMAS HOOD. 149 - - FRAMLEY PARSONAGE 150 - CHAPTER IV.--_A Matter of Conscience._ - „ V.--_Amantium Iræ Amoris Integratio._ - „ VI.--_Mr. Harold Smith’s Lecture._ - - TITHONUS. By ALFRED TENNYSON 175 - - WILLIAM HOGARTH: PAINTER, ENGRAVER, AND PHILOSOPHER. - Essays on the Man, the Work, and the Time 177 - I.--_Little Boy Hogarth._ - - UNSPOKEN DIALOGUE. By R. MONCKTON MILNES. (With an Illustration) 194 - - STUDIES IN ANIMAL LIFE 198 - CHAPTER II.--_Ponds and rock-pools--Our necessary tackle-- - Wimbledon Common--Early memories--Gnat larvæ--Entomostraca - and their paradoxes--Races of animals dispensing with the - sterner sex--Insignificance of males--Volvox globator: is - it an animal?--Plants swimming like animals--Animal - retrogressions--The Dytiscus and its larva--The - dragon-fly larva--Molluscs and their eggs--Polypes, and - how to find them--A new polype_, Hydra rubra-- - _Nest-building fish--Contempt replaced by reverence_. - - CURIOUS, IF TRUE. (Extract from a Letter from Richard Whittingham, - Esq.) 208 - - LIFE AMONG THE LIGHTHOUSES 220 - - LOVEL THE WIDOWER 233 - CHAPTER II.--_In which Miss Prior is kept at the Door._ - (With an Illustration.) - - AN ESSAY WITHOUT END 248 - - - LONDON: SMITH, ELDER AND CO., - 65, CORNHILL. - - - - -THE - -CORNHILL MAGAZINE. - -FEBRUARY, 1860. - - - - -Nil Nisi Bonum. - - -Almost the last words which Sir Walter spoke to Lockhart, his -biographer, were, “Be a good man, my dear!” and with the last flicker -of breath on his dying lips, he sighed a farewell to his family, and -passed away blessing them. - -Two men, famous, admired, beloved, have just left us, the Goldsmith and -the Gibbon of our time. Ere a few weeks are over, many a critic’s pen -will be at work, reviewing their lives, and passing judgment on their -works. This is no review, or history, or criticism: only a word in -testimony of respect and regard from a man of letters, who owes to his -own professional labour the honour of becoming acquainted with these -two eminent literary men. One was the first ambassador whom the New -World of Letters sent to the Old. He was born almost with the republic; -the _pater patriæ_ had laid his hand on the child’s head. He bore -Washington’s name: he came amongst us bringing the kindest sympathy, -the most artless, smiling goodwill. His new country (which some people -here might be disposed to regard rather superciliously) could send -us, as he showed in his own person, a gentleman, who, though himself -born in no very high sphere, was most finished, polished, easy, witty, -quiet; and, socially, the equal of the most refined Europeans. If -Irving’s welcome in England was a kind one, was it not also gratefully -remembered? If he ate our salt, did he not pay us with a thankful -heart? Who can calculate the amount of friendliness and good feeling -for our country which this writer’s generous and untiring regard for -us disseminated in his own? His books are read by millions[1] of his -countrymen, whom he has taught to love England, and why to love her. -It would have been easy to speak otherwise than he did: to inflame -national rancours, which, at the time when he first became known as a -public writer, war had just renewed: to cry down the old civilization -at the expense of the new: to point out our faults, arrogance, -shortcomings, and give the republic to infer how much she was the -parent state’s superior. There are writers enough in the United -States, honest and otherwise, who preach that kind of doctrine. But the -good Irving, the peaceful, the friendly, had no place for bitterness -in his heart, and no scheme but kindness. Received in England with -extraordinary tenderness and friendship (Scott, Southey, Byron, a -hundred others have borne witness to their liking for him), he was a -messenger of goodwill and peace between his country and ours. “See, -friends!” he seems to say, “these English are not so wicked, rapacious, -callous, proud, as you have been taught to believe them. I went amongst -them a humble man; won my way by my pen; and, when known, found every -hand held out to me with kindliness and welcome. Scott is a great man, -you acknowledge. Did not Scott’s king of England give a gold medal to -him, and another to me, your countryman, and a stranger?” - -Tradition in the United States still fondly retains the history of the -feasts and rejoicings which awaited Irving on his return to his native -country from Europe. He had a national welcome; he stammered in his -speeches, hid himself in confusion, and the people loved him all the -better. He had worthily represented America in Europe. In that young -community a man who brings home with him abundant European testimonials -is still treated with respect (I have found American writers of -wide-world reputation, strangely solicitous about the opinions of quite -obscure British critics, and elated or depressed by their judgments); -and Irving went home medalled by the king, diplomatized by the -university, crowned, and honoured and admired. He had not in any way -intrigued for his honours, he had fairly won them; and, in Irving’s -instance, as in others, the old country was glad and eager to pay them. - -In America the love and regard for Irving was a national sentiment. -Party wars are perpetually raging there, and are carried on by the -press with a rancour and fierceness against individuals which exceed -British, almost Irish, virulence. It seemed to me, during a year’s -travel in the country, as if no one ever aimed a blow at Irving. All -men held their hand from that harmless, friendly peacemaker. I had -the good fortune to see him at New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and -Washington,[2] and remarked how in every place he was honoured and -welcome. Every large city has its “Irving House.” The country takes -pride in the fame of its men of letters. The gate of his own charming -little domain on the beautiful Hudson River was for ever swinging -before visitors who came to him. He shut out no one.[3] I had seen many -pictures of his house, and read descriptions of it, in both of which -it was treated with a not unusual American exaggeration. It was but a -pretty little cabin of a place; the gentleman of the press who took -notes of the place, whilst his kind old host was sleeping, might have -visited the whole house in a couple of minutes. - -And how came it that this house was so small, when Mr. Irving’s books -were sold by hundreds of thousands, nay, millions, when his profits -were known to be large, and the habits of life of the good old bachelor -were notoriously modest and simple? He had loved once in his life. The -lady he loved died; and he, whom all the world loved, never sought to -replace her. I can’t say how much the thought of that fidelity has -touched me. Does not the very cheerfulness of his after life add to the -pathos of that untold story? To grieve always was not in his nature; -or, when he had his sorrow, to bring all the world in to condole with -him and bemoan it. Deep and quiet he lays the love of his heart, and -buries it; and grass and flowers grow over the scarred ground in due -time. - -Irving had such a small house and such narrow rooms, because there was -a great number of people to occupy them. He could only afford to keep -one old horse (which, lazy and aged as it was, managed once or twice -to run away with that careless old horseman). He could only afford to -give plain sherry to that amiable British paragraph-monger from New -York, who saw the patriarch asleep over his modest, blameless cup, and -fetched the public into his private chamber to look at him. Irving -could only live very modestly, because the wifeless, childless man had -a number of children to whom he was as a father. He had as many as nine -nieces, I am told--I saw two of these ladies at his house--with all of -whom the dear old man had shared the produce of his labour and genius. - -“_Be a good man, my dear._” One can’t but think of these last words -of the veteran Chief of Letters, who had tasted and tested the value -of worldly success, admiration, prosperity. Was Irving not good, and, -of his works, was not his life the best part? In his family, gentle, -generous, good-humoured, affectionate, self-denying: in society, a -delightful example of complete gentlemanhood; quite unspoiled by -prosperity; never obsequious to the great (or, worse still, to the -base and mean, as some public men are forced to be in his and other -countries); eager to acknowledge every contemporary’s merit; always -kind and affable with the young members of his calling; in his -professional bargains and mercantile dealings delicately honest and -grateful; one of the most charming masters of our lighter language; the -constant friend to us and our nation; to men of letters doubly dear, -not for his wit and genius merely, but as an exemplar of goodness, -probity, and pure life:--I don’t know what sort of testimonial will -be raised to him in his own country, where generous and enthusiastic -acknowledgment of American merit is never wanting: but Irving was in -our service as well as theirs; and as they have placed a stone at -Greenwich yonder in memory of that gallant young Bellot, who shared -the perils and fate of some of our Arctic seamen, I would like to hear -of some memorial raised by English writers and friends of letters in -affectionate remembrance of the dear and good Washington Irving. - -As for the other writer, whose departure many friends, some few most -dearly-loved relatives, and multitudes of admiring readers deplore, our -republic has already decreed his statue, and he must have known that he -had earned this posthumous honour. He is not a poet and man of letters -merely, but citizen, statesman, a great British worthy. Almost from the -first moment when he appears, amongst boys, amongst college students, -amongst men, he is marked, and takes rank as a great Englishman. All -sorts of successes are easy to him: as a lad he goes down into the -arena with others, and wins all the prizes to which he has a mind. A -place in the senate is straightway offered to the young man. He takes -his seat there; he speaks, when so minded, without party anger or -intrigue, but not without party faith and a sort of heroic enthusiasm -for his cause. Still he is poet and philosopher even more than orator. -That he may have leisure and means to pursue his darling studies, he -absents himself for a while, and accepts a richly-remunerated post -in the East. As learned a man may live in a cottage or a college -common-room; but it always seemed to me that ample means and recognized -rank were Macaulay’s as of right. Years ago there was a wretched outcry -raised because Mr. Macaulay dated a letter from Windsor Castle, where -he was staying. Immortal gods! Was this man not a fit guest for any -palace in the world? or a fit companion for any man or woman in it? I -daresay, after Austerlitz, the old K. K. court officials and footmen -sneered at Napoleon for dating from Schönbrunn. But that miserable -“Windsor Castle” outcry is an echo out of fast-retreating old-world -remembrances. The place of such a natural chief was amongst the first -of the land; and that country is best, according to our British notion, -at least, where the man of eminence has the best chance of investing -his genius and intellect. - -If a company of giants were got together, very likely one or two of -the mere six-feet-six people might be angry at the incontestable -superiority of the very tallest of the party: and so I have heard some -London wits, rather peevish at Macaulay’s superiority, complain that he -occupied too much of the talk, and so forth. Now that wonderful tongue -is to speak no more, will not many a man grieve that he no longer has -the chance to listen? To remember the talk is to wonder: to think not -only of the treasures he had in his memory, but of the trifles he had -stored there, and could produce with equal readiness. Almost on the -last day I had the fortune to see him, a conversation happened suddenly -to spring up about senior wranglers, and what they had done in after -life. To the almost terror of the persons present, Macaulay began with -the senior wrangler of 1801–2–3–4, and so on, giving the name of each, -and relating his subsequent career and rise. Every man who has known -him has his story regarding that astonishing memory. It may be he was -not ill-pleased that you should recognize it; but to those prodigious -intellectual feats, which were so easy to him, who would grudge his -tribute of homage? His talk was, in a word, admirable, and we admired -it. - -Of the notices which have appeared regarding Lord Macaulay, up to -the day when the present lines are written (the 9th of January), the -reader should not deny himself the pleasure of looking especially at -two. It is a good sign of the times when such articles as these (I -mean the articles in _The Times_ and _Saturday Review_) appear in our -public prints about our public men. They educate us, as it were, to -admire rightly. An uninstructed person in a museum or at a concert may -pass by without recognizing a picture or a passage of music, which -the connoisseur by his side may show him is a masterpiece of harmony, -or a wonder of artistic skill. After reading these papers you like -and respect more the person you have admired so much already. And so -with regard to Macaulay’s style there may be faults of course--what -critic can’t point them out? But for the nonce we are not talking about -faults: we want to say _nil nisi bonum_. Well--take at hazard any three -pages of the _Essays_ or _History_;--and, glimmering below the stream -of the narrative, as it were, you, an average reader, see one, two, -three, a half-score of allusions to other historic facts, characters, -literature, poetry, with which you are acquainted. Why is this epithet -used? Whence is that simile drawn? How does he manage, in two or -three words, to paint an individual, or to indicate a landscape? Your -neighbour, who has _his_ reading, and his little stock of literature -stowed away in his mind, shall detect more points, allusions, happy -touches, indicating not only the prodigious memory and vast learning of -this master, but the wonderful industry, the honest, humble previous -toil of this great scholar. He reads twenty books to write a sentence; -he travels a hundred miles to make a line of description. - -Many Londoners--not all--have seen the British Museum Library. I speak -_à cœur ouvert_, and pray the kindly reader to bear with me. I have -seen all sorts of domes of Peters and Pauls, Sophia, Pantheon,--what -not?--and have been struck by none of them so much as by that catholic -dome in Bloomsbury, under which our million volumes are housed. What -peace, what love, what truth, what beauty, what happiness for all, what -generous kindness for you and me, are here spread out! It seems to me -one cannot sit down in that place without a heart full of grateful -reverence. I own to have said my grace at the table, and to have -thanked heaven for this my English birthright, freely to partake of -these bountiful books, and to speak the truth I find there. Under the -dome which held Macaulay’s brain, and from which his solemn eyes looked -out on the world but a fortnight since, what a vast, brilliant, and -wonderful store of learning was ranged! what strange lore would he not -fetch for you at your bidding! A volume of law, or history, a book of -poetry familiar or forgotten (except by himself who forgot nothing), -a novel ever so old, and he had it at hand. I spoke to him once about -_Clarissa_. “Not read _Clarissa_!” he cried out. “If you have once -thoroughly entered on _Clarissa_, and are infected by it, you can’t -leave it. When I was in India, I passed one hot season at the hills, -and there were the governor-general, and the secretary of government, -and the commander-in chief, and their wives. I had _Clarissa_ with -me: and, as soon as they began to read, the whole station was in a -passion of excitement about Miss Harlowe and her misfortunes, and her -scoundrelly Lovelace! The governor’s wife seized the book, and the -secretary waited for it, and the chief justice could not read it for -tears!” He acted the whole scene: he paced up and down the Athenæum -library: I daresay he could have spoken pages of the book--of that -book, and of what countless piles of others! - -In this little paper let us keep to the text of _nil nisi bonum_. One -paper I have read regarding Lord Macaulay says “he had no heart.” -Why, a man’s books may not always speak the truth, but they speak -his mind in spite of himself: and it seems to me this man’s heart is -beating through every page he penned. He is always in a storm of revolt -and indignation against wrong, craft, tyranny. How he cheers heroic -resistance; how he backs and applauds freedom struggling for its own; -how he hates scoundrels, ever so victorious and successful; how he -recognizes genius, though selfish villains possess it! The critic who -says Macaulay had no heart, might say that Johnson had none: and two -men more generous, and more loving, and more hating, and more partial, -and more noble, do not live in our history. - -The writer who said that Lord Macaulay had no heart could not know him. -Press writers should read a man well, and all over, and again; and -hesitate, at least, before they speak of those αἰδοἴα. Those -who knew Lord Macaulay knew how admirably tender, and generous,[4] and -affectionate he was. It was not his business to bring his family before -the theatre footlights, and call for bouquets from the gallery as he -wept over them. - -If any young man of letters reads this little sermon--and to him, -indeed, it is addressed--I would say to him, “Bear Scott’s words in -your mind, and ‘_be good, my dear_.’” Here are two literary men gone -to their account, and, _laus Deo_, as far as we know, it is fair, and -open, and clean. Here is no need of apologies for shortcomings, or -explanations of vices which would have been virtues but for unavoidable -&c. Here are two examples of men most differently gifted: each pursuing -his calling; each speaking his truth as God bade him; each honest in -his life; just and irreproachable in his dealings; dear to his friends; -honoured by his country; beloved at his fireside. It has been the -fortunate lot of both to give uncountable happiness and delight to the -world, which thanks them in return with an immense kindliness, respect, -affection. It may not be our chance, brother scribe, to be endowed -with such merit, or rewarded with such fame. But the rewards of these -men are rewards paid to _our service_. We may not win the baton or -epaulettes; but God give us strength to guard the honour of the flag! - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1] See his _Life_ in the most remarkable _Dictionary of Authors_, -published lately at Philadelphia, by Mr. Alibone. - -[2] At Washington, Mr. Irving came to a lecture given by the writer, -which Mr. Filmore and General Pierce, the president and president -elect, were also kind enough to attend together. “Two Kings of -Brentford smelling at one rose,” says Irving, looking up with his -good-humoured smile. - -[3] Mr. Irving described to me, with that humour and good humour which -he always kept, how, amongst other visitors, a member of the British -press who had carried his distinguished pen to America (where he -employed it in vilifying his own country) came to Sunnyside, introduced -himself to Irving, partook of his wine and luncheon, and in two days -described Mr. Irving, his house, his nieces, his meal, and his manner -of dozing afterwards, in a New York paper. On another occasion, -Irving said, laughing: “Two persons came to me, and one held me in -conversation whilst the other miscreant took my portrait!” - -[4] Since the above was written, I have been informed that it has been -found, on examining Lord Macaulay’s papers, that he was in the habit of -giving away _more than a fourth part_ of his annual income. - - - - -Invasion Panics. - - -When, about the year 1899, Field-marshal Dowbiggin, full of years and -honours, shall edit, with copious notes, the Private Correspondence -of his kinsman, Queen Victoria’s celebrated War Minister during -England’s bloody struggle with Russia in 1854–5, the grandchildren of -the present generation may probably learn a good deal more respecting -the real causes of the failures and shortcomings of that “horrible and -heartrending” period than we, their grandfathers, are likely to know on -this side our graves. - -And when some future Earl of Pembroke shall devote his splendid -leisure, under the cedar groves of Wilton, to preparing for the -information of the twentieth century the memoirs of his great -ancestor, Mr. Secretary Herbert, posterity will then run some chance -of discovering--what is kept a close secret from the public just -now--whether any domestic causes exist to justify the invasion-panic -under which the nation has recently been shivering. - -The insular position of England, her lofty cliffs, her stormy seas, her -winter fogs, fortify her with everlasting fortifications, as no other -European power is fortified. She is rich, she is populous, she contains -within herself an abundance of coal, iron, timber, and almost all other -munitions of war; railways intersect and encircle her on all sides; in -patriotism, in loyalty, in manliness, in intelligence, her sons yield -to no other race of men. Blest with all these advantages, she ought, -of all the nations of Europe, to be the last to fear, the readiest to -repel invasion; yet, strange to say, of all the nations of Europe, -England appears to apprehend invasion most! - -There must be some good and sufficient reason for this extraordinary -state of things. Many reasons are daily assigned for it, all differing -from each other, all in turn disputed and denied by those who know the -real reason best. - -The statesman and the soldier declare that the fault lies with -parliament and the people. They complain that parliament is niggardly -in placing sufficient means at the disposal of the executive, and -that the people are distrustful and over-inquisitive as to their -application; ever too ready to attribute evil motives and incapacity -to those set in authority over them. Parliament and the people, on -the other hand, reply, that ample means are yearly allotted for the -defence of the country, and that more would readily be forthcoming, -had they reason to suppose that what has already been spent, has been -well spent; their Humes and their Brights loudly and harshly denounce -the nepotism, the incapacity, and the greed, which, according to them, -disgrace the governing classes, and waste and weaken the resources of -the land. And so the painful squabble ferments--no probable end to it -being in view. Indeed, the public are permitted to know so little of -the conduct of their most important affairs--silence is so strictly -enjoined to the men at the helm--that the most carefully prepared -indictment against an official delinquent is invariably evaded by the -introduction of some new feature into his case, hitherto unknown to any -but his brother officials, which at once casts upon the assailant the -stigma of having arraigned a public servant on incomplete information, -and puts him out of court. - -But if, in this the year of our Lord 1860, we have no means of -discovering why millions of strong, brave, well-armed Englishmen should -be so moved at the prospect of a possible attack from twenty or thirty -thousand French, we have recently been placed in possession of the -means of ascertaining why, some sixty years ago, this powerful nation -was afflicted with a similar fit of timidity. - -The first American war had then just ended--not gloriously for the -British arms. Lord Amherst, the commander-in-chief at home, had been -compelled by his age and infirmities to retire from office, having, it -was said, been indulgently permitted by his royal master to retain it -longer than had been good for the credit and discipline of the service. -The Duke of York, an enthusiastic and practical soldier, in the prime -of life, fresh from an active command in Flanders, had succeeded him. -In that day there were few open-mouthed and vulgar demagogues to carp -at the public expenditure and to revile the privileged classes; and the -few that there were had a very bad time of it. Public money was sown -broadcast, both at home and abroad, with a reckless hand; regulars, -militia, yeomanry, and volunteers, fearfully and wonderfully attired, -bristled in thousands wherever a landing was conceived possible; and, -best of all, that noble school of Great British seamen, which had -reared us a Nelson, had reared us many other valiant guardians of our -shores scarcely less worthy than he. But in spite of her Yorks and her -Nelsons, England felt uneasy and unsafe. Confident in her navy, she -had little confidence in her army, which at that time was entirely -and absolutely in the hands and under the management of the court; -parliament and the people being only permitted to pay for it. - -Yet the royal commander-in-chief was declared by the general officers -most in favour at court to know his business well, and to be carrying -vigorously into effect the necessary reforms suggested by our American -mishaps; his personal acquaintance with the officers of the army was -said to have enabled him to form his military family of the most -capable men in the service;[5] his exalted position, and his enormous -income, were supposed to place him above the temptation of jobbing: -in short, the Duke of York was universally held up to the nation by -his military friends--and a royal commander-in-chief has many and warm -military friends--as the regenerator of the British army, which just -then happened to be sadly in need of regeneration. - -A work has recently been published which tells us very plainly now -many things which it would have been treasonable even to suspect sixty -years ago. It is entitled _The Cornwallis Correspondence_, and contains -the private papers and letters of the first Marquis Cornwallis, one of -the foremost Englishmen of his time. Bred a soldier, he served with -distinction in Germany and in America. He then proceeded to India in -the double capacity of governor-general and commander-in-chief. On -his return from that service he filled for some years the post of -master-general of the Ordnance, refused a seat in the Cabinet, offered -him by Mr. Pitt; and, although again named governor-general of India, -on the breaking out of the Irish rebellion of 1798 was hurried to -Dublin as lord-lieutenant and commander-in-chief. He was subsequently -employed to negotiate the peace of Amiens, and, in 1805, died at -Ghazeepore, in India, having been appointed its governor-general for -the third time. - -From the correspondence of this distinguished statesman and soldier, -we may now ascertain whether, sixty years ago, the people of England -had or had not good grounds for dreading invasion by the French, and -whether the governing classes or the governed were most in fault on -that occasion for the doubtful condition of their native land. - -George the Third was verging upon insanity. So detested and despised -was the Prince of Wales, his successor, that those who directed his -Majesty’s councils, as well as the people at large, clung eagerly to -the hopes of the king’s welfare; trusting that the evil days of a -regency might be postponed. And it would seem from the _Cornwallis -Correspondence_, that the English were just in their estimation of -that bad man. H. R. H. having quarrelled shamefully with his parents, -and with Pitt, had thrown himself into the hands of the Opposition, -and appears to have corresponded occasionally with Cornwallis, who -had two votes at his command in the Commons, during that nobleman’s -first Indian administration. In 1790, Lord Cornwallis, writing to his -brother, the Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, says: “You tell me that -I am accused of being remiss in my correspondence with a certain great -personage. Nothing can be more false, for I have answered every letter -from him by the first ship that sailed from hence after I received it. -The style of them, although personally kind to excess, has not been -very agreeable to me, as they have always pressed upon me some infamous -and unjustifiable job, which I have uniformly been obliged to refuse, -and contained much gross and false abuse of Mr. Pitt, and improper -charges against other and greater personages, about whom, to me at -least, he ought to be silent.”[6] - -The intimacy which had existed from boyhood between General Richard -Grenville, military tutor to the Duke of York, and Lord Cornwallis, -and the correspondence which took place between them, to which we have -now access, afford ample means of judging of the real capacity of that -royal soldier, to whose charge the military destinies of England, both -at home and abroad, were intrusted by the king at such a critical -moment. - -At seventeen years of age the duke became, _per saltum_, as the -usage is with royal personages, a colonel in the British army. After -attending for two or three years the great Prussian reviews, by way -of studying his profession, he was, on attaining his majority, raised -to the rank of general, and appointed colonel of the Coldstream -Guards. Various notices of H. R. H. are to be found in the numerous -confidential letters which passed about that time between Cornwallis -and Grenville. They were both warmly attached to him; both most anxious -for his own sake, and for that of their profession, that he should turn -out well. - -They describe H. R. H. as brave, good-humoured, and weak; utterly -destitute of military talent, incapable of attending to business, much -given to drink, and more to dice, hopelessly insolvent, and steeped in -debauchery and extravagance of all kinds. In 1790, Grenville writes to -Cornwallis in India: “The conduct of a certain great personage, who has -so cruelly disappointed both you and myself, still continues to give me -great uneasiness; more especially as I see no hopes of amendment.” The -duke was at that date twenty-seven years of age. - -In 1791, the Duke of York married, and but two years afterwards -Lord Cornwallis, on his return from India, actually found his -friend Grenville’s unpromising pupil in Flanders, at the head of a -considerable English force, acting in conjunction with the Austrians, -Russians, and Dutch, against the French. His utter want of military -talent, his inexperience, his idleness, and his vices had not prevented -his being intrusted by his royal parent with the lives of a large body -of brave men, and with the honour of England. Great difficulties soon -arose in this allied army, its chiefs mutually accusing each other, -possibly not without good reason, of incapacity. At last, a person, -whose name is not even now divulged, but who possessed the entire -confidence of both Pitt and Cornwallis, wrote as follows, from the -British head-quarters at Arnheim, on the 11th Nov. 1794:-- - -“We are really come to such a critical situation, that unless some -decided, determined, and immediate steps are taken, God knows what may -happen. Despised by our enemies, without discipline, confidence, or -exertion among ourselves, hated and more dreaded than the enemy, even -by the well-disposed inhabitants of the country, every disgrace and -misfortune is to be expected. You must thoroughly feel how painful -it must be to acknowledge this even to your lordship, but no honest -man who has any regard for his country can avoid seeing it. Whatever -measures are adopted at home, either removing us from the continent -or remaining, something must be done to restore discipline, and the -confidence that always attends it. The sortie from Nimeguen, on the -4th, was made entirely by the British, and executed with their usual -spirit; they ran into the French without firing a single shot, and, -consequently, lost very few men,--their loss was when they afterwards -were ordered to retire. Yet from what I have mentioned in the first -part of my letter, I assure you I dread the thought of these troops -being attacked or harassed in retreat.”[7] - -Upon the receipt of this grave intelligence, Mr. Pitt at once -communicated to the king the absolute necessity of the duke’s -immediate recall. His Majesty had no choice but to consent, which he -reluctantly did; and H. R. H. returned home, was immediately created a -field-marshal, and placed in command of all the forces of the United -Kingdom! - -Lord Cornwallis’s bitter remark upon this astounding appointment -is--“Whether we shall get any good by this, God only knows; but I think -things cannot change for the worse at the Horse Guards. If the French -land, and that they will land I am certain, I should not like to trust -the new field-marshal with the defence of Culford.”[8] - -Having thus practically ascertained, at an enormous cost of blood and -treasure, that the best-tempered and bravest general cannot command -with success a British army in the field, if he happens, as was the -case with the Duke of York, to be a weak man of high social position, -destitute of military talent and habits of business, and much addicted -to pleasure, an examination of Lord Cornwallis’s correspondence during -the next few years will show how it fared with the British army when it -was directed by such an officer at home. - -In expressing his conviction that the French were determined to invade -us, Lord Cornwallis proved a true prophet. Late in 1796, a fleet, -commanded by Admiral De Galle, sailed from Brest for Ireland, carrying -General Hoche and 15,000 men. Furious December gales dispersed the -French ships,--only a portion of the expedition reached Bantry Bay; -the vessel in which De Galle and Hoche were, was missing. Admiral -Boivet, the second in command, hesitated to disembark the troops -without the orders of his superiors. The United Irishmen, who had -promised instant co-operation, made no sign; the weather rendered -even Bantry Bay insecure; and, finally, such of the ships as escaped -wreck or capture, straggled back to France, where Hoche and De Galle, -after cruising about for many days in fog and storm on the banks of -Newfoundland, had had the good luck to arrive before them. On that -occasion, our natural defences may indeed be said to have stood us in -good stead. But it was not consolatory to those who feared invasion to -reflect that such a large force should have succeeded in reaching our -shores unperceived and unmolested by the British cruisers; and that, -had the weather been tolerable, 15,000 French bayonets would have -landed without opposition on Irish ground. - -The next year passed over in constant alarms; our information -respecting the local preparations of the French being unfortunately -very vague. The military defence of England appears to have been at -that time mainly intrusted to Sir David Dundas, an unlucky pedant -of the German school of tactics, of whom the king and court had the -highest opinion, so tightly had he dressed and so accurately had he -drilled the Guards. Lord Cornwallis, writing early in 1798 to the Hon. -Col. Wesley,[9] says:--“We are brought to the state to which I have -long since looked forward, deserted by all our allies, and in daily -expectation of invasion, for which the French are making the most -serious preparations. I have no doubt of the courage and fidelity of -our militia; but the system of David Dundas, and the total want of -light infantry, sit heavy on my mind, and point out the advantages -which the activity of the French will have in a country which is for -the most part enclosed.” - -At this juncture, the rebellion of 1798 broke out in Ireland, and at -the urgent request of Ministers, who appear to have considered Lord -Cornwallis the man for every difficulty, his lordship consented to -undertake the joint duties of lord-lieutenant and commander-in-chief -in that unhappy country, then as disturbed and disloyal as conflicting -races and religions, and the most savage misgovernment, could make it. - -His lordship’s letters to the Duke of Portland and others, from -Dublin, evince far more apprehension at the violence, cruelty, and -insubordination of the army under his command, than at the rebels who -were up in arms against him. His words are:--“The violence of our -friends, and their folly in endeavouring to make this a religious -war, added to the ferocity of our troops, who delight in murder, -most powerfully counteract all plans of conciliation.” Nevertheless -his judgment, firmness, and temper soon prevailed; by midsummer -the insurrection was suppressed with far less bloodshed than was -pleasing to the supporters of the government; and Lord Cornwallis was -endeavouring to concentrate his attention on the reorganization of -the military mob, which then, under the name of soldiers, garrisoned -Ireland against foreign and domestic foes, when the invader actually -arrived.[10] - -On the 22nd of August, three frigates under English colours anchored in -Killala Bay, co. Mayo, carrying a force of about 1,100 French troops, -commanded by General Humbert. They were the vanguard of a larger force -under General Hardy, which was to have sailed at the same time, but -which had been detained by unforeseen difficulties at Brest. - -There being no sufficient force to oppose them, the French easily -took possession of Killala, and established their head-quarters in -the palace of the bishop, Dr. Stock, who has left a most interesting -journal of what occurred whilst the French occupied the town. - -Humbert had brought with him a large supply of arms, ammunition, and -uniforms, to be distributed amongst the United Irishmen, who he had -been led to suppose would instantly rally round his standard. But he -soon discovered that he had been deceived, that he had landed in the -wrong place, and that he had arrived too late. The peasantry of Mayo, a -simple and uncivilized race, ignorant of the use of fire-arms, crowded -round the invaders as long as they had anything to give, and as long as -there was no enemy to fight; but, at the first shot, they invariably -ran away. Besides, the neck of the rebellion had been already -dislocated by the judicious vigour of Cornwallis. Had the landing -been effected earlier, and farther north, the result might have been -different; as it was, the French general found that he had a losing -game to play--and most manfully and creditably did he play it. - -Professing to wage no war against the Irish, he assured the bishop that -neither pillage nor violence should be permitted, and that his troops -should only take what was absolutely necessary for their subsistence; -and on these points, the bishop tells us, the Frenchman “religiously -kept his word;” not only controlling his own soldiers, but actually -protecting the bishop and his little Protestant flock from the rapacity -of the Irish rebels who for a time joined the invaders. - -The bishop’s account of the French soldiery is notable; they appear to -have been an under-sized and mean-looking set of men, whom Sir David -Dundas would have held in no account on parade; yet they did the work -they had to do, hopeless and fatal as it was, as well as the Duke of -York’s own gigantic regiment of guards could have done it. - -“The French,” says the bishop, “are a nation apt enough to consider -themselves as superior to any people in the world; but here, indeed, -it would have been ridiculous not to prefer the Gallic troops in -every respect before their Irish allies. Intelligence, activity, -temperance, patience to a surprising degree, appeared to be combined in -the soldiery that came over with Humbert, together with the exactest -obedience to discipline. Yet, if you except their grenadiers, they had -nothing to catch the eye: their stature for the most part was low, -their complexions pale and sallow, their clothes much the worse for -wear; to a superficial observer they would have appeared incapable of -enduring almost any hardship. These were the men, however, of whom it -was presently observed that they could be well content to live on bread -and potatoes, to drink water, to make the stones of the street their -bed, and to sleep in their clothes, with no covering but the canopy of -heaven. One half of their number had served in Italy under Buonaparte, -the rest were from the army of the Rhine, where they had suffered -distresses that well accounted for thin persons and wan looks.” - -Humbert himself, who had accompanied the Bantry Bay expedition in 1796, -had risen from the ranks, and had brought himself into notice by his -brilliant conduct in La Vendée. - -The day after landing, the French advanced towards Ballina, leaving -at Killala six officers and two hundred men to guard a quantity of -ammunition which they had no means of carrying with them. The English -garrison of Ballina fled on their approach, and Humbert, stationing -there one hundred more of his men, pushed on to Castlebar, where -General Lake was prepared to meet him. The latter had previously -ascertained, by means of a flag of truce, the exact number of the -French, and had sent a message privily to the bishop, telling him to -be of good cheer, inasmuch as the great superiority of his own numbers -would speedily enable him to give a good account of the invading force. -What did occur when the French and English met is, perhaps, best told -in the words of General Hutchinson, Lake’s second in command during the -affair. Contemporary authorities, however, prove that Hutchinson has -very much understated the numbers of the English force:-- - -“On Monday morning, 27th August, about an hour before sunrise, a -report was received from the outposts, distant about six miles, that -the enemy was advancing. The troops were immediately assembled, having -the night before received orders to be under arms two hours before -day-break. The troops and cannon were then posted on a position -previously taken, where they remained until seven o’clock. They were -1,600 or 1,700 cavalry and infantry, ten pieces of cannon and a -howitzer. The ground was very strong by nature; the French were about -700, having left 100 at Ballina and 200 at Killala. They did not land -above 1,000 rank and file. They had with them about 500 rebels, a great -proportion of whom fled after the first discharge of cannon. The French -had only two 4-pounders and from thirty to forty mounted men. - -“Nothing could exceed the misconduct of the troops, with the exception -of the artillery, which was admirably served, and of Lord Roden’s -Fencibles, who appeared at all times ready to do their duty. There -is too much reason to imagine that two of the regiments had been -previously tampered with; the hope of which disaffection induced -the French to make the attack, which was certainly one of the most -hazardous and desperate ever thought of against a very superior body of -troops, as their retreat both on Killala and Ballina was cut off by Sir -Thomas Chapman and General Taylor. - -“When the troops fell into confusion without the possibility of -rallying them, there was scarcely any danger; very few men had at that -time fallen on our part: the French, on the contrary, had suffered -considerably. They lost six officers and from 70 to 80 men, which was -great, considering how short a time the action lasted and the smallness -of their numbers. I am convinced that had our troops continued firm -for ten minutes longer, the affair must have been over to our entire -advantage, but they fired volleys without any orders at a few men -before they were within musket-shot. It was impossible to stop them, -and they abandoned their ground immediately afterwards.” - -Although the French did not attempt to pursue, the defeated army of -Lake never halted till they reached Tuam, nearly forty English miles -from the field of battle. On the evening of the same day they renewed -their flight, and retired still farther towards Athlone, where an -officer of Carabineers, with sixty of his men, arrived at one o’clock -on Tuesday, the 29th August, having achieved a retreat of above seventy -English miles in twenty-seven hours! All Lake’s artillery fell into the -hands of the French. As soon as Lord Cornwallis heard of the invasion, -conscious of the uncertain temper of the troops upon whom he had to -rely, he determined to march in person to the west, collecting, as he -came, such a force as must at once overwhelm the enemy. - -Meantime the victorious French were met on the 5th of September at -Colooney by Colonel Vereker, of the Limerick Regiment, an energetic -officer, who had hastened from Sligo to attack them with 200 infantry, -30 dragoons, and two guns. After a gallant struggle he was compelled -to retire with the loss of his guns, and the French advanced into -Leitrim, hoping to find elsewhere stouter and more helpful allies than -they had hitherto found amongst the half-starved cottiers of Mayo. - -Crawford, afterwards the celebrated leader of the light division in -Spain, rashly attacked them on the 7th of September with an inferior -force near Ballynamore, and was very roughly handled by them; but -on the 8th, Humbert, closely followed by Lake and Crawford, found -himself confronted at Ballynamuck by Cornwallis and the main army. -In this desperate situation, surrounded by upwards of 25,000 men, -Humbert coolly drew up his little force, with no other object, it -must be presumed, than to maintain the honour of the French flag. His -rearguard, again attacked by Crawford, surrendered, but the remainder -of the French continued to defend themselves for about half-an-hour -longer, and contrived to take prisoner Lord Roden and some of his -dragoons. They then, on the appearance of the main body of General -Lake’s army, laid down their arms--746 privates and 96 officers; having -lost about 200 men since their landing at Killala, on the 22nd of -August. - -The loss of the British at the battle of Ballynamuck was officially -stated at three killed, and thirteen wounded. Their losses at Castlebar -and elsewhere were never communicated to the public. - -Plowden, who gives a detailed account of Humbert’s invasion in his -_Historical Review of the State of Ireland_, published but five -years after the event, observes:--“It must ever remain a humiliating -reflection upon the power and lustre of the British arms that so -pitiful a detachment as that of 1,100 French infantry should, in a -kingdom in which there was an armed force of above 150,000 men, have -not only put to rout a select army of 6,000 men prepared to receive the -invaders, but also provided themselves with ordnance and ammunition -from our stores, taken several of our towns, marched 122 Irish (above -150 English) miles through the country, and kept arms in their -victorious hands for seventeen days in the heart of an armed kingdom. -But it was this English army which the gallant and uncompromising -Abercromby had, on the 26th of the preceding February, found ‘in such a -state of licentiousness as must render it formidable to every one but -the enemy.’” - -Although the private letters of Lord Cornwallis, General Lake and -Captain Herbert Taylor, which are now submitted to us, breathe nothing -but indignation and disgust at the misconduct, insubordination, and -cruelty of their panic-stricken troops, the public despatches, as the -custom is, contain unalloyed praise. - -A lengthy despatch penned by General Lake, on the evening of the -surrender of Humbert’s little band, is worded almost as emphatically -as Wellington’s despatch after Waterloo; about thirty officers are -especially mentioned in it by name, and the conduct of the cavalry is -sub-sarcastically described as having been “highly conspicuous.” Lord -Cornwallis’s general order, too, dated on the following day, declares -“that he cannot too much applaud the zeal and spirit which has been -manifested by the army from the commencement of the operations against -the invading enemy until the surrender of the French forces.” Such is -too often the real value of official praise. - -Notwithstanding this public testimony to the worth of the large army -which surrounded and captured the handful of French invaders of 1798, -the information which we now glean from _The Cornwallis Correspondence_ -serves but little to establish the Duke of York’s character as a -successful military administrator, if a commander-in-chief is to be -judged of by the effective state of the officers and troops under his -direction. - -Tired of the parade-ground and the desk, or, possibly, feeling that -he did not shine at them, H. R. H. again tried his hand at active -campaigning in 1799, and again failed. On the 9th of September of that -year he once more sailed for Holland, and was actually permitted to -assume the direction of the most considerable expedition that ever left -the British shores. In conjunction with Russia, its object was to expel -the French from Holland. After several bloody battles, fought with -doubtful success, the duke found himself, in less than five weeks, so -situated as to render it advisable for him to treat with the enemy. He -proposed that the French should allow the allied army under his command -to re-embark, threatening to destroy the dykes and ruin the surrounding -country if his proposal was not entertained. After some discussion -the French agreed to the re-embarkation of the allies, provided they -departed before the 1st of November, left behind them all the artillery -they had taken, and restored 8,000 French and Batavian prisoners who -had been captured on former occasions. On these terms “a British king’s -son, commanding 41,000 men, capitulated to a French general who had -only 30,000,”[11] and the duke, fortunately for England, sheathed his -sword, to draw it no more on the field of battle. - -Lord Cornwallis writes on the 24th October: “By private letters which -I have seen from Holland, our troops in general seem to have been -in the greatest confusion, and on many occasions to have behaved -exceedingly ill. There may be some exception in the corps belonging -to Abercromby’s division. Considering the hasty manner in which they -were thrown together, and the officers by whom they were commanded, I -am not surprised at this. Would to God they were all on board! I dread -the retreat and embarkation. David Dundas will never be like Cæsar, -the favourite of fortune; hitherto, at least, that fickle goddess has -set her face very steadily against him.” “I see no prospect of any -essential improvement in our military system, for I am afraid that a -buttoned coat, a heavy hat and feather, and a cursed sash tied round -our waist will not lead the way to victory.” - -The abortive expeditions against Ostend and Ferrol, which had -terminated in the capture and disgrace of the troops employed in them, -appear to have induced Lord Cornwallis to draw up a memorandum on the -subject, and to submit it to the duke. The following is an extract from -it:-- - -“I admit that while we are at war, and have the means of acting, we -should not remain entirely on the defensive, but at the same time I -would not go lightly in quest of adventures, with regiments raised -with extreme difficulty, without means of recruiting, and commanded -principally by officers without experience or knowledge of their -profession. The expense, likewise, of expeditions is enormous, and the -disgrace attending upon ill success is not likely to promote that most -desirable object--a good peace.” - -After the re-embarkation of the Ferrol expedition, he writes: “The -prospect of public affairs is most gloomy. What a disgraceful and what -an expensive campaign have we made! Twenty-two thousand men, a large -proportion not soldiers, floating round the greater part of Europe the -scorn and laughing-stock of friends and foes.” - -In the spring of 1801, Lord Cornwallis, replaced in Ireland by Lord -Hardwicke and Sir W. Medows, assumed the command of the eastern -district in England--invasion appearing imminent. His letters to his -friend Ross at this period are most desponding. Our best troops were -abroad upon expeditions. One barren success in Egypt, with which -ministers attempted to gild half-a-dozen failures, had cost us the -gallant Abercromby. The defence of the country was intrusted to the -militia. The Duke of York had actually proposed to introduce a Russian -force to coerce and civilize Ireland, and would have done so had not -the better sense and feeling of Cornwallis prevailed. “My disgrace -must be certain,” writes he to Ross, “should the enemy land. What -could I hope, with eight weak regiments of militia, making about 2,800 -firelocks, and two regiments of dragoons?”... “In our wooden walls -alone must we place our trust; we should make a sad business of it on -shore.”... “If it is really intended that ---- should defend Kent and -Sussex, it is of very little consequence what army you place under -his command.”... “God send that we may have no occasion to decide -the matter on shore, where I have too much reason to apprehend that -the contest must terminate in the disgrace of the general and the -destruction of the country.”... “I confess that I see no prospect of -peace, or of anything good. We shall prepare for the land defence of -England by much wild and capricious expenditure of money, and if the -enemy should ever elude the vigilance of our wooden walls, we shall -after all make a bad figure.”[12] - -Bad as matters had been at the time of Humbert’s invasion, it is clear -that Lord Cornwallis believed our military affairs to be in a much -worse condition in 1801. - -In Ireland, in 1798, he had under him a few officers on whom he could -depend, and although his army, thanks to Lord Amherst and the Duke of -York, was in a deplorable state of discipline, he, a good and practised -general, was at its head, to make the best of it. - -The Duke of Wellington has since taught us, on more than one occasion, -that there are some extraordinary workmen who can do good work with -any tools, and who can even make their own tools as they require -them.--But in England, in 1801, the military workmen in court employ -were all so execrably bad, that it mattered little what was the quality -of the tools supplied to them. The Duke of York, David Dundas, and -Lord Chatham had everything their own way: the most important posts, -the most costly expeditions, were intrusted, not to the officers most -formidable to the enemy, but to the friends and _protégés_ of the -military courtiers who stood best at Windsor and St. James’s. It is no -small proof of Cornwallis’s tact in judging of men, that whilst we find -him deprecating the employment in independent commands of such generals -as the Dukes of Gloucester and Cumberland, Dundas, Burrard (of Cintra), -Coote (of Ostend), Pulteney (of Ferrol), Whitelock (of Buenos Ayres), -and Lord Chatham (of Walcheren), he had always a word of approval for -Lake and Abercromby, and in an introductory letter to Sir John Shore, -speaks of the lieutenant-colonel of his own regiment, the Hon. Arthur -Wesley, as a “sensible man and a good officer.” - -Throughout the whole of _The Cornwallis Correspondence_, there is no -single hint of stinted means for the defence of the country, there is -no single doubt cast upon the personal bravery of our officers and our -men; but there are many out-spoken complaints of utter incompetence and -reckless extravagance on the part of those who had the chief conduct -of our military affairs. From 1795 to 1805--that time of fear--we have -now incontrovertible testimony that both England and Ireland were in -an indefensible condition, had an invader landed with a very moderate -body of such soldiers as Humbert led; and that that condition was owing -in no degree to any want of manliness or liberality on the part of the -British nation, but solely and entirely to the want of capacity of -the men whom it pleased the court, in spite of repeated disgrace and -defeat, perversely to maintain in the management and command of the -army.[13] - -Mr. Pitt survived Lord Cornwallis but a few months, dying early in -1806, and Lord Grenville, when invited by George III. to succeed -him, positively declined to do so, unless the army was placed under -ministerial control. To this innovation the poor crazy king demurred. -It had been an amusement and an occupation to him in his lucid -intervals, “to transact military business with Frederick,” with what -deplorable results to the resources and credit of the nation we now -know.[14] His Majesty objected, that ever since the time of the first -Duke of Cumberland, the army had been considered as under the exclusive -control of the sovereign, without any right of interference on the -part of his ministers, save in matters relating to levying, clothing, -feeding, and paying it; and he expressed a strong disinclination to -make any concession which should fetter himself, and the Duke of York, -in doing as they pleased with their own. - -Lord Grenville, however, remained firm; for, in the opinion of himself -and his friends, the safety of the kingdom required that he should be -so, and, ultimately, the king gave way, on condition that no changes -should be carried into effect at the Horse Guards without his knowledge -and approval. - -But other and more complaisant advisers soon replaced Lord Grenville, -and circumstances, entirely corroborative of the estimate which -Grenville and Cornwallis had formed of his character, rendered it -advisable that the Duke of York should retire from public life.[15] Sir -David Dundas, notoriously one of the most incapable and unfit general -officers in the service, was selected by the court as H. R. H.’s -successor; and, about two years afterwards, George III. finally -disappeared from the scene, and the Regency commenced.[16] Then the -duke, in spite of all that had transpired, was instantly recalled by -his royal brother to Whitehall, where he remained until his death. -The Regent was not the man to waive one iota of what he held to be -his prerogative. During his reign, the right of the Crown to the -irresponsible direction of the British army was fully asserted; and, in -spite of five years of almost unvaried success in the Peninsula, and of -the crowning glory of Waterloo, a fantastically dressed, luxurious, and -unpopular body it became under the royal auspices. To the present day, -regimental officers, fond of their glass, bless his Majesty for what -is called “the Prince Regent’s allowance,” a boon which daily ensures -to them a cheap after-dinner bottle of wine, at a cost to their more -abstemious brother officers, and to taxpayers in general, of 27,000_l._ -a year. - -Happily for the present generation, matters have changed since those -corrupt times, in many--many respects for the better. The British army -is no longer looked upon by the people as a costly and not very useful -toy, chiefly maintained for the diversion of royalty; we now recognize -and respect in it an important national engine, for the proper -condition and conduct of which--as for that of the navy--a Secretary -of State is directly responsible to Parliament. But a change of such -magnitude has not been carried out without much peevish remonstrance -and factious opposition on the part of the many whose patronage it has -diminished, and whose power it has curtailed; and there are still not a -few who offer what opposition they dare to its harmonious consummation. - -It is to be feared that a slight leaven of the same spirit which, sixty -years ago, wasted the resources and paralyzed the energies of this -powerful nation, may, perchance, still linger around the precincts of -Whitehall and St. James’s,--and it is not impossible that when the -SMITH AND ELDER of the twentieth century present to the public their -first editions of the _Panmure Papers_ and the _Herbert Memoirs_, -facts, bearing on the disasters of the Crimean war, and on the invasion -panic of 1859–60, may for the first time be made known--not entirely -different from those with which we have recently become acquainted -through _The Cornwallis Correspondence_. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[5] “The duke has very unwisely taken over three or four boys of the -Guards as his aides-de-camp: which will be of great disservice to him, -and can be of no use to them.”--_Lord Cornwallis to Lt.-Col. Ross, -1784._ - -[6] Three or four of the Prince of Wales’s letters are given at length. -They all prove “the first gentleman and scholar of his day” to have -been a very illiterate and unscrupulous jobber. In one of them he -proposed to the Governor-General to displace “a black, named Alii -Cann,” who was chief criminal judge of Benares, in order that a youth, -named Pellegrine Treves, the son of a notorious London money-lender, -might be appointed to that office. - -Lord Cornwallis replied, that Ali Ibrahim Khan, though a native, was -one of the most able and respected public servants in India, and -that it would be a most difficult and unpopular step to remove him; -and that even if his post were vacant, the youth and inexperience of -the money-lender’s son rendered him utterly ineligible for such an -important trust. One of the causes of complaint which H. R. H. urged -against his royal parent was, that he, also, was not intrusted with -high military command. - -[7] The sufferings of the British soldiers in Holland, in 1794–5, -from the incompetence and negligence of their superior officers, and -the waste of public money from the same causes, have scarcely been -exceeded during the Crimean war. In Lord Malmesbury’s Diary we find the -following entry on the 7th Dec. 1793: “Lord Herbert came to see me. -Complained much of the insubordination of the army; that it was greater -than could be believed, and that the Guards were so beyond measure. -Condemned the conduct of Gage, who had resigned on being refused leave -of absence.” On the 16th of Feb. 1794, the Duke of Portland writes to -Lord Malmesbury: “The Duke of York will return to the army the latter -end of next week. But I cannot help saying that unless the licentious, -not to say mutinous, spirit which prevails among our troops, and which -originated in, I am sorry to say, and is cultivated by the Guards, is -not subdued and extinguished, there is an end of the army.” - -[8] His lordship’s country seat. - -[9] The Duke. - -[10] The following letter, addressed by a subaltern to his commanding -officer, is given by the editor of the _Cornwallis Papers_, as a -specimen of the habits, education and discipline of the British army -about the year 1800:-- - - “_To Lieut.-Col. ----, -- Foot._ - - “SIR,--I _believe_ (I am a member of the ---- mess), if so, I - will take the liberty to submit the following argument, viz., - every gentleman under the immediate propensity of liquor has - different propensities; to prove which, I have only to mention - the present instance with respect to myself and Lieut. ----. _My_ - propensity is noise and riot--_his_ sleep. - - “I ever conceived that in a public mess-room, three things were - certain: first, that it was open to every officer who chose to - pay the subscription; second, that he might indulge himself with - liquor as much as he pleased; and third, that if a gentleman and - a member of the mess chose to get intoxicated in the mess-room, - that no other officer (however high his rank in the regiment) - had a right, or dare order to restrain (not being president) his - _momentary propensity_ in the mess-room. - - “As such, and this being the case, I must inform you that you - have acted in a most unprecedented and unknown (not to say - ungentlemanlike) way, in presuming to enter the mess-room as a - commanding officer, and to bring a sentry at your back (which you - asserted you had) to turn out the amusement (a hand organ) of - the company (a stranger being present), and thereby prevent the - harmony which it is supposed ought to exist in a mess-room. - - “I appeal to you as a gentleman, and if you will answer this - letter _as such_, you at all times know how to direct to - - “---- ----, - “_Lieut. ----, -- Foot_.” - - - - -[11] Mr. Tierney’s speech in the House of Commons. - -[12] Lieut.-Col. Gordon (Sir Willoughby), Military Secretary to the -Duke of York, speaks of Lord Cornwallis as “an officer whose estimation -in the army could not be exceeded.”--_Lieut.-Col. Gordon to Sir A. -Wellesley, 1807._ - -[13] “The staff in Kent seems to be calculated solely for the purpose -of placing the defence of the country in the hands of Sir D. Dundas. -However he may succeed with other people, I think he cannot persuade -Mr. Pitt and Lord Melville that he is a clever fellow; and surely they -must have too much sense to believe that it is possible that a man -without talents, and who can neither write nor talk intelligibly, can -be a good general.”--_Lord C. to Lt.-Gen. Ross._ - -[14] “April 12, 1800. The king much improved. Saw the Duke of York for -two hours yesterday, on military matters. - -“April 13. The king not so well. Over-excited himself -yesterday.”--_Diary of the Right Hon. Sir George Rose._ - -[15] “The Duke of York is certainly in a bad way. All that we can do -will be to acquit him of corruption; and indeed I doubt whether we -shall be able to carry him so far as to acquit him of suspecting Mrs. -Clarke’s practices and allowing them to go on. If we should succeed in -both these objects, the question will then turn upon the point whether -it is proper that a prince of the blood, who has manifested so much -weakness as he has, and has led such a life (for that is material in -these days), is a proper person to be intrusted with the duties of a -responsible office. - -“We shall be beat upon this question, I think. If we should carry it -by a small majority, the duke will equally be obliged to resign his -office, and most probably the consequence of such a victory must be -that the government will be broken up.”--_Sir A. Wellesley to the Duke -of Richmond, 1809._ - -[16] “General Dundas is, I understand, appointed commander-in-chief, _I -should imagine much against the inclination of the king’s ministers_; -but I understand that it is expected that the Duke of York will be able -to resume his situation by the time Sir David is quite superannuated, -and it might not be so easy to get a younger or a better man out of -office at so early a period.”--_Sir A. W. to the Duke of R., 1809._ - - - - -To Goldenhair. - -(FROM HORACE.) - - - Ah, Pyrrha--tell me, whose the happy lot - To woo thee on a couch of lavish roses-- - Who, bathed in odorous dews, in his fond arms encloses - Thee, in some happy grot? - - For whom those nets of golden-gloried hair - Dost thou entwine in cunning carelessnesses? - Alas, poor boy! Who thee, in fond belief, caresses - Deeming thee wholly fair! - - How oft shall he thy fickleness bemoan, - When fair to foul shall change--and he, unskilful - In pilotage, beholds--with tempests wildly wilful-- - The happy calm o’erthrown! - - He, who now hopes that thou wilt ever prove - All void of care, and full of fond endearing, - Knows not that varies more, than Zephyrs ever-veering, - The fickle breath of Love. - - Ah, hapless he, to whom, like seas untried, - Thou seemest fair! That _my_ sea-going’s ended - My votive tablet proves, to those dark Gods suspended, - Who o’er the waves preside. - - THOMAS HOOD. - - - - -Framley Parsonage. - - -CHAPTER IV. - -A MATTER OF CONSCIENCE. - -It is no doubt very wrong to long after a naughty thing. But -nevertheless we all do so. One may say that hankering after naughty -things is the very essence of the evil into which we have been -precipitated by Adam’s fall. When we confess that we are all sinners, -we confess that we all long after naughty things. - -And ambition is a great vice--as Mark Antony told us a long time ago--a -great vice, no doubt, if the ambition of the man be with reference to -his own advancement, and not to the advancement of others. But then, -how many of us are there who are not ambitious in this vicious manner? - -And there is nothing viler than the desire to know great people--people -of great rank I should say; nothing worse than the hunting of titles -and worshipping of wealth. We all know this, and say it every day of -our lives. But presuming that a way into the society of Park Lane was -open to us, and a way also into that of Bedford Row, how many of us are -there who would prefer Bedford Row because it is so vile to worship -wealth and title? - -I am led into these rather trite remarks by the necessity of putting -forward some sort of excuse for that frame of mind in which the Rev. -Mark Robarts awoke on the morning after his arrival at Chaldicotes. And -I trust that the fact of his being a clergyman will not be allowed to -press against him unfairly. Clergymen are subject to the same passions -as other men; and, as far as I can see, give way to them, in one -line or in another, almost as frequently. Every clergyman should, by -canonical rule, feel a personal disinclination to a bishopric; but yet -we do not believe that such personal disinclination is generally very -strong. - -Mark’s first thoughts when he woke on that morning flew back to Mr. -Fothergill’s invitation. The duke had sent a special message to say how -peculiarly glad he, the duke, would be to make acquaintance with him, -the parson! How much of this message had been of Mr. Fothergill’s own -manufacture, that Mark Robarts did not consider. - -He had obtained a living at an age when other young clergymen are -beginning to think of a curacy, and he had obtained such a living as -middle-aged parsons in their dreams regard as a possible Paradise for -their old years. Of course he thought that all these good things had -been the results of his own peculiar merits. Of course he felt that he -was different from other parsons,--more fitted by nature for intimacy -with great persons, more urbane, more polished, and more richly endowed -with modern clerical well-to-do aptitudes. He was grateful to Lady -Lufton for what she had done for him; but perhaps not so grateful as he -should have been. - -At any rate he was not Lady Lufton’s servant, nor even her dependant. -So much he had repeated to himself on many occasions, and had gone -so far as to hint the same idea to his wife. In his career as parish -priest he must in most things be the judge of his own actions--and in -many also it was his duty to be the judge of those of his patroness. -The fact of Lady Lufton having placed him in the living, could by no -means make her the proper judge of his actions. This he often said -to himself; and he said as often that Lady Lufton certainly had a -hankering after such a judgment-seat. - -Of whom generally did prime ministers and official bigwigs think it -expedient to make bishops and deans? Was it not, as a rule, of those -clergymen who had shown themselves able to perform their clerical -duties efficiently, and able also to take their place with ease in high -society? He was very well off certainly at Framley; but he could never -hope for anything beyond Framley, if he allowed himself to regard Lady -Lufton as a bugbear. Putting Lady Lufton and her prejudices out of the -question, was there any reason why he ought not to accept the duke’s -invitation? He could not see that there was any such reason. If any one -could be a better judge on such a subject than himself, it must be his -bishop. And it was clear that the bishop wished him to go to Gatherum -Castle. - -The matter was still left open to him. Mr. Fothergill had especially -explained that; and therefore his ultimate decision was as yet within -his own power. Such a visit would cost him some money, for he knew -that a man does not stay at great houses without expense; and then, in -spite of his good income, he was not very flush of money. He had been -down this year with Lord Lufton in Scotland. Perhaps it might be more -prudent for him to return home. - -But then an idea came to him that it behoved him as a man and a priest -to break through that Framley thraldom under which he felt that he did -to a certain extent exist. Was it not the fact that he was about to -decline this invitation from fear of Lady Lufton? and if so, was that a -motive by which he ought to be actuated? It was incumbent on him to rid -himself of that feeling. And in this spirit he got up and dressed. - -There was hunting again on that day; and as the hounds were to meet -near Chaldicotes, and to draw some coverts lying on the verge of the -chase, the ladies were to go in carriages through the drives of the -forest, and Mr. Robarts was to escort them on horseback. Indeed it was -one of those hunting-days got up rather for the ladies than for the -sport. Great nuisances they are to steady, middle-aged hunting men; but -the young fellows like them because they have thereby an opportunity -of showing off their sporting finery, and of doing a little flirtation -on horseback. The bishop, also, had been minded to be of the party; -so, at least, he had said on the previous evening; and a place in one -of the carriages had been set apart for him: but since that, he and -Mrs. Proudie had discussed the matter in private, and at breakfast his -lordship declared that he had changed his mind. - -Mr. Sowerby was one of those men who are known to be very poor--as poor -as debt can make a man--but who, nevertheless, enjoy all the luxuries -which money can give. It was believed that he could not live in -England out of jail but for his protection as a member of Parliament; -and yet it seemed that there was no end to his horses and carriages, -his servants and retinue. He had been at this work for a great many -years, and practice, they say, makes perfect. Such companions are very -dangerous. There is no cholera, no yellow-fever, no small-pox more -contagious than debt. If one lives habitually among embarrassed men, -one catches it to a certainty. No one had injured the community in this -way more fatally than Mr. Sowerby. But still he carried on the game -himself; and now on this morning carriages and horses thronged at his -gate, as though he were as substantially rich as his friend the Duke of -Omnium. - -“Robarts, my dear fellow,” said Mr. Sowerby, when they were well -under way down one of the glades of the forest,--for the place -where the hounds met was some four or five miles from the house of -Chaldicotes,--“ride on with me a moment. I want to speak to you; and if -I stay behind we shall never get to the hounds.” So Mark, who had come -expressly to escort the ladies, rode on alongside of Mr. Sowerby in his -pink coat. - -“My dear fellow, Fothergill tells me that you have some hesitation -about going to Gatherum Castle.” - -“Well, I did decline, certainly. You know I am not a man of pleasure, -as you are. I have some duties to attend to.” - -“Gammon!” said Mr. Sowerby; and as he said it he looked with a kind of -derisive smile into the clergyman’s face. - -“It is easy enough to say that, Sowerby; and perhaps I have no right to -expect that you should understand me.” - -“Ah, but I do understand you; and I say it is gammon. I would be the -last man in the world to ridicule your scruples about duty, if this -hesitation on your part arose from any such scruple. But answer me -honestly, do you not know that such is not the case?” - -“I know nothing of the kind.” - -“Ah, but I think you do. If you persist in refusing this invitation -will it not be because you are afraid of making Lady Lufton angry? I do -not know what there can be in that woman that she is able to hold both -you and Lufton in leading-strings.” - -Robarts, of course, denied the charge and protested that he was not -to be taken back to his own parsonage by any fear of Lady Lufton. -But though he made such protest with warmth, he knew that he did so -ineffectually. Sowerby only smiled and said that the proof of the -pudding was in the eating. - -“What is the good of a man keeping a curate if it be not to save him -from that sort of drudgery?” he asked. - -“Drudgery! If I were a drudge how could I be here to-day?” - -“Well, Robarts, look here. I am speaking now, perhaps, with more of the -energy of an old friend than circumstances fully warrant; but I am an -older man than you, and as I have a regard for you I do not like to see -you throw up a good game when it is in your hands.” - -“Oh, as far as that goes, Sowerby, I need hardly tell you that I -appreciate your kindness.” - -“If you are content,” continued the man of the world, “to live at -Framley all your life, and to warm yourself in the sunshine of the -dowager there, why, in such case, it may perhaps be useless for you to -extend the circle of your friends; but if you have higher ideas than -these, I think you will be very wrong to omit the present opportunity -of going to the duke’s. I never knew the duke go so much out of his way -to be civil to a clergyman as he has done in this instance.” - -“I am sure I am very much obliged to him.” - -“The fact is, that you may, if you please, make yourself popular in the -county; but you cannot do it by obeying all Lady Lufton’s behests. She -is a dear old woman, I am sure.” - -“She is, Sowerby; and you would say so, if you knew her.” - -“I don’t doubt it; but it would not do for you or me to live exactly -according to her ideas. Now, here, in this case, the bishop of the -diocese is to be one of the party, and he has, I believe, already -expressed a wish that you should be another.” - -“He asked me if I were going.” - -“Exactly; and Archdeacon Grantley will be there.” - -“Will he?” asked Mark. Now, that would be a great point gained, for -Archdeacon Grantley was a close friend of Lady Lufton. - -“So I understand from Fothergill. Indeed, it will be very wrong of you -not to go, and I tell you so plainly; and what is more, when you talk -about your duty--you having a curate as you have--why, it is gammon.” -These last words he spoke looking back over his shoulder as he stood -up in his stirrups, for he had caught the eye of the huntsman who was -surrounded by his hounds, and was now trotting on to join him. - -During a great portion of the day, Mark found himself riding by the -side of Mrs. Proudie, as that lady leaned back in her carriage. And -Mrs. Proudie smiled on him graciously though her daughter would not do -so. Mrs. Proudie was fond of having an attendant clergyman; and as it -was evident that Mr. Robarts lived among nice people--titled dowagers, -members of parliament, and people of that sort--she was quite willing -to instal him as a sort of honorary chaplain _pro tem_. - -“I’ll tell you what we have settled, Mrs. Harold Smith and I,” said -Mrs. Proudie to him. “This lecture at Barchester will be so late on -Saturday evening, that you had all better come and dine with us.” - -Mark bowed and thanked her, and declared that he should be very happy -to make one of such a party. Even Lady Lufton could not object to this, -although she was not especially fond of Mrs. Proudie. - -“And then they are to sleep at the hotel. It will really be too late -for ladies to think of going back so far at this time of the year. I -told Mrs. Harold Smith, and Miss Dunstable too, that we could manage -to make room at any rate for them. But they will not leave the other -ladies; so they go to the hotel for that night. But, Mr. Robarts, the -bishop will never allow you to stay at the inn, so of course you will -take a bed at the palace.” - -It immediately occurred to Mark that as the lecture was to be given -on Saturday evening, the next morning would be Sunday; and, on that -Sunday, he would have to preach at Chaldicotes. “I thought they were -all going to return the same night,” said he. - -“Well, they did intend it; but you see Mrs. Smith is afraid.” - -“I should have to get back here on the Sunday morning, Mrs. Proudie.” - -“Ah, yes, that is bad--very bad, indeed. No one dislikes any -interference with the Sabbath more than I do. Indeed, if I am -particular about anything it is about that. But some works are works -of necessity, Mr. Robarts; are they not? Now you must necessarily be -back at Chaldicotes on Sunday morning!” and so the matter was settled. -Mrs. Proudie was very firm in general in the matter of Sabbath-day -observances; but when she had to deal with such persons as Mrs. Harold -Smith, it was expedient that she should give way a little. “You can -start as soon as it’s daylight, you know, if you like it, Mr. Robarts,” -said Mrs. Proudie. - -There was not much to boast of as to the hunting, but it was a very -pleasant day for the ladies. The men rode up and down the grass -roads through the chase, sometimes in the greatest possible hurry as -though they never could go quick enough; and then the coachmen would -drive very fast also though they did not know why, for a fast pace -of movement is another of those contagious diseases. And then again -the sportsmen would move at an undertaker’s pace, when the fox had -traversed and the hounds would be at a loss to know which was the hunt -and which was the heel; and then the carriage also would go slowly, and -the ladies would stand up and talk. And then the time for lunch came; -and altogether the day went by pleasantly enough. - -“And so that’s hunting, is it?” said Miss Dunstable. - -“Yes, that’s hunting,” said Mr. Sowerby. - -“I did not see any gentleman do anything that I could not do myself, -except there was one young man slipped off into the mud; and I -shouldn’t like that.” - -“But there was no breaking of bones, was there, my dear?” said Mrs. -Harold Smith. - -“And nobody caught any foxes,” said Miss Dunstable. “The fact is, Mrs. -Smith, that I don’t think much more of their sport than I do of their -business. I shall take to hunting a pack of hounds myself after this.” - -“Do, my dear, and I’ll be your whipper-in. I wonder whether Mrs. -Proudie would join us.” - -“I shall be writing to the duke to-night,” said Mr. Fothergill to Mark, -as they were all riding up to the stable-yard together. “You will let -me tell his grace that you will accept his invitation--will you not?” - -“Upon my word, the duke is very kind,” said Mark. - -“He is very anxious to know you, I can assure you,” said Fothergill. - -What could a young flattered fool of a parson do, but say that he would -go? Mark did say that he would go; and, in the course of the evening -his friend Mr. Sowerby congratulated him, and the bishop joked with him -and said that he knew that he would not give up good company so soon; -and Miss Dunstable said she would make him her chaplain as soon as -parliament would allow quack doctors to have such articles--an allusion -which Mark did not understand, till he learned that Miss Dunstable was -herself the proprietress of the celebrated Oil of Lebanon, invented -by her late respected father, and patented by him with such wonderful -results in the way of accumulated fortune; and Mrs. Proudie made him -quite one of their party, talking to him about all manner of church -subjects; and then at last, even Miss Proudie smiled on him, when she -learned that he had been thought worthy of a bed at a duke’s castle. -And all the world seemed to be open to him. - -But he could not make himself happy that evening. On the next morning -he must write to his wife; and he could already see the look of painful -sorrow which would fall upon his Fanny’s brow when she learned that -her husband was going to be a guest at the Duke of Omnium’s. And he -must tell her to send him money, and money was scarce. And then, as -to Lady Lufton, should he send her some message, or should he not? In -either case he must declare war against her. And then did he not owe -everything to Lady Lufton? And thus in spite of all his triumphs he -could not get himself to bed in a happy frame of mind. - -On the next day, which was Friday, he postponed the disagreeable task -of writing. Saturday would do as well; and on Saturday morning, before -they all started for Barchester, he did write. And his letter ran as -follows:-- - - “Chaldicotes,--November, 185--. - - “DEAREST LOVE,--You will be astonished when I tell you how gay - we all are here, and what further dissipations are in store for - us. The Arabins, as you supposed, are not of our party; but the - Proudies are,--as you supposed also. Your suppositions are always - right. And what will you think when I tell you that I am to sleep - at the palace on Saturday? You know that there is to be a lecture - in Barchester on that day. Well; we must all go, of course, as - Harold Smith, one of our set here, is to give it. And now it - turns out that we cannot get back the same night because there is - no moon; and Mrs. Bishop would not allow that my cloth should be - contaminated by an hotel;--very kind and considerate, is it not? - - “But I have a more astounding piece of news for you than this. - There is to be a great party at Gatherum Castle next week, and - they have talked me over into accepting an invitation which the - duke sent expressly to me. I refused at first; but everybody - here said that my doing so would be so strange; and then they - all wanted to know my reason. When I came to render it, I did - not know what reason I had to give. The bishop is going, and he - thought it very odd that I should not go also, seeing that I was - asked. - - “I know what my own darling will think, and I know that she will - not be pleased, and I must put off my defence till I return - to her from this ogre-land,--if ever I do get back alive. But - joking apart, Fanny, I think that I should have been wrong to - stand out, when so much was said about it. I should have been - seeming to take upon myself to sit in judgment upon the duke. - I doubt if there be a single clergyman in the diocese, under - fifty years of age, who would have refused the invitation under - such circumstances,--unless it be Crawley, who is so mad on the - subject that he thinks it almost wrong to take a walk out of his - own parish. - - “I must stay at Gatherum Castle over Sunday week--indeed, we only - go there on Friday. I have written to Jones about the duties. I - can make it up to him, as I know he wishes to go into Wales at - Christmas. My wanderings will all be over then, and he may go - for a couple of months if he pleases. I suppose you will take my - classes in the school on Sunday, as well as your own; but pray - make them have a good fire. If this is too much for you, make - Mrs. Podgens take the boys. Indeed I think that will be better. - - “Of course you will tell her ladyship of my whereabouts. Tell her - from me, that as regards the bishop, as well as regarding another - great personage, the colour has been laid on perhaps a little - too thickly. Not that Lady Lufton would ever like him. Make her - understand that my going to the duke’s has almost become a matter - of conscience with me. I have not known how to make it appear - that it would be right for me to refuse, without absolutely - making a party matter of it. I saw that it would be said, that - I, coming from Lady Lufton’s parish, could not go to the Duke of - Omnium’s. This I did not choose. - - “I find that I shall want a little more money before I leave - here, five or ten pounds--say ten pounds. If you cannot spare it, - get it from Davis. He owes me more than that, a good deal. - - “And now, God bless and preserve you, my own love. Kiss my - darling bairns for papa, and give them my blessing. - - “Always and ever your own, - “M. R.” - - -And then there was written, on an outside scrap which was folded round -the full-written sheet of paper, “Make it as smooth at Framley Court as -possible.” - -However strong, and reasonable, and unanswerable the body of Mark’s -letter may have been, all his hesitation, weakness, doubt, and fear, -were expressed in this short postscript. - - -CHAPTER V. - -AMANTIUM IRÆ AMORIS INTEGRATIO. - -And now, with my reader’s consent, I will follow the postman with -that letter to Framley; not by its own circuitous route indeed, or by -the same mode of conveyance; for that letter went into Barchester by -the Courcy night mail-cart, which, on its road, passes through the -villages of Uffley and Chaldicotes, reaching Barchester in time for the -up mail-train to London. By that train, the letter was sent towards -the metropolis as far as the junction of the Barset branch line, but -there it was turned in its course, and came down again by the main line -as far as Silverbridge; at which place, between six and seven in the -morning, it was shouldered by the Framley footpost messenger, and in -due course delivered at the Framley Parsonage exactly as Mrs. Robarts -had finished reading prayers to the four servants. Or, I should say -rather, that such would in its usual course have been that letter’s -destiny. As it was, however, it reached Silverbridge on Sunday, and lay -there till the Monday, as the Framley people have declined their Sunday -post. And then again, when the letter was delivered at the parsonage, -on that wet Monday morning, Mrs. Robarts was not at home. As we are all -aware, she was staying with her ladyship at Framley Court. - -“Oh, but it’s mortial wet,” said the shivering postman as he handed in -that and the vicar’s newspaper. The vicar was a man of the world, and -took the _Jupiter_. - -“Come in, Robin postman, and warm theeself awhile,” said Jemima the -cook, pushing a stool a little to one side, but still well in front of -the big kitchen fire. - -“Well, I dudna jist know how it’ll be. The wery ’edges ’as eyes -and tells on me in Silverbridge, if I so much as stops to pick a -blackberry.” - -“There bain’t no hedges here, mon, nor yet no blackberries; so sit thee -down and warm theeself. That’s better nor blackberries I’m thinking,” -and she handed him a bowl of tea with a slice of buttered toast. - -Robin postman took the proffered tea, put his dripping hat on the -ground, and thanked Jemima cook. “But I dudna jist know how it’ll be,” -said he; “only it do pour so tarnation heavy.” Which among us, O my -readers, could have withstood that temptation? - -Such was the circuitous course of Mark’s letter; but as it left -Chaldicotes on Saturday evening, and reached Mrs. Robarts on the -following morning, or would have done, but for that intervening Sunday, -doing all its peregrinations during the night, it may be held that its -course of transport was not inconveniently arranged. We, however, will -travel by a much shorter route. - -Robin, in the course of his daily travels, passed, first the -post-office at Framley, then the Framley Court back entrance, and then -the vicar’s house, so that on this wet morning Jemima cook was not able -to make use of his services in transporting this letter back to her -mistress; for Robin had got another village before him, expectant of -its letters. - -“Why didn’t thee leave it, mon, with Mr. Applejohn at the Court?” Mr. -Applejohn was the butler who took the letter-bag. “Thee know’st as how -missus was there.” - -And then Robin, mindful of the tea and toast, explained to her -courteously how the law made it imperative on him to bring the letter -to the very house that was indicated, let the owner of the letter be -where she might; and he laid down the law very satisfactorily with -sundry long-worded quotations. Not to much effect, however, for the -housemaid called him an oaf; and Robin would decidedly have had the -worst of it had not the gardener come in and taken his part. “They -women knows nothin’, and understands nothin’,” said the gardener. -“Give us hold of the letter. I’ll take it up to the house. It’s the -master’s fist.” And then Robin postman went on one way, and the -gardener, he went the other. The gardener never disliked an excuse for -going up to the Court gardens, even on so wet a day as this. - -Mrs. Robarts was sitting over the drawing-room fire with Lady Meredith, -when her husband’s letter was brought to her. The Framley Court -letter-bag had been discussed at breakfast; but that was now nearly -an hour since, and Lady Lufton, as was her wont, was away in her own -room writing her own letters, and looking after her own matters; for -Lady Lufton was a person who dealt in figures herself, and understood -business almost as well as Harold Smith. And on that morning she also -had received a letter which had displeased her not a little. Whence -arose this displeasure neither Mrs. Robarts nor Lady Meredith knew; but -her ladyship’s brow had grown black at breakfast time; she had bundled -up an ominous-looking epistle into her bag without speaking of it, and -had left the room immediately that breakfast was over. - -“There’s something wrong,” said Sir George. - -“Mamma does fret herself so much about Ludovic’s money matters,” said -Lady Meredith. Ludovic was Lord Lufton,--Ludovic Lufton, Baron Lufton -of Lufton, in the county of Oxfordshire. - -“And yet I don’t think Lufton gets much astray,” said Sir George, as he -sauntered out of the room. “Well, Justy; we’ll put off going then till -to-morrow; but remember, it must be the first train.” Lady Meredith -said she would remember, and then they went into the drawing-room, and -there Mrs. Robarts received her letter. - -Fanny, when she read it, hardly at first realized to herself the idea -that her husband, the clergyman of Framley, the family clerical friend -of Lady Lufton’s establishment, was going to stay with the Duke of -Omnium. It was so thoroughly understood at Framley Court that the duke -and all belonging to him was noxious and damnable. He was a Whig, he -was a bachelor, he was a gambler, he was immoral in every way, he was a -man of no church principle, a corrupter of youth, a sworn foe of young -wives, a swallower up of small men’s patrimonies; a man whom mothers -feared for their sons, and sisters for their brothers; and worse again, -whom fathers had cause to fear for their daughters, and brothers for -their sisters;--a man who, with his belongings, dwelt, and must dwell, -poles asunder from Lady Lufton and her belongings! - -And it must be remembered that all these evil things were fully -believed by Mrs. Robarts. Could it really be that her husband was going -to dwell in the halls of Apollyon, to shelter himself beneath the wings -of this very Lucifer? A cloud of sorrow settled upon her face, and -then she read the letter again very slowly, not omitting the tell-tale -postscript. - -“Oh, Justinia!” at last she said. - -“What, have you got bad news, too?” - -“I hardly know how to tell you what has occurred. There; I suppose -you had better read it;” and she handed her husband’s epistle to Lady -Meredith,--keeping back, however, the postscript. - -“What on earth will her ladyship say now?” said Lady Meredith, as she -folded the paper, and replaced it in the envelope. - -“What had I better do, Justinia? how had I better tell her?” And then -the two ladies put their heads together, bethinking themselves how they -might best deprecate the wrath of Lady Lufton. It had been arranged -that Mrs. Robarts should go back to the parsonage after lunch, and -she had persisted in her intention after it had been settled that the -Merediths were to stay over that evening. Lady Meredith now advised her -friend to carry out this determination without saying anything about -her husband’s terrible iniquities, and then to send the letter up to -Lady Lufton as soon as she reached the parsonage. “Mamma will never -know that you received it here,” said Lady Meredith. - -But Mrs. Robarts would not consent to this. Such a course seemed to her -to be cowardly. She knew that her husband was doing wrong; she felt -that he knew it himself; but still it was necessary that she should -defend him. However terrible might be the storm, it must break upon her -own head. So she at once went up and tapped at Lady Lufton’s private -door; and as she did so Lady Meredith followed her. - -“Come in,” said Lady Lufton, and the voice did not sound soft and -pleasant. When they entered, they found her sitting at her little -writing table, with her head resting on her arm, and that letter which -she had received that morning was lying open on the table before her. -Indeed there were two letters now there, one from a London lawyer to -herself, and the other from her son to that London lawyer. It needs -only be explained that the subject of those letters was the immediate -sale of that outlying portion of the Lufton property in Oxfordshire, as -to which Mr. Sowerby once spoke. Lord Lufton had told the lawyer that -the thing must be done at once, adding that his friend Robarts would -have explained the whole affair to his mother. And then the lawyer had -written to Lady Lufton, as indeed was necessary; but unfortunately Lady -Lufton had not hitherto heard a word of the matter. - -In her eyes, the sale of family property was horrible; the fact that a -young man with some fifteen or twenty thousand a year should require -subsidiary money was horrible; that her own son should have not written -to her himself was horrible; and it was also horrible that her own pet, -the clergyman whom she had brought there to be her son’s friend, should -be mixed up in the matter,--should be cognizant of it while she was not -cognizant,--should be employed in it as a go-between and agent in her -son’s bad courses. It was all horrible, and Lady Lufton was sitting -there with a black brow and an uneasy heart. As regarded our poor -parson, we may say that in this matter he was blameless, except that he -had hitherto lacked the courage to execute his friend’s commission. - -“What is it, Fanny?” said Lady Lufton as soon as the door was opened; -“I should have been down in half-an-hour, if you wanted me, Justinia.” - -“Fanny has received a letter which makes her wish to speak to you at -once,” said Lady Meredith. - -“What letter, Fanny?” - -Poor Fanny’s heart was in her mouth; she held it in her hand, but had -not yet quite made up her mind whether she would show it bodily to Lady -Lufton. - -“From Mr. Robarts,” she said. - -“Well; I suppose he is going to stay another week at Chaldicotes. For -my part I should be as well pleased;” and Lady Lufton’s voice was -not friendly, for she was thinking of that farm in Oxfordshire. The -imprudence of the young is very sore to the prudence of their elders. -No woman could be less covetous, less grasping than Lady Lufton; but -the sale of a portion of the old family property was to her as the loss -of her own heart’s blood. - -“Here is the letter, Lady Lufton; perhaps you had better read it;” and -Fanny handed it to her, again keeping back the postscript. She had -read and re-read the letter downstairs, but could not make out whether -her husband had intended her to show it. From the line of the argument -she thought that he must have done so. At any rate he said for himself -more than she could say for him, and so, probably, it was best that her -ladyship should see it. - -Lady Lufton took it, and read it, and her face grew blacker and -blacker. Her mind was set against the writer before she began it, and -every word in it tended to make her feel more estranged from him. “Oh, -he is going to the palace, is he--well; he must choose his own friends. -Harold Smith one of his party! It’s a pity, my dear, he did not see -Miss Proudie before he met you, he might have lived to be the bishop’s -chaplain. Gatherum Castle! You don’t mean to tell me that he is going -there? Then I tell you fairly, Fanny, that I have done with him.” - -“Oh, Lady Lufton, don’t say that,” said Mrs. Robarts, with tears in her -eyes. - -“Mamma, mamma, don’t speak in that way,” said Lady Meredith. - -“But my dear, what am I to say? I must speak in that way. You would not -wish me to speak falsehoods, would you? A man must choose for himself, -but he can’t live with two different sets of people; at least, not if -I belong to one and the Duke of Omnium to the other. The bishop going -indeed! If there be anything that I hate it is hypocrisy.” - -“There is no hypocrisy in that, Lady Lufton.” - -“But I say there is, Fanny. Very strange, indeed! ‘Put off his -defence!’ Why should a man need any defence to his wife if he acts in -a straightforward way. His own language condemns him: ‘Wrong to stand -out!’ Now, will either of you tell me that Mr. Robarts would really -have thought it wrong to refuse that invitation? I say that that is -hypocrisy. There is no other word for it.” - -By this time the poor wife, who had been in tears, was wiping them away -and preparing for action. Lady Lufton’s extreme severity gave her -courage. She knew that it behoved her to fight for her husband when he -was thus attacked. Had Lady Lufton been moderate in her remarks Mrs. -Robarts would not have had a word to say. - -“My husband may have been ill-judged,” she said, “but he is no -hypocrite.” - -“Very well, my dear, I dare say you know better than I; but to me it -looks extremely like hypocrisy: eh, Justinia?” - -“Oh, mamma, do be moderate.” - -“Moderate! That’s all very well. How is one to moderate one’s feelings -when one has been betrayed?” - -“You do not mean that Mr. Robarts has betrayed you?” said the wife. - -“Oh, no; of course not.” And then she went on reading the letter: -“‘Seem to have been standing in judgment upon the duke.’ Might he -not use the same argument as to going into any house in the kingdom, -however infamous? We must all stand in judgment one upon another in -that sense. ‘Crawley!’ Yes; if he were a little more like Mr. Crawley -it would be a good thing for me, and for the parish, and for you too, -my dear. God forgive me for bringing him here; that’s all.” - -“Lady Lufton, I must say that you are very hard upon him--very hard. I -did not expect it from such a friend.” - -“My dear, you ought to know me well enough to be sure that I shall -speak my mind. ‘Written to Jones’--yes; it is easy enough to write to -poor Jones. He had better write to Jones, and bid him do the whole -duty. Then he can go and be the duke’s domestic chaplain.” - -“I believe my husband does as much of his own duty as any clergyman in -the whole diocese,” said Mrs. Robarts, now again in tears. - -“And you are to take his work in the school; you and Mrs. Podgens. -What with his curate and his wife and Mrs. Podgens, I don’t see why he -should come back at all.” - -“Oh, mamma,” said Justinia, “pray, pray don’t be so harsh to her.” - -“Let me finish it, my dear,--oh, here I come. ‘Tell her ladyship my -whereabouts.’ He little thought you’d show me this letter.” - -“Didn’t he?” said Mrs. Robarts, putting out her hand to get it back, -but in vain. “I thought it was for the best; I did indeed.” - -“I had better finish it now, if you please. What is this? How does he -dare send his ribald jokes to me in such a matter? No, I do not suppose -I ever shall like Dr. Proudie; I have never expected it. A matter of -conscience with him! Well--well, well. Had I not read it myself, I -could not have believed it of him; I would not positively have believed -it. ‘Coming from my parish he could not go to the Duke of Omnium!’ And -it is what I would wish to have said. People fit for this parish should -not be fit for the Duke of Omnium’s house. And I had trusted that he -would have this feeling more strongly than any one else in it. I have -been deceived--that’s all.” - -“He has done nothing to deceive you, Lady Lufton.” - -“I hope he will not have deceived you, my dear. ‘More money;’ yes, it -is probable that he will want more money. There is your letter, Fanny. -I am very sorry for it. I can say nothing more.” And she folded up the -letter and gave it back to Mrs. Robarts. - -“I thought it right to show it you,” said Mrs. Robarts. - -“It did not much matter whether you did or no; of course I must have -been told.” - -“He especially begs me to tell you.” - -“Why, yes; he could not very well have kept me in the dark in such -a matter. He could not neglect his own work, and go and live with -gamblers and adulterers at the Duke of Omnium’s without my knowing it.” - -And now Fanny Robarts’s cup was full, full to the overflowing. When -she heard these words she forgot all about Lady Lufton, all about Lady -Meredith, and remembered only her husband,--that he was her husband, -and, in spite of his faults, a good and loving husband;--and that other -fact also she remembered, that she was his wife. - -“Lady Lufton,” she said, “you forget yourself in speaking in that way -of my husband.” - -“What!” said her ladyship; “you are to show me such a letter as that, -and I am not to tell you what I think?” - -“Not if you think such hard things as that. Even you are not justified -in speaking to me in that way, and I will not hear it.” - -“Heighty-tighty,” said her ladyship. - -“Whether or no he is right in going to the Duke of Omnium’s, I will not -pretend to judge. He is the judge of his own actions, and neither you -nor I.” - -“And when he leaves you with the butcher’s bill unpaid and no money to -buy shoes for the children, who will be the judge then?” - -“Not you, Lady Lufton. If such bad days should ever come--and neither -you nor I have a right to expect them--I will not come to you in my -troubles; not after this.” - -“Very well, my dear. You may go to the Duke of Omnium if that suits you -better.” - -“Fanny, come away,” said Lady Meredith. “Why should you try to anger my -mother?” - -“I don’t want to anger her; but I won’t hear him abused in that way -without speaking up for him. If I don’t defend him, who will? Lady -Lufton has said terrible things about him; and they are not true.” - -“Oh, Fanny!” said Justinia. - -“Very well, very well!” said Lady Lufton. “This is the sort of return -that one gets.” - -“I don’t know what you mean by return, Lady Lufton: but would you wish -me to stand by quietly and hear such things said of my husband? He -does not live with such people as you have named. He does not neglect -his duties. If every clergyman were as much in his parish, it would -be well for some of them. And in going to such a house as the Duke of -Omnium’s it does make a difference that he goes there in company with -the bishop. I can’t explain why, but I know that it does.” - -“Especially when the bishop is coupled up with the devil, as Mr. -Robarts has done,” said Lady Lufton; “he can join the duke with them -and then they’ll stand for the three Graces, won’t they, Justinia?” And -Lady Lufton laughed a bitter little laugh at her own wit. - -“I suppose I may go now, Lady Lufton.” - -“Oh, yes, certainly, my dear.” - -“I am sorry if I have made you angry with me; but I will not allow any -one to speak against Mr. Robarts without answering them. You have been -very unjust to him; and even though I do anger you, I must say so.” - -“Come, Fanny; this is too bad,” said Lady Lufton. “You have been -scolding me for the last half-hour because I would not congratulate you -on this new friend that your husband has made, and now you are going -to begin it all over again. That is more than I can stand. If you have -nothing else particular to say, you might as well leave me.” And Lady -Lufton’s face as she spoke was unbending, severe, and harsh. - -Mrs. Robarts had never before been so spoken to by her old friend; -indeed she had never been so spoken to by any one, and she hardly knew -how to bear herself. - -“Very well, Lady Lufton,” she said; “then I will go. Good-bye.” - -“Good-bye,” said Lady Lufton, and turning herself to her table she -began to arrange her papers. Fanny had never before left Framley Court -to go back to her own parsonage without a warm embrace. Now she was to -do so without even having her hand taken. Had it come to this, that -there was absolutely to be a quarrel between them,--a quarrel for ever? - -“Fanny is going, you know, mamma,” said Lady Meredith. “She will be -home before you are down again.” - -“I cannot help it, my dear. Fanny must do as she pleases. I am not to -be the judge of her actions. She has just told me so.” - -Mrs. Robarts had said nothing of the kind, but she was far too proud to -point this out. So with a gentle step she retreated through the door, -and then Lady Meredith, having tried what a conciliatory whisper with -her mother would do, followed her. Alas, the conciliatory whisper was -altogether ineffectual! - -The two ladies said nothing as they descended the stairs, but when they -had regained the drawing-room they looked with blank horror into each -other’s faces. What were they to do now? Of such a tragedy as this they -had had no remotest preconception. Was it absolutely the case that -Fanny Robarts was to walk out of Lady Lufton’s house as a declared -enemy,--she who, before her marriage as well as since, had been almost -treated as an adopted daughter of the family? - -“Oh, Fanny, why did you answer my mother in that way?” said Lady -Meredith. “You saw that she was vexed. She had other things to vex her -besides this about Mr. Robarts.” - -“And would not you answer any one who attacked Sir George?” - -“No, not my own mother. I would let her say what she pleased, and leave -Sir George to fight his own battles.” - -“Ah, but it is different with you. You are her daughter, and Sir -George----she would not dare to speak in that way as to Sir George’s -doings.” - -“Indeed she would, if it pleased her. I am sorry I let you go up to -her.” - -“It is as well that it should be over, Justinia. As those are her -thoughts about Mr. Roberts, it is quite as well that we should know -them. Even for all that I owe to her, and all the love I bear to you, -I will not come to this house if I am to hear my husband abused;--not -into any house.” - -“My dearest Fanny, we all know what happens when two angry people get -together.” - -“I was not angry when I went up to her; not in the least.” - -“It is no good looking back. What are we to do now, Fanny?” - -“I suppose I had better go home,” said Mrs. Robarts. “I will go and put -my things up, and then I will send James for them.” - -“Wait till after lunch, and then you will be able to kiss my mother -before you leave us.” - -“No, Justinia; I cannot wait. I must answer Mr. Robarts by this post, -and I must think what I have to say to him. I could not write that -letter here, and the post goes at four.” And Mrs. Robarts got up from -her chair, preparatory to her final departure. - -“I shall come to you before dinner,” said Lady Meredith; “and if I can -bring you good tidings, I shall expect you to come back here with me. -It is out of the question that I should go away from Framley leaving -you and my mother at enmity with each other.” - -To this Mrs. Robarts made no answer; and in a very few minutes -afterwards she was in her own nursery, kissing her children, and -teaching the elder one to say something about papa. But, even as she -taught him, the tears stood in her eyes, and the little fellow knew -that everything was not right. - -And there she sat till about two, doing little odds and ends of things -for the children, and allowing that occupation to stand as an excuse -to her for not commencing her letter. But then there remained only two -hours to her, and it might be that the letter would be difficult in the -writing--would require thought and changes, and must needs be copied, -perhaps more than once. As to the money, that she had in the house--as -much, at least, as Mark now wanted, though the sending of it would -leave her nearly penniless. She could, however, in case of personal -need, resort to Davis as desired by him. - -So she got out her desk in the drawing-room and sat down and wrote her -letter. It was difficult, though she found that it hardly took so long -as she expected. It was difficult, for she felt bound to tell him the -truth; and yet she was anxious not to spoil all his pleasure among -his friends. She told him, however, that Lady Lufton was very angry, -“unreasonably angry I must say,” she put in, in order to show that she -had not sided against him. “And indeed we have quite quarrelled, and -this has made me unhappy, as it will you, dearest; I know that. But we -both know how good she is at heart, and Justinia thinks that she had -other things to trouble her; and I hope it will all be made up before -you come home; only, dearest Mark, pray do not be longer than you said -in your last letter.” And then there were three or four paragraphs -about the babies and two about the schools, which I may as well omit. - -She had just finished her letter, and was carefully folding it for its -envelope, with the two whole five-pound notes imprudently placed within -it, when she heard a footstep on the gravel path which led up from a -small wicket to the front door. The path ran near the drawing-room -window, and she was just in time to catch a glimpse of the last fold -of a passing cloak. “It is Justinia,” she said to herself; and her -heart became disturbed at the idea of again discussing the morning’s -adventure. “What am I to do,” she had said to herself before, “if she -wants me to beg her pardon? I will not own before her that he is in the -wrong.” - -And then the door opened--for the visitor made her entrance without the -aid of any servant--and Lady Lufton herself stood before her. “Fanny,” -she said at once, “I have come to beg your pardon.” - -“Oh, Lady Lufton!” - -“I was very much harassed when you came to me just now;--by more things -than one, my dear, But, nevertheless, I should not have spoken to you -of your husband as I did, and so I have come to beg your pardon.” - -Mrs. Robarts was past answering by the time that this was said,--past -answering at least in words; so she jumped up and, with her eyes full -of tears, threw herself into her old friend’s arms. “Oh, Lady Lufton!” -she sobbed forth again. - -“You will forgive me, won’t you?” said her ladyship, as she returned -her young friend’s caress. “Well, that’s right. I have not been at all -happy since you left my den this morning, and I don’t suppose you have. -But, Fanny, dearest, we love each other too well and know each other -too thoroughly, to have a long quarrel, don’t we?” - -“Oh, yes, Lady Lufton.” - -“Of course we do. Friends are not to be picked up on the road-side -every day; nor are they to be thrown away lightly. And now sit down, -my love, and let us have a little talk. There, I must take my bonnet -off. You have pulled the strings so that you have almost choked me.” -And Lady Lufton deposited her bonnet on the table and seated herself -comfortably in the corner of the sofa. - -“My dear,” she said, “there is no duty which any woman owes to any -other human being at all equal to that which she owes to her husband, -and, therefore, you were quite right to stand up for Mr. Robarts this -morning.” - -Upon this Mrs. Robarts said nothing, but she got her hand within that -of her ladyship and gave it a slight squeeze. - -“And I loved you for what you were doing all the time. I did, my dear; -though you were a little fierce, you know. Even Justinia admits that, -and she has been at me ever since you went away. And indeed, I did not -know that it was in you to look in that way out of those pretty eyes of -yours.” - -“Oh, Lady Lufton!” - -“But I looked fierce enough too myself, I dare say; so we’ll say -nothing more about that; will we? But now, about this good man of -yours?” - -“Dear Lady Lufton, you must forgive him.” - -“Well: as you ask me, I will. We’ll have nothing more said about the -duke, either now or when he comes back; not a word. Let me see--he’s to -be back;--when is it?” - -“Wednesday week, I think.” - -“Ah, Wednesday. Well, tell him to come and dine up at the house on -Wednesday. He’ll be in time, I suppose, and there shan’t be a word said -about this horrid duke.” - -“I am so much obliged to you, Lady Lufton.” - -“But look here, my dear; believe me, he’s better off without such -friends.” - -“Oh, I know he is; much better off.” - -“Well, I’m glad you admit that, for I thought you seemed to be in -favour of the duke.” - -“Oh, no, Lady Lufton.” - -“That’s right, then. And now, if you’ll take my advice, you’ll use your -influence, as a good, dear sweet wife as you are, to prevent his going -there any more. I’m an old woman and he is a young man, and it’s very -natural that he should think me behind the times. I’m not angry at -that. But he’ll find that it’s better for him, better for him in every -way, to stick to his old friends. It will be better for his peace of -mind, better for his character as a clergyman, better for his pocket, -better for his children and for you,--and better for his eternal -welfare. The duke is not such a companion as he should seek;--nor if he -is sought, should he allow himself to be led away.” - -And then Lady Lufton ceased, and Fanny Robarts kneeling at her feet -sobbed, with her face hidden on her friend’s knees. She had not a word -now to say as to her husband’s capability of judging for himself. - -“And now I must be going again; but Justinia has made me -promise,--promise, mind you, most solemnly, that I would have you back -to dinner to-night,--by force if necessary. It was the only way I could -make my peace with her; so you must not leave me in the lurch.” Of -course, Fanny said that she would go and dine at Framley Court. - -“And you must not send that letter, by any means,” said her ladyship -as she was leaving the room, poking with her umbrella at the epistle -which lay directed on Mrs. Robarts’s desk. “I can understand very well -what it contains. You must alter it altogether, my dear.” And then Lady -Lufton went. - -Mrs. Robarts instantly rushed to her desk and tore open her letter. She -looked at her watch and it was past four. She had hardly begun another -when the postman came. “Oh, Mary,” she said, “do make him wait. If -he’ll wait a quarter of an hour I’ll give him a shilling.” - -“There’s no need of that, ma’am. Let him have a glass of beer.” - -“Very well, Mary; but don’t give him too much, for fear he should drop -the letters about. I’ll be ready in ten minutes.” - -And in five minutes she had scrawled a very different sort of a letter. -But he might want the money immediately, so she would not delay it for -a day. - - -CHAPTER VI. - -MR. HAROLD SMITH’S LECTURE. - -On the whole the party at Chaldicotes was very pleasant and the -time passed away quickly enough. Mr. Robarts’s chief friend there, -independently of Mr. Sowerby, was Miss Dunstable, who seemed to take -a great fancy to him, whereas she was not very accessible to the -blandishments of Mr. Supplehouse, nor more specially courteous even to -her host than good manners required of her. But then Mr. Supplehouse -and Mr. Sowerby were both bachelors, while Mark Robarts was a married -man. - -With Mr. Sowerby Robarts had more than one communication respecting -Lord Lufton and his affairs, which he would willingly have avoided had -it been possible. Sowerby was one of those men who are always mixing up -business with pleasure, and who have usually some scheme in their mind -which requires forwarding. Men of this class have, as a rule, no daily -work, no regular routine of labour; but it may be doubted whether they -do not toil much more incessantly than those who have. - -“Lufton is so dilatory,” Mr. Sowerby said. “Why did he not arrange this -at once, when he promised it? And then he is so afraid of that old -woman at Framley Court. Well, my dear fellow, say what you will; she is -an old woman and she’ll never be younger. But do write to Lufton and -tell him that this delay is inconvenient to me; he’ll do anything for -you, I know.” - -Mark said that he would write, and, indeed, did do so; but he did not -at first like the tone of the conversation into which he was dragged. -It was very painful to him to hear Lady Lufton called an old woman, and -hardly less so to discuss the propriety of Lord Lufton’s parting with -his property. This was irksome to him, till habit made it easy. But by -degrees his feelings became less acute and he accustomed himself to his -friend Sowerby’s mode of talking. - -And then on the Saturday afternoon they all went over to Barchester. -Harold Smith during the last forty-eight hours had become crammed to -overflowing with Sarawak, Labuan, New Guinea, and the Salomon Islands. -As is the case with all men labouring under temporary specialities, -he for the time had faith in nothing else, and was not content that -any one near him should have any other faith. They called him Viscount -Papua and Baron Borneo; and his wife, who headed the joke against him, -insisted on having her title. Miss Dunstable swore that she would wed -none but a South Sea islander; and to Mark was offered the income and -duties of Bishop of Spices. Nor did the Proudie family set themselves -against these little sarcastic quips with any overwhelming severity. -It is sweet to unbend oneself at the proper opportunity, and this was -the proper opportunity for Mrs. Proudie’s unbending. No mortal can be -seriously wise at all hours; and in these happy hours did that usually -wise mortal, the bishop, lay aside for awhile his serious wisdom. - -“We think of dining at five to-morrow, my Lady Papua,” said the -facetious bishop; “will that suit his lordship and the affairs of -State? he! he! he!” And the good prelate laughed at the fun. - -How pleasantly young men and women of fifty or thereabouts can joke -and flirt and poke their fun about, laughing and holding their sides, -dealing in little innuendoes and rejoicing in nicknames when they have -no Mentors of twenty-five or thirty near them to keep them in order. -The vicar of Framley might perhaps have been regarded as such a Mentor, -were it not for that capability of adapting himself to the company -immediately around him on which he so much piqued himself. He therefore -also talked to my Lady Papua, and was jocose about the Baron,--not -altogether to the satisfaction of Mr. Harold Smith himself. - -For Mr. Harold Smith was in earnest and did not quite relish these -jocundities. He had an idea that he could in about three months talk -the British world into civilizing New Guinea, and that the world of -Barsetshire would be made to go with him by one night’s efforts. He did -not understand why others should be less serious, and was inclined to -resent somewhat stiffly the amenities of our friend Mark. - -“We must not keep the Baron waiting,” said Mark, as they were preparing -to start for Barchester. - -“I don’t know what you mean by the Baron, sir,” said Harold Smith. “But -perhaps the joke will be against you, when you are getting up into your -pulpit to-morrow and sending the hat round among the clodhoppers of -Chaldicotes.” - -“Those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones; eh, Baron?” -said Miss Dunstable. “Mr. Robarts’s sermon will be too near akin to -your lecture to allow of his laughing.” - -“If we can do nothing towards instructing the outer world till it’s -done by the parsons,” said Harold Smith, “the outer world will have to -wait a long time, I fear.” - -“Nobody can do anything of that kind short of a member of parliament -and a would-be minister,” whispered Mrs. Harold. - -And so they were all very pleasant together, in spite of a little -fencing with edge tools; and at three o’clock the _cortége_ of -carriages started for Barchester, that of the bishop, of course, -leading the way. His lordship, however, was not in it. - -“Mrs. Proudie, I’m sure you’ll let me go with you,” said Miss -Dunstable, at the last moment, as she came down the big stone steps. “I -want to hear the rest of that story about Mr. Slope.” - -Now this upset everything. The bishop was to have gone with his wife, -Mrs. Smith, and Mark Robarts; and Mr. Sowerby had so arranged matters -that he could have accompanied Miss Dunstable in his phaeton. But no -one ever dreamed of denying Miss Dunstable anything. Of course Mark -gave way; but it ended in the bishop declaring that he had no special -predilection for his own carriage, which he did in compliance with a -glance from his wife’s eye. Then other changes of course followed, and, -at last, Mr. Sowerby and Harold Smith were the joint occupants of the -phaeton. - -The poor lecturer, as he seated himself, made some remark such as those -he had been making for the last two days--for out of a full heart the -mouth speaketh. But he spoke to an impatient listener. “D---- the South -Sea islanders,” said Mr. Sowerby. “You’ll have it all your own way in -a few minutes, like a bull in a china-shop; but for Heaven’s sake let -us have a little peace till that time comes.” It appeared that Mr. -Sowerby’s little plan of having Miss Dunstable for his companion was -not quite insignificant; and, indeed, it may be said that but few of -his little plans were so. At the present moment he flung himself back -in the carriage and prepared for sleep. He could further no plan of his -by a _tête-à-tête_ conversation with his brother-in-law. - -And then Mrs. Proudie began her story about Mr. Slope, or rather -recommenced it. She was very fond of talking about this gentleman, who -had once been her pet chaplain but was now her bitterest foe; and in -telling the story, she had sometimes to whisper to Miss Dunstable, for -there were one or two fie-fie little anecdotes about a married lady, -not altogether fit for young Mr. Robarts’s ears. But Mrs. Harold Smith -insisted on having them out loud, and Miss Dunstable would gratify that -lady in spite of Mrs. Proudie’s winks. - -“What, kissing her hand, and he a clergyman!” said Miss Dunstable. “I -did not think they ever did such things, Mr. Robarts.” - -“Still waters run deepest,” said Mrs. Harold Smith. - -“Hush-h-h,” looked, rather than spoke, Mrs. Proudie. “The grief of -spirit which that bad man caused me nearly broke my heart, and all the -while, you know, he was courting--” and then Mrs. Proudie whispered a -name. - -“What, the dean’s wife!” shouted Miss Dunstable, in a voice which made -the coachman of the next carriage give a chuck to his horses as he -overheard her. - -“The archdeacon’s sister-in-law!” screamed Mrs. Harold Smith. - -“What might he not have attempted next?” said Miss Dunstable. - -“She wasn’t the dean’s wife then, you know,” said Mrs. Proudie, -explaining. - -“Well, you’ve a gay set in the chapter, I must say,” said Miss -Dunstable. “You ought to make one of them in Barchester, Mr. Robarts.” - -“Only perhaps Mrs. Robarts might not like it,” said Mrs. Harold Smith. - -“And then the schemes which he tried on with the bishop!” said Mrs. -Proudie. - -“It’s all fair in love and war, you know,” said Miss Dunstable. - -“But he little knew whom he had to deal with when he began that,” said -Mrs. Proudie. - -“The bishop was too many for him,” suggested Mrs. Harold Smith, very -maliciously. - -“If the bishop was not, somebody else was; and he was obliged to leave -Barchester in utter disgrace. He has since married the wife of some -tallow chandler.” - -“The wife!” said Miss Dunstable. “What a man!” - -“Widow, I mean; but it’s all one to him.” - -“The gentleman was clearly born when Venus was in the ascendant,” -said Mrs. Smith. “You clergymen usually are, I believe, Mr. Robarts.” -So that Mrs. Proudie’s carriage was by no means the dullest as they -drove into Barchester that day; and by degrees our friend Mark became -accustomed to his companions, and before they reached the palace he -acknowledged to himself that Miss Dunstable was very good fun. - -We cannot linger over the bishop’s dinner, though it was very good of -its kind; and as Mr. Sowerby contrived to sit next to Miss Dunstable, -thereby overturning a little scheme made by Mr. Supplehouse, he again -shone forth in unclouded good humour. But Mr. Harold Smith became -impatient immediately on the withdrawal of the cloth. The lecture was -to begin at seven, and according to his watch that hour had already -come. He declared that Sowerby and Supplehouse were endeavouring to -delay matters in order that the Barchesterians might become vexed -and impatient; and so the bishop was not allowed to exercise his -hospitality in true episcopal fashion. - -“You forget, Sowerby,” said Supplehouse, “that the world here for the -last fortnight has been looking forward to nothing else.” - -“The world shall be gratified at once,” said Mrs. Harold, obeying a -little nod from Mrs. Proudie. “Come, my dear,” and she took hold of -Miss Dunstable’s arm, “don’t let us keep Barchester waiting. We shall -be ready in a quarter-of-an-hour, shall we not, Mrs. Proudie?” and so -they sailed off. - -“And we shall have time for one glass of claret,” said the bishop. - -“There; that’s seven by the cathedral,” said Harold Smith, jumping up -from his chair as he heard the clock. “If the people have come it would -not be right in me to keep them waiting, and I shall go.” - -“Just one glass of claret, Mr. Smith; and we’ll be off,” said the -bishop. - -“Those women will keep me an hour,” said Harold, filling his glass, and -drinking it standing. “They do it on purpose.” He was thinking of his -wife, but it seemed to the bishop as though his guest were actually -speaking of Mrs. Proudie! - -It was rather late when they all found themselves in the big room -of the Mechanics’ Institute; but I do not know whether this on the -whole did them any harm. Most of Mr. Smith’s hearers, excepting the -party from the palace, were Barchester tradesmen with their wives and -families; and they waited, not impatiently, for the big people. And -then the lecture was gratis, a fact which is always borne in mind by an -Englishman when he comes to reckon up and calculate the way in which he -is treated. When he pays his money, then he takes his choice; he may be -impatient or not as he likes. His sense of justice teaches him so much, -and in accordance with that sense he usually acts. - -So the people on the benches rose graciously when the palace party -entered the room. Seats for them had been kept in the front. There were -three arm-chairs, which were filled, after some little hesitation, by -the bishop, Mrs. Proudie, and Miss Dunstable--Mrs. Smith positively -declining to take one of them; though, as she admitted, her rank as -Lady Papua of the islands did give her some claim. And this remark, as -it was made quite out loud, reached Mr. Smith’s ears as he stood behind -a little table on a small raised dais, holding his white kid gloves; -and it annoyed him and rather put him out. He did not like that joke -about Lady Papua. - -And then the others of the party sat upon a front bench covered -with red cloth. “We shall find this very hard and very narrow about -the second hour,” said Mr. Sowerby, and Mr. Smith on his dais again -overheard the words, and dashed his gloves down to the table. He felt -that all the room would hear it. - -And there were one or two gentlemen on the second seat who shook -hands with some of our party. There was Mr. Thorne of Ullathorne, -a good-natured old bachelor, whose residence was near enough -to Barchester to allow of his coming in without much personal -inconvenience; and next to him was Mr. Harding, an old clergyman of the -chapter, with whom Mrs. Proudie shook hands very graciously, making way -for him to seat himself close behind her if he would so please. But -Mr. Harding did not so please. Having paid his respects to the bishop -he returned quietly to the side of his old friend Mr. Thorne, thereby -angering Mrs. Proudie, as might easily be seen by her face. And Mr. -Chadwick also was there, the episcopal man of business for the diocese; -but he also adhered to the two gentlemen above named. - -And now that the bishop and the ladies had taken their places, Mr. -Harold Smith relifted his gloves and again laid them down, hummed three -times distinctly, and then began. - -“It was,” he said, “the most peculiar characteristic of the present era -in the British islands that those who were high placed before the world -in rank, wealth, and education were willing to come forward and give -their time and knowledge without fee or reward, for the advantage and -amelioration of those who did not stand so high in the social scale.” -And then he paused for a moment, during which Mrs. Smith remarked to -Miss Dunstable that that was pretty well for a beginning; and Miss -Dunstable replied, “that as for herself she felt very grateful to -rank, wealth, and education.” Mr. Sowerby winked to Mr. Supplehouse, -who opened his eyes very wide and shrugged his shoulders. But the -Barchesterians took it all in good part and gave the lecturer the -applause of their hands and feet. - -And then, well pleased, he recommenced--“I do not make these remarks -with reference to myself----” - -“I hope he’s not going to be modest,” said Miss Dunstable. - -“It will be quite new if he is,” replied Mrs. Smith. - -“----so much as to many noble and talented lords and members of the -lower house who have lately from time to time devoted themselves to -this good work.” And then he went through a long list of peers and -members of parliament, beginning, of course, with Lord Boanerges, and -ending with Mr. Green Walker, a young gentleman who had lately been -returned by his uncle’s interest for the borough of Crew Junction, and -had immediately made his entrance into public life by giving a lecture -on the grammarians of the Latin language as exemplified at Eton school. - -“On the present occasion,” Mr. Smith continued, “our object is to learn -something as to those grand and magnificent islands which lie far away, -beyond the Indies, in the Southern Ocean; the lands of which produce -rich spices and glorious fruits, and whose seas are imbedded with -pearls and corals, Papua and the Philippines, Borneo and the Moluccas. -My friends, you are familiar with your maps, and you know the track -which the equator makes for itself through those distant oceans.” And -then many heads were turned down, and there was a rustle of leaves; -for not a few of those “who stood not so high in the social scale” had -brought their maps with them, and refreshed their memories as to the -whereabouts of these wondrous islands. - -And then Mr. Smith also, with a map in his hand, and pointing -occasionally to another large map which hung against the wall, went -into the geography of the matter. “We might have found that out from -our atlases, I think, without coming all the way to Barchester,” -said that unsympathizing helpmate Mrs. Harold, very cruelly--most -illogically too, for there be so many things which we could find out -ourselves by search, but which we never do find out unless they be -specially told us; and why should not the latitude and longitude of -Labuan be one--or rather two of these things? - -And then, when he had duly marked the path of the line through Borneo, -Celebes, and Gilolo, through the Macassar strait and the Molucca -passage, Mr. Harold Smith rose to a higher flight. “But what,” said he, -“avails all that God can give to man, unless man will open his hand to -receive the gift? And what is this opening of the hand but the process -of civilization--yes, my friends, the process of civilization? These -South Sea islanders have all that a kind Providence can bestow on -them; but that all is as nothing without education. That education and -that civilization it is for you to bestow upon them--yes, my friends, -for you; for you, citizens of Barchester as you are.” And then he -paused again, in order that the feet and hands might go to work. The -feet and hands did go to work, during which Mr. Smith took a slight -drink of water. - -He was now quite in his element and had got into the proper way of -punching the table with his fists. A few words dropping from Mr. -Sowerby did now and again find their way to his ears, but the sound of -his own voice had brought with it the accustomed charm, and he ran on -from platitude to truism, and from truism back to platitude, with an -eloquence that was charming to himself. - -“Civilization,” he exclaimed, lifting up his eyes and hands to the -ceiling. “Oh, civilization----” - -“There will not be a chance for us now for the next hour and a half,” -said Mr. Supplehouse groaning. - -Harold Smith cast one eye down at him, but it immediately flew back to -the ceiling. - -“Oh, civilization! thou that ennoblest mankind and makest him equal to -the gods, what is like unto thee?” Here Mrs. Proudie showed evident -signs of disapprobation, which no doubt would have been shared by -the bishop, had not that worthy prelate been asleep. But Mr. Smith -continued unobservant; or, at any rate, regardless. - -“What is like unto thee? Thou art the irrigating stream which makest -fertile the barren plain. Till thou comest all is dark and dreary; but -at thy advent the noontide sun shines out, the earth gives forth her -increase; the deep bowels of the rocks render up their tribute. Forms -which were dull and hideous become endowed with grace and beauty, and -vegetable existence rises to the scale of celestial life. Then, too, -genius appears clad in a panoply of translucent armour, grasping in -his hand the whole terrestrial surface, and making every rood of earth -subservient to his purposes;--Genius, the child of civilization, the -mother of the Arts!” - -The last little bit, taken from the Pedigree of Progress, had a great -success and all Barchester went to work with its hands and feet;--all -Barchester, except that ill-natured aristocratic front-row together -with the three arm-chairs at the corner of it. The aristocratic -front-row felt itself to be too intimate with civilization to care -much about it; and the three arm-chairs, or rather that special one -which contained Mrs. Proudie, considered that there was a certain -heathenness, a pagan sentimentality almost amounting to infidelity, -contained in the lecturer’s remarks, with which she, a pillar of the -church, could not put up, seated as she was now in public conclave. - -“It is to civilization that we must look,” continued Mr. Harold Smith, -descending from poetry to prose as a lecturer well knows how, and -thereby showing the value of both--“for any material progress in these -islands; and----” - -“And to Christianity,” shouted Mrs. Proudie, to the great amazement -of the assembled people and to the thorough wakening of the bishop, -who, jumping up in his chair at the sound of the well-known voice, -exclaimed, “Certainly, certainly.” - -“Hear, hear, hear,” said those on the benches who particularly belonged -to Mrs. Proudie’s school of divinity in the city, and among the voices -was distinctly heard that of a new verger in whose behalf she had -greatly interested herself. - -“Oh, yes, Christianity of course,” said Harold Smith, upon whom the -interruption did not seem to operate favourably. - -“Christianity and Sabbath-day observance,” exclaimed Mrs. Proudie, who -now that she had obtained the ear of the public seemed well inclined to -keep it. “Let us never forget that these islanders can never prosper -unless they keep the Sabbath holy.” - -Poor Mr. Smith, having been so rudely dragged from his high horse, was -never able to mount it again, and completed the lecture in a manner -not at all comfortable to himself. He had there, on the table before -him, a huge bundle of statistics with which he had meant to convince -the reason of his hearers after he had taken full possession of their -feelings. But they fell very dull and flat. And at the moment when he -was interrupted he was about to explain that that material progress to -which he had alluded could not be attained without money; and that it -behoved them, the people of Barchester before him, to come forward with -their purses like men and brothers. He did also attempt this; but from -the moment of that fatal onslaught from the arm-chair, it was clear to -him and to every one else, that Mrs. Proudie was now the hero of the -hour. His time had gone by, and the people of Barchester did not care a -straw for his appeal. - -From these causes the lecture was over full twenty minutes earlier -than any one had expected, to the great delight of Messrs. Sowerby and -Supplehouse, who, on that evening, moved and carried a vote of thanks -to Mrs. Proudie. For they had gay doings yet before they went to their -beds. - -“Robarts, here one moment,” Mr. Sowerby said, as they were standing -at the door of the Mechanics’ Institute. “Don’t you go off with Mr. -and Mrs. Bishop. We are going to have a little supper at the Dragon of -Wantly, and after what we have gone through upon my word we want it. -You can tell one of the palace servants to let you in.” - -Mark considered the proposal wistfully. He would fain have joined the -supper-party had he dared; but he, like many others of his cloth, had -the fear of Mrs. Proudie before his eyes. - -And a very merry supper they had; but poor Mr. Harold Smith was not the -merriest of the party. - - - - -Tithonus. - - - Ay me! ay me! the woods decay and fall, - The vapours weep their burthen to the ground, - Man comes and tills the earth and lies beneath, - And after many a summer dies the swan. - Me only cruel immortality - Consumes: I wither slowly in thine arms, - Here at the quiet limit of the world, - A white-hair’d shadow roaming like a dream - The ever silent spaces of the East, - Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn. - - Alas! for this gray shadow, once a man-- - So glorious in his beauty and thy choice, - Who madest him thy chosen, that he seem’d - To his great heart none other than a God! - I ask’d thee, “Give me immortality.” - Then didst thou grant mine asking with a smile, - Like wealthy men who care not how they give. - But thy strong Hours indignant work’d their wills, - And beat me down and marr’d and wasted me, - And tho’ they could not end me, left me maim’d - To dwell in presence of immortal youth, - Immortal age beside immortal youth, - And all I was, in ashes. Can thy love, - Thy beauty, make amends, tho’ even now, - Close over us, the silver star, thy guide, - Shines in those tremulous eyes that fill with tears - To hear me? Let me go: take back thy gift: - Why should a man desire in any way - To vary from the kindly race of men, - Or pass beyond the goal of ordinance - Where all should pause, as is most meet for all? - - A soft air fans the cloud apart; there comes - A glimpse of that dark world where I was born. - Once more the old mysterious glimmer steals - From thy pure brows, and from thy shoulders pure, - And bosom beating with a heart renew’d. - Thy cheek begins to redden thro’ the gloom, - Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly close to mine, - Ere yet they blind the stars, and that wild team - Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, arise, - And shake the darkness from their loosen’d manes, - And beat the twilight into flakes of fire. - - Lo! ever thus thou growest beautiful - In silence, then before thine answer given - Departest, and thy tears are on my cheek. - - Why wilt thou ever scare me with thy tears, - And make me tremble lest a saying learnt, - In days far-off, on that dark earth, be true? - “The Gods themselves cannot recall their gifts.” - - Ay me! ay me! with what another heart - In days far-off, and with what other eyes - I used to watch--if I be he that watch’d-- - The lucid outline forming round thee, saw - The dim curls kindle into sunny rings, - Changed with thy mystic change, and felt my blood - Glow with the glow that slowly crimson’d all - Thy presence and thy portals, while I lay, - Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy-warm - With kisses balmier than half-opening buds - Of April, and could hear the lips that kiss’d - Whispering I knew not what of wild and sweet, - Like that strange song I heard Apollo sing - While Ilion like a mist rose into towers. - - Yet hold me not for ever in thine East: - How can my nature longer mix with thine? - Coldly thy rosy shadows bathe me, cold - Are all thy lights, and cold my wrinkled feet - Upon thy glimmering thresholds, when the steam - Floats up from those dim fields about the homes - Of happy men that have the power to die, - And grassy barrows of the happier dead. - Release me, and restore me to the ground; - Thou seëst all things, thou wilt see my grave: - Thou wilt renew thy beauty morn by morn; - I earth in earth forget these empty courts, - And thee returning on thy silver wheels. - - ALFRED TENNYSON. - - - - -William Hogarth: - -PAINTER, ENGRAVER, AND PHILOSOPHER. - -_Essays on the Man, the Work, and the Time._ - - -I.--LITTLE BOY HOGARTH. - -“The Life and Adventures of William Hogarth,”--that would be a taking -title, indeed! To do for the great painter of manners that which Mr. -Forster has done for their great describer, would be a captivating -task; and, successfully accomplished, might entitle a man to wear some -little sprig of laurel in his cap, and rest, thenceforth, on his oars. -It is not my fortune to have the means of writing such a book; and, for -many reasons, this performance must be limited to a series of Essays -upon the genius and character of the MAN Hogarth; upon the WORK he was -permitted, by a healthful, sanguine constitution and by great powers -of will and self-reliance backboning an unflagging industry, to get -through in his appointed span here below; and upon the curious quaint -TIME in which he lived and did his work. Hogarth’s life, away from -his works and times, would be but a barren theme. Those old Italian -painting men had strange adventures and vicissitudes. Rafaelle’s life -was one brief glorious romance. Leonardo had a king’s arms to die in. -Buonarotti lived amidst battles and sieges, and held flouting matches -with popes. Titian’s pencil was picked up by an emperor. The Germans -and Dutchmen, even, were picturesque and eventful in their careers. Was -not Rubens an ambassador? Are there not mysterious dealings between -Rembrandt and the Jews that have not yet been fathomed? Did not Peter -de Laar kill a monk? But in what manner is the historian to extract -exciting elements from the history of a chubby little man in a cocked -hat and scarlet roque-laure, who lived at the sign of the “Painter’s -Head” in Leicester Fields, and died in his bed there in competence and -honour; who was the son of a schoolmaster in the Old Bailey, and the -descendant of a long line of north country yeomen, of whom the prime -progenitor is presumed to have kept pigs and to have gone by the rude -name of “Hogherd”--whence Hogard and Hogart, at last liquefied into -Hogarth? Benvenuto Cellini worked for the silversmiths, but at least -he had poniarded his man and lain for his sins in the dungeons of St. -Angelo; our Hogarth was a plain silversmith’s apprentice, in Cranbourn -Alley. He kept a shop afterwards, and engraved tankards and salvers, -and never committed a graver act of violence than to throw a pewter -pot at the head of a ruffian who had insulted him during an outing to -Highgate. Honest man! they never sent him to Newgate or the Tower. -Only once he was clapped up for an hour or so in a Calais guardhouse, -and, coming home by the next packet-boat, took a stout revenge on the -frog-eaters with his etching needle upon copper. He was no great -traveller; and beyond the Calais ship just spoken of, does not appear -to have undertaken any journeys more important than the immortal -excursion to Rochester, of which the chronicle, illustrated by his -own sketches, is still extant, (those doughty setters-forth from the -Bedford Head were decidedly the first Pickwickians,) and a jaunt to St. -Alban’s after Culloden, to sketch the trapped fox Simon Fraser Lord -Lovat, as he sate in the inn-room under the barber’s hands, counting -the dispersed Highland clans and their available forces of caterans and -brae-men on his half-palsied, crooked, picking and stealing fingers. - -William Hogarth did but one romantic thing in his life, and that was, -to run away with Sir James Thornhill’s pretty daughter; and even that -escapade soon resolved itself into a cheery, English, business-like, -house-keeping union. Papa-in-law--who painted cathedral cupolas at -forty shillings a yard--forgave William and Jane. William loved his -wife dearly--she had her tempers, and he was not a man of snow--took -a country house for her, and set up a coach when things were going -prosperously and he was Sergeant Painter to King George; and when -William (not quite a dotard, as the twin-scamps Wilkes and Churchill -called him) died, Jane made a comfortable living by selling impressions -of the plates he had engraved. These and the writing of the _Analysis -of Beauty_, the dispute concerning Sigismunda, the interest taken in -the welfare of the Foundling Hospital, the dedication [in a pique -against the king who hated “boets and bainters,”] of the _March to -Finchley_ to Frederick the Great, and the abortive picture auction -scheme, are very nearly all the notable events in the life of William -Hogarth. And yet the man left a name remembered now with affection and -applause, and which will be remembered, and honoured, and glorified -when, to quote the self-conscious Unknown who used the _Public -Advertiser_ as a fulcrum for that terrible lever of his, “kings and -ministers are forgotten, the force and direction of personal satire -are no longer understood, and measures are felt only in their remotest -consequences.” - -By the announcement, then, that I do not contemplate, here, a complete -biography of Hogarth: that I do not know enough to complete a reliable -and authentic life: “_nec, si sciam, dicere ausim_:” these papers are -to be considered but as “_Mémoires pour servir_;” little photographs -and chalk studies of drapery, furniture, accessories of costume and -snuff-box, cocked hat and silver buckle detail, all useful enough in -their place and way, but quite subordinate and inferior to the grand -design and complete picture of the hero. I am aware that high critical -authorities have been inveighing lately against the employment of -the costumiers and _bric a brac_ shop-keepers and inventory takers’ -attributes in biography; and writers are enjoined, under heavy -penalties, to be, all of them, Plutarchs, and limn their characters -in half a dozen broad vigorous dashes. It can conduce little, it has -been argued, towards our knowledge of the Seven Years’ War to be told -that Frederick the Great wore a pigtail, and that to his jackboots “Day -and Martin with their soot-pots were forbidden to approach;” and it -has been asked whether any likelihood exists of our knowing more of -the character of Napoleon Bonaparte from the sight of his cocked hat -and toothbrush at Madame Tussaud’s. Presuming to run counter to the -opinion of the high critical authorities, I would point out that the -very best biographies that have ever been written--those of Samuel -Johnson, Samuel Pepys [his diary being eminently biographical], Lord -Herbert of Cherbury, and Jean Jacques Rousseau [in the _Confessions_, -and bating the lies and madnesses with which that poor crazed wanderer -disfigures an otherwise limpid narrative]--are full of those little -scraps and fragments of minute cross-hatching, chronicles of “seven -livres three sols, parisis,” lamentable records of unpaid-for hose, -histories of joyous carouses, anecdotes of men and women’s meannesses -and generosities, and the like. On the other hand, how cold, pallid, -unhuman, is the half-dozen-line character, with all its broad vigorous -dashes! Certain Roman emperors might have come out far better fellows -from the historian’s alembic if their togas and sandals had been more -scrupulously dwelt upon. Is our awful veneration for St. Augustine -one whit diminished by the small deer he condescends to hunt in the -history of his youth? The heaviest blow and greatest discouragement -to the composition of admirable biographies, are in the fact that -strength and delicacy, vigour and finish, are seldom combined; and that -a Milton with a dash of the macaroni in him is a _rara avis_ indeed. -Now and then we find an elephant that can dance on the tight-rope -without being either awkward or grotesque; now and then we find a man -with a mind like a Nasmyth’s steam hammer, that can roll out huge -bars of iron, and anon knock a tin-tack into a deal board with gentle -accurate taps. These are the men who can describe a Revolution, and by -its side the corned beef and carrots which country parsons were once -glad to eat; who can tell us how the Bastille was stormed, and, a few -pages on, what manner of coat and small clothes wore Philip Egalité at -his guillotining. When we find such men we christen them Macaulay or -Carlyle. - -The latitude, therefore, I take through incapacity for accuracy, saves -me from inflicting on you a long prolegomena; saves me from scoring the -basement of this page with foot-notes, or its margins with references; -saves me from denouncing the “British Dryasdust,” from whom I have -culled the scanty dates and facts, the mile and year stones in William -Hogarth’s life. Indeed, he has been very useful to me, this British -Dryasdust, and I should have made but a sorry figure without him. He or -they--Nichols, Steevens, Trusler, Rouquet, Ireland, Ducarel, Burn--have -but little to tell; but that which they know, they declare in a frank, -straightforward manner. Among commentators on Hogarth, Ireland is the -best; Trusler, the worst. T. Clerk and T. H. Horne also edited (1810) -a voluminous edition of Hogarth’s works, accompanied by a sufficiently -jejune _Life_. Allan Cunningham, in the _British Painters_, has given -a lively, agreeable adaptation of all who have come before him, spiced -and brightened by his own clear appreciation of, and love for, art -and its professors. Half a day’s reading, however, will tell you all -that these writers know. Horace Walpole for criticism on Hogarth is -admirable; lucid, elegant, and--a wonder with the dilettante friend -of Madame du Deffand--generous. The mere explicatory testimony as to -the principal Hogarthian series or engraved dramas by the Sire Rouquet -[he was a Swiss] cited above, is valuable; the more so, that he was -a friend of the painter, and, it is conjectured, took many of his -instructions viva voce from William Hogarth himself. The Germans have -not been indifferent to the merits of the great humoristic painter; and -a certain Herr Von Fürstenburg has found out some odd things connected -with suggestive objects in one of the most famous scenes of the first -series--the _Kate Hackabout_, _Mother Needham_, and _Colonel Charteris -epopœiœ_--never dreamt of previously in the good people of England’s -philosophy. Occasionally, too, in a French _Revue_, you meet with an -_Etude_ on _La vie et les ouvrages de Hogarth_, giving us little beyond -a fresh opportunity to be convinced that, if there exist on earth a -people of whose manners and customs the French know considerably less -than about those of the man in the moon, that people are the English. - -By his own countrymen, William Hogarth has ever been justly and -honourably treated. He was an outspoken man, and his pencil and -graver were as unbridled as his tongue. His works have a taint of the -coarseness, but not of the vice of his age. Most at home would be many -of his works, perhaps, in low tap-rooms and skittle-alleys; but he was -no Boucher or Fragonard to paint alcoves or _dessus de portes_ for -the contemporary Cotillons I. and Cotillons II., for the Pompadours -and Dubarrys of Louis the well-beloved. He was vulgar and ignoble -frequently, but the next generation of his countrymen forgave him these -faults--forgave him for the sake of his honesty, his stern justice, his -unbending defence of right and denunciation of wrong. This philosopher -ever preached the sturdy English virtues that have made us what we -are. He taught us to fear God and honour the King; to shun idleness, -extravagance, and dissipation; to go to church, help the poor, and -treat dumb animals with kindness; to abhor knavery, hypocrisy, and -avarice. For this reason is it that Sectarianism itself (though he was -hard against tub-thumping) has raised but a very weak and bleating -voice against Hogarth’s “improprieties;” that cheap and popular -editions of his works have been multiplied, even in this fastidious -nineteenth century; that in hundreds of decorous family libraries a -plump copy of Hogarth complete may be found [yes: I have heard the -stateliest old ladies chat about the history of _Kate Hackabout_, and I -have seen age explaining to youth and beauty--that came in a carriage -to Marlborough House--the marvellous _Marriage à la Mode_ in the Vernon -collections]; that, finally--and which may be regarded as a good and -gratifying stamp of the man’s excellence and moral worth--the Church -of England have always been favourable to William Hogarth. An Anglican -bishop wrote the poetic legends to the _Rake’s Progress_; and Hogarth -has been patronized by the beneficed and dignified clergy ever since. - -So come, then, William Hogarth, and let me in these essays strive to -glorify thy painting, thy engraving, and thy philosophy. Let me stand -over against thee, and walk round thee--yea, and sometimes wander for a -little while quite away from thee, endeavouring to explore the timeous -world as thou knew it. But be thou always near: the statue on the -pedestal, the picture on the wall, the genius of the place, to recall -me when I stray, to remind me when I am forgetful, to reprove me when I -err! - -Born in the Old Bailey, and the ninth year of William the Dutchman, -that should properly be my starting point; but the reader must first -come away with me to Westmoreland, and into the Vale of Bampton--to -a village sixteen miles north of Kendal and Windermere Lake. In this -district had lived for centuries a family of yeomen, called Hogart -or Hogard: the founder of the family, as I have hinted, may have -been Hogherd, from his vocation--a guardian of swine. _His_ father, -perchance, was that Gurth, the son of Beowulph, erst thrall to Cedric -the Saxon, and who, after his emancipation by the worthy but irascible -Franklin for good suit and service rendered in the merry greenwood, -gave himself, or had given to him in pride and joy, that which he had -never had before--a surname; and so, emigrating northwards, became -progenitor of a free race of Hogherds. In this same Bampton Vale, the -Hogarts possessed a small freehold; and of this tenement, the other -rude elders being beyond my ken, the grandfather of the painter was -holder in the middle of the seventeenth century. To him were three -sons. The eldest succeeded to the freehold, and was no more heard -of, his name being written in clods. He tilled the earth, ate of -its fruits, and, his time being come, died. The two remaining sons, -as the custom of Borough English did not prevail in Bampton, had to -provide for themselves. Son intermediate--my William’s uncle--was a -genius. Adam Walker, writer on natural philosophy, and who was the -friend and correspondent of Nicholls of the _Anecdotes_, called him -a “mountain Theocritus;” his contemporaries, with less elegance but -more enthusiasm, dubbed him “Auld Hogart.” He was a poet, humorist, -satirist, and especially a dramatist; and coarse plays of his, full of -coarse fun, rough and ready action, and sarcastic hard hitting, yet -linger, more by oral tradition than by any manuscript remains of his, -among the Westmoreland fells. These were all written, too, in the very -hardest, thickest, and broadest Westmoreland dialect; a patois to which -Tim Bobbin’s Lancashire dialect is as mellifluous as the _langue d’oc_; -a patois which has been compared to the speech of Demosthenes before -his course of pebbles, but which, to my ears, offers more analogy to -that which may have proceeded from the famous Anti-Philippian orator -_during_ the pebble probation; and in order to speak which patois -fluently (after the pebbles), an admirable apprenticeship is to fill -your mouth as full as possible of the gritty oatcake, or “clapt bread,” -which is kept in the “cratch,” or rack suspended from the ceiling -in Westmoreland farmhouses. In this Scythian speech, however, “auld -Hogart” concocted a famous drama, quite in the Lope de Vega’s manner, -called _Troy Taken_. I do not compare the play unadvisedly with those -of the prolific Spanish playwright. You know how artfully Lope’s plays -begin: with what immediate action and seduction of its audience to a -foregone conclusion. The curtain draws up. A man in a cloak crosses the -stage. A masked cavalier rushes after him with a drawn sword. There is -a _rixe_ at once established; the audience begin to imagine all sorts -of terrible things, and the success of the piece is half assured. So -“auld Hogart’s” play of _Troy Taken_, begins with a _rixe_. Paris is -seen in the very act of running away with Helen; and Menelaus runs -after them, calling “Stop thief!” With such an auspicious commencement, -and plenty of good boisterous episodes throughout: Hector dragged about -by the heels; Thersites cudgelled within an inch of his life; Achilles -storming for half an hour at the loss of Patrocles, and a real wooden -horse to finish up with: the whole spiced with “auld Hogart’s” broadest -jokes: who can wonder that _Troy Taken_ achieved immense popularity, -and that years after the death of the facetious author, natural -philosopher Adam Walker saw the piece performed from recollection by -the Troutbeck rustics, the stage a greensward, the auditorium a grassy -knoll, the canopy, Heaven? The proceedings were inaugurated by a grand -cavalcade, headed by the minstrels of five parishes, and a lusty yeoman -mounted on a bull’s back and playing on the fiddle; and as a prologue -to _Troy Taken_, there was a pilgrimage of the visitors to a stone -dropped by the enemy of mankind in an unsuccessful attempt to build a -bridge across Windermere! - -The brother of the “auld” dramatist of the _Iliad_, and third son of -the Bampton yeoman, was Richard Hogart. Without being dogmatical, I -trust that I am justified in the assumption that the “liquefaction” -of the patronymic into Hogarth was due partly to the more elegant -education of this yeoman’s son, partly to our painter’s formation of a -“genteel” connection, when he married Jane Thornhill. I have not seen -his indentures; and take the authority of Ireland for the registry of -his birth; but it is certain that he was at one period called,--ay, and -pretty well known--as Hogart: witness Swift, in his hideously clever -satire of the _Legion Club_:-- - - “How I want thee, hum’rous Hogart, - Thou, I hear, a pleasant rogue art”-- - -Now Swift wrote this in Ireland, at a distance from means of accuracy, -and the “pleasant rogue’s” name was not likely to be found in a -calendar of the nobility and gentry. If Bolingbroke or Pope had written -to the dean about the rogue and his pleasantries, it is very probable -that they might have spelt his name “Hogart,” “Hogard,” “Hoggert,” or -“Hogarth.” You must remember that scores of the most distinguished -characters of the eighteenth century were of my Lord Malmesbury’s -opinion concerning orthography, that neither the great Duke of -Marlborough, nay, nor his duchess, the terrible “old Sarah,” nay, nor -Mrs. Masham, nay, nor Queen Anne herself, could spell, and that the -young Pretender (in the Stuart papers) writes his father’s name thus: -“Gems” for “James.” Again, Swift may have suppressed the “_th_” for -mere rhythmical reasons; just as Pope, _aux abois_ between dactyls and -spondees, barbarized a name which undeniably before had been pronounced -“Saint John” into “Sinjin.” But, on the other hand, Jonathan Swift was -not so dizzy when he wrote the _Legion Club_ to have lost one pin’s -point of his marvellous memory; and he was too rich in rhymes to have -resorted to the pusillanimous expedient of cutting off a letter. If -ever a man lived who could have found an easy rhyme to “Hippopotamus,” -it was the Dean of St. Patrick’s. I opine, therefore, that when Swift -first heard of Hogarth--in the early days of George I.--he was really -called “Hogart;” that such a name was carried by the dean with him to -Dublin, and that the change to “Hogart” only took place when the great -Drapier was dying “in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole.” - -Richard Hogart--whatever he called himself in the scholastic Latinity -that converted “Saumaise” into “Salmasius,” and a Dutch logician, -“Smygel” into “Smeglesius,”--was educated at St. Bees’ College, in -Westmoreland; was too poor, it is thought, after his college course -to take orders, and kept school for a time in his native county. -His classical accomplishments were considerable. In the manuscript -department of the British Museum are preserved some Latin letters by -him; and he wrote besides a Latin-English dictionary, and a school-book -entitled _Grammar Disputatations_, which has not attained the fame or -immortality of the works of Cocker and Walkingame. It is stated that -Richard Hogart was occasionally employed as a corrector of the press; -an office then frequently discharged by trustworthy scholars quite -extraneous to the recognized staff of the printing-office. - -It is certain that, William and Mary reigning, Dominic Hogart came -to London, and established himself as a schoolmaster, in Ship Court, -Old Bailey. He had married, as it is the wont of poor schoolmasters -to do, and his wife bare him two daughters and one son. The girls -were Mary and Anne; and have only to be mentioned to pass out of this -record:--Who cares about Joseph Mallard Turner’s nephews and nieces? -The boy, WILLIAM HOGARTH, was born on the 10th of November, 1697, and -stands in the parish register of St. Bartholomew the Great, as having -been baptized, November the 28th. - -You do not expect me to tell who nursed little chubby-baby Hogarth, -whether he took to his pap kindly, and at what age he first evinced an -affection for sweet-stuff? Making, however, a very early halt in his -nonage, I am compelled to shake my head at a very pretty legend about -him, and as prettily made into a picture, some years ago. According to -this, little boy Hogarth was sent to a dame’s school, where he much -vexed the good woman who boasted “unruly brats with birch to tame,” -by a persistence in drawing caricatures on his slate. The picture -represents him in sore disgrace, mounted on the stool of repentance, -crowned with the asinine tiara of tribulation, holding in one hand the -virgal rod of anguish, and in the other the slate which has brought -him to this evil estate: a slate much bechalked with libellous -representations of his dame. In the background is that Nemesis in a -mob-cap, inflexible; around, an amphitheatre of children-spectators; -the boys, as suits their boisterous character, jeering and exultant; -the girls, as beseems their softer nature, scared and terrified. A very -pretty, naïve picture, but apocryphal, I fear. There were no slates in -dame-schools in those days. The hornbook, _Pellucid_, with its Christ -Cross Row, was the beginning of knowledge, as the “baleful twig” that -“frayed” the brats was the end thereof. If little boy Hogarth had been -born at Kirby Thore, I would have admitted the dame-school theory in an -instant; but it is far more feasible that he learnt his hornbook at his -mother’s knee, and in due time was promoted to a bench in the school -his father taught, and an impartial share in the stripes which the good -pedagogue distributed. Nor need Dominie Hogart have been by any means -a cruel pedagogue. In none of his pictures does Hogarth display any -rancour against scholastic discipline (what school-scenes that pencil -might have drawn!), and it generally happens that he who has suffered -much in the flesh as a boy, will have a fling at the rod and the ferule -when he is a man; even if he have had Orbilius for his father. And -be it kept in mind, that, although the awful Busby, who called the -birch “his sieve,” through which the cleverest boys must pass, and -who of the Bench of Bishops taught sixteen mitred ones, was but just -dead. Mr. John Locke was then also publishing his admirable treatise -on _Education_, a treatise that enjoins and inculcates tenderness and -mercy to children. - -Ship Court, Old Bailey, is on the west side of that ominous -thoroughfare, and a few doors from Ludgate Hill. By a very curious -coincidence, the house No. 67, Old Bailey, corner of Ship Court, -was occupied, about forty years ago, by a certain William Hone, an -odd, quaint, restless man, but marvellously bustling and energetic: -a man not to be “put down” by any magnates, civic, Westmonasterian, -or otherwise; and who, at 67, had a little shop, where he sold -prints and pamphlets, so very radical in their tendencies as to be -occasionally seditious, and open to some slight accusation of ribaldry -and scurrility. Here did Hone publish, in 1817, those ribald parodies -of the Litany and Catechism for which he stood three trials before -the then Lord Ellenborough, who vehemently assumed the part of public -prosecutor (staining his ermine by that act), and tried his utmost to -have Hone cast, but in vain. As to William Hone, the man drifted at -last, tired, and I hope ashamed, out of sedition and sculduddry, and, -so far as his literary undertakings went, made a good end of it. To -him we owe those capital table-books, every-day books, and year-books, -full of anecdote, quaint research, and folk-lore, which have amused -and instructed so many thousands, and have done such excellent service -to the book-making craft. Be you sure that I have Mr. Hone’s books for -the table, day and year, before me, as I write, and shall have them -these few months to come. Without such aids; without Mr. Cunningham’s -_Handbook_ and Mr. Timbs’ _Curiosities of London_; without Walpole, -Cibber, and “Rainy-day Smith;” without Ned Ward and Tom Brown; -without the Somers Tracts and the Sessions Papers; without King and -Nicholls’ anecdotes and the lives of Nollekens and Northcote; without -a set of the _British Essayists_, from Addison to Hawkesworth; without -the great _Grub-street Journal_ and the _Daily Courant_; without -Gay’s _Trivia_ and Garth’s _Dispensary_; without Aubrey, Evelyn, and -Luttrell’s diaries; without the _London Gazette_ and Defoe’s _Complete -English Tradesman_; without Swift’s _Journal to Stella_, and Vertue -and Faithorne’s maps, and Wilkinson, Strype, Maitland, Malcolm, Gwynn, -and the great Crowle Pennant; with plenty of small deer in the way -of tracts, broadsides, and selections from the bookstall-keepers’ -sweepings and the cheesemongers’ rejected addresses; without these -modest materials, how is this humble picture to be painted? - -After this little glance behind the scenes of a book-maker’s workshop, -you will be wondering, I dare say, as to what was the curious -coincidence I spoke of in connection with William Hone’s sojourn in -Ship Court, Old Bailey. Simply this. Three years after his Litany -escapades, the restless man went tooth and nail into the crapulous -controversy between George IV. and his unhappy wife; who, though -undoubtedly no better than she should be, was undoubtedly used much -worse than she or any other woman, not a Messalina or a Frédégonde, -should have been. From Hone’s shop issued those merry, rascally libels -against the fat potentate late of Carlton House, and which, under -the titles of “The Green Bag,” “Doctor Slop,” the “House that Jack -built,” and the like, brought such shame and ridicule upon the vain, -gross old man, that all Mr. Theodore Hook’s counter-scurrilities in -the high Tory _John Bull_ could not alleviate or wipe away the stains -thereof. Ah! it was a nice time--a jocund, Christian time. Reformers -calling their king “knave, tyrant, and debauchee;” loyalists screaming -“hussey,” and worse names, after their queen. That was in the time -of the Consul _Un_manlius I should think. Hone’s clever rascalities -sold enormously, especially among the aristocracy of the “Opposition.” -But Mr. Hone’s disloyal facetiæ from Ship Court were relieved and -atoned for by the illustrations, engraved from drawings executed -with quite an astonishing power of graphic delineation and acuteness -of humour, by a then very young artist named GEORGE CRUIKSHANK: a -gentleman whose earliest toys, I believe, had been a strip of copper -and an etching-needle; who has, since those wild days of ’21, achieved -hundreds of successes more brilliant, but not more notorious, than -those he won by working for restless Mr. Hone; and whom I am proud to -speak of here, with Hogarth’s name at the head of my sheet, now that -he, our George, is old, and honoured, and famous. Do I attach too much -importance to the works of these twin geniuses, I wonder, because I -love the style of art in which they have excelled with a secret craving -devotion, and because I have vainly striven to excel in it myself? -Am I stilted or turgid when I paraphrase that which Johnson said of -Homer and Milton _in re_ the _Iliad_ and the _Paradise Lost_, and say -of Hogarth and Cruikshank that George is not the greatest pictorial -humorist our country has seen only because he is not the first? At -any rate, you will grant the coincidence--won’t you?--between the lad -George Cruikshank and little boy Hogarth, toddling about Ship Court -and perchance scrawling caricatures on the walls, exaggerating in -rollicking chalk (I allow him as many brick walls as you like, but no -slates) the Slawkenbergian nose of William the Deliverer, or adding -abnormal curls to the vast wig of the detested clerical statesman, -Burnet. - -Little boy Hogarth is yet too young to see these things; but he may be -at Gilbert Burnet’s turbulent funeral yet. First, we must get him out -of the Old Bailey, where he dwells for a good dozen years at least. -Dominie Hogarth has the school upstairs, where he drums _Lilly’s -Accidence_, or perhaps his own _Grammatical Disputations_ into his -scholars. Of what order may these scholars have been? The gentry had -long since left the Bailey; and you may start, perhaps, to be told -that British Brahmins had ever inhabited that lowering precinct of -the gallows, and parvyse of the press-room. Yet, in the Old Bailey -stood Sydney House, a stately mansion built for the Sydneys, Earls of -Leicester, and which they abandoned [circa 1660] for the genteeler -locality of Leicester Fields. I don’t know what Sydney House could have -been like, or by whom it was inhabited when Hogarth was a little boy; -but it was to all likelihood in a tumbledown, desolate condition. In -Pennant’s time it was a coachmaker’s shop. The keeper of Newgate may -have had children, too, for schooling, but his corporation connections -would probably have insured his boy’s admission to Christ’s Hospital, -or to Paul’s, or Merchant Taylors’ School, for the keeper of Newgate -was then a somebody; and it was by times his privilege to entertain -the sheriffs with sack and sugar. Dominie Hogarth’s pupils must have -been sons of substantial traders in the Bailey itself--where were -many noted booksellers’ shops--or from the adjacent Ludgate, whilom -Bowyers Hill, and from Fleet Street, or, perchance, Aldersgate Street; -which, not then purely commercial or shopkeeping, was the site of many -imposing mansions superbly decorated within, formerly the property of -the nobility, but then (1697) occupied by stately Turkey and Levant -merchants. And to the dominie’s may have come the offspring of the -wealthy butchers of Newgate Market, whose rubicund meat-wives are -libellously declared to have been in the habit of getting “over-taken -by burnt sherry” by eight o’clock in the morning; and while in that -jovial but prematurely matutinal condition, rivalling the flat-caps -of the Dark House, Billingsgate, and the pease-pottage sellers of -Baldwin’s Gardens--to say nothing of the cake and comfit purveyors to -the Finsbury archers--in voluble and abusive eloquence. Bonny dames -were these butchers’ wives; lusty, rotund, generous to the poor, -loud, but cheery with their apprentices and journeymen, great (as -now) in making fortunes for their beast-buying-and-killing husbands; -radiant in gold-chains, earrings, and laced aprons, and tremendous at -trades-feasts and civic junketings. - -And I am yet in the year 1697, and in the Old Bailey with a child -in my arms. Were this an honest plain-sailing biography, now, what -would be easier for me than to skip the first twelve or thirteen -years of the boy’s life, assume that he got satisfactorily through -his teething, thrush, measles, and chicken-pox perils, and launch him -comfortably, a chubby lad, in the midst of the period of which the -ruthless Doctor Swift will write a history--the last four years of -the reign of Queen Anne--and make up his little bundle for him, ready -for his apprenticeship to Mr. Ellis Gamble, silver-plate engraver of -Cranbourne Alley, Leicester Fields. He may have been sent out to nurse -at Tottenham or Edmonton, or, may be, distant Ware, as children of his -degree were wont to be sent out (Mr. John Locke’s _Education_, and Mr. -Daniel Defoe’s _Family Instructor, passim_). But, in good sooth, I am -loth to turn over my William to the tender mercies of the eighteenth -century and the Augustan age. I fear great “Anna” and her era, and -for a double reason: first, that people know already so much about -the reign of Queen Anne. No kindly book a’ bosom but can follow Sir -Roger de Coverley and his tall silent friend the _Spectator_ in their -rambles; but has seen Swift walking across the park in mighty fear of -the Mohocks; but has taken a dish of coffee at Miss Vanhomrigh’s; but -has lounged in the elegant saloon, among the China monsters and the -black boys, with Belinda or Sir Plume; but has accompanied Steele from -coffee-house to coffee-house, and peeped over his shoulder while he -scribbled those charming little billets to his wife; but has seen Queen -Anne herself, the “stately lady in black velvet and diamonds,” who -touched little Sam Johnson for the evil, and hung round his neck that -broad piece of angel gold, which in its more earthly form of a guinea -the poor doctor wanted so often and so badly at a subsequent stage of -his career. The humorists and essayists of Queen Anne’s days have made -them as crystal-clear to us as Grammont and Pepys made those of the -Second Charles; and--there! bah! it is mock modesty to blink the truth -because my pen happens to be enlisted under such a banner. I could -have gone swaggeringly enough into all the minutiæ of Anne’s days, all -the glories and meannesses of John Churchill, all the humours, and -tyrannies, and quarrels of Pope, and Gay, and Harley, and St. John, -if a book called _Esmond_ had never been written. Yet finding myself -in this cleft stick, between the historian who wrote of the state of -manners at the close of the reign of Charles II., and the novelist, -who has made the men and women of Queen Anne’s court and city and army -live again, I feel slightly relieved. There is just one little niche -left for me. Just three years to dwell upon, while little boy Hogarth -is in his swaddling clothes, or is consorting with divers other little -brats as diminutive as he, on the doorsteps or the pavement of Ship -Court. Three years,--’97, ’98, ’99. _Ah! laissez-moi pleurer ces années -mortes._ Let me linger over these three ignored years. They were a -transition time. They are lost in the deeper shadow cast by the vicious -bonfire that Charles’s _roués_ and beauties lighted up--a shadow -shortly to be dispelled by the purer radiance of an Augustan era of -literature. Pepys and Evelyn are so minute, so lifelike, that between -their word-paintings, and those of the _Spectator_ and _Tatler_, there -seems a great black blank. - -No seven-league boots are necessary for me to stride back to my -subject, and to the time when my little-boy-hero is forming his -earliest acquaintance with the Old Bailey stones. I said that I wanted -those last three dying years of the seventeenth century. Let me take -them, and endeavour to make the best of them, even when I compress some -of their characteristics within the compass of a single London day. - -The century, then, is on its last legs. The town seems to have quite -done with the Stuarts, socially speaking, although politically another -Stuart will reign: a dethroned Stuart is actually at St. Germains, -maundering with his confessors, and conspiring with his shabby refugee -courtiers; thinking half of assassinating the abhorred Dutchman, and -making Père la Chaise Archbishop of Canterbury _in partibus_, and -half of slinking away to La Trappe, wearing a hair shirt, and doing -grave-digging on his own account for good and all. Politically, too, -this crooked-wayed, impracticable Stuart’s son and grandson will give -the world some trouble till the year 1788, when, a hundred years after -the Revolution, a worn-out, _blasé_ sensualist, called the Young -Pretender, dies at Rome, leaving a brother, the Cardinal of York, -who survived to be a pensioner of George the Third, and bequeathed -to him those Stuart papers, which, had their contents been known at -the Cockpit, Westminster, half a century before, would have caused -the fall of many a head as noble as Derwentwater’s, as chivalrous as -Charles Ratcliffe’s, and broken many a heart as loving and true as -Flora Macdonald’s or Lady Nithisdale’s. But with the Restoration-Stuart -period, London town has quite done. Rochester has died penitent, -Buckingham bankrupt and forlorn. Archbishop Tenison has preached Nelly -Gwynn’s funeral sermon; Portsmouth, Davies, are no more heard of; Will -Chiffinch can procure for kings no more: the rigid Dutchman scorns such -painted children of dirt; Barbara, Duchess of Cleveland, has married -one Fielding, a swindling caricature of a “beau;” Wycherly is old and -broken, and the iron of the Fleet has entered into his soul; and poor -noble old John Dryden, twitted as a renegade, neglected, unpensioned, -and maligned, is savagely writing the finest “copy” that has issued -yet from that grand fertile brain, writing it with a Spartan fortitude -and persistence, and ever and anon giving left-legged Jacob Tonson -a sound verbal trouncing, when the publisher would palm on the poet -clipped moidores for milled Jacobuses. Ah, little boy Hogarth, you -will see Johnson fifty years hence, listen to him behind the curtain -in the twilight room, as the Jacobite schoolman raves against the -cruelty of government in hanging Doctor Cameron; but you will never -behold John Dryden in the flesh, little boy, or hear him at Wills’s on -golden summer afternoons, the undisputed oracle of wits, and critics, -and poets. The horrible Chancellor Jeffries (however could the ruffian -have found patience and temper to deliver a decree in Chancery!) is -dead, but he has a son alive, a rake-hell, Mohock Lord Jeffries, who, -four years hence, will be implicated in a scandalous disturbance at -Dryden’s house, in Gerrard Street; the poet’s corpse lying there. There -are brave men hard at work for the nineteenth century. Isaac Newton is -working; in ’95 he was appointed Master of the Mint. Pope is beginning -to feel his poetic feet. Mr. Joseph Addison is at college. Swift has -had the run of Temple’s library. Lely has thrown down the pencil; -Knelier has taken it up; and James Thornhill is preparing for vast -sprawlings on ceilings, after the model of Verrio and Laguerre. - -Away with Restoration reminiscences, for the more decent century that -is to come. By 8th and 9th William III., Alsatia is ruined, and its -privileges of sanctuary wholly taken away. A dreadful outpouring and -scattering of ragged rogues and ruffians, crying out in what huff-cap -cant and crambo they can command, that _delenda est Carthago_, -takes place. Foul reeking taverns disgorge knavish tatterdemalions, -soddened with usquebaugh and spiced Hollands, querulous or lachrymose -with potations of “mad dog,” “angel’s food,” “dragon’s milk,” and -“go-by-the-wall.” Stern catchpoles seize these inebriated and indebted -maltbugs, and drag them off to the Compters, or to Ludgate, “where -citizens lie in durance, surrounded by copies of their freedom.” -Alewives accustomed to mix beer with rosin and salt deplore the loss -of their best customers; for their creed was Pistol’s advice to Dame -Quickly, “Trust none;” and the debased vagabonds who crowded the -drinking-shops--if they drank till they were as red as cocks and little -wiser than their combs, if they occasionally cut one another’s throats -in front of the bar, or stabbed the drawer for refusing to deliver -strong waters without cash--could sometimes borrow, and sometimes -beg, and sometimes steal money, and then they drank and paid. No use -was there in passing bad money in Alsatia, when every sanctuary man -and woman knew how to coin and to clip it. You couldn’t run away from -your lodgings in Alsatia, for so soon as you showed your nose at the -Whitefriars’ gate, in Fleet Street, the Philistines were upon you. -Oh! for the ruffianly soldados, the copper captains, the curl’d-pate -braggarts, the poltroons who had lost their ears in the pillory, -and swore they had been carried off by the wind of a cannon-shot at -Sedgemoor! Oh! for the beauteous slatterns, the Phrynes and Aspasias -of this Fleet Street Athens, with their paint and their black visor -masques; their organ-pipe head-dresses, their low stomachers, and -their high-heeled shoes; the tresses of dead men’s hair they thatched -their poor bald crowns withal; the live fools’ rings and necklaces -they sported between taking out and pawning in! Beggars, cut-purses, -swindlers, tavern-bilks, broken life-guardsmen, foreign counts, -native highwaymen, and some poor honest unfortunates, the victims of -a Draconic law of debtor and creditor, all found their Patmos turn -out to be a mere shifting quicksand. The town does not long remain -troubled with these broken spars and timbers of the wrecked ship--once -a tall caravel--Humanity. Don’t you remember when the “Holy Land” of -St. Giles’s was pulled down to build New Oxford Street, what an outcry -arose as to where the dispossessed Gilesians were to find shelter? and -don’t you remember how quickly they found congenial holes and corners -into which to subside--dirt to dirt, disease to disease, squalor to -squalor, rags to rags? So with the Alsatians. A miserable compensation -is made to them for their lost sanctuary by the statute which quashes -all foregone executions for debts under fifty pounds; but they soon -get arrested again--often for sums not much more than fifty pence--and, -being laid up in hold, starve and rot miserably. There are debtors -in Newgate, there are debtors in Ludgate; in the Clink, the Borough, -Poultry, and Wood Street Compters, the Marshalsea, the King’s Bench, -and at Westminster Gate houses, besides innumerable spunging houses, or -“spider’s webs,” with signs like inns, such as the “Pied Bull” in the -Borough, and the “Angel” in Cursitor Street. Little boy Hogarth will -have much to observe about prisons and prisoners when he is grown to -be a man. Many Alsatians take refuge in the Southwark Mint, likewise, -and by the same statute deprived of its sanctuary; but which, in -some underhand manner--perhaps from there being only one bridge into -Southwark, and that rotten--contrives to evade it till late in the -reign of George I. Coining flourishes thenceforth more than ever in the -Mint; the science of Water Lane being added to the experience of St. -Mary Overy, and both being aided, perhaps, by the ancient numismatic -traditions of the place. More of the Alsatians are caught up by -alguazils of the criminal law, and, after a brief sojourn at Newgate, -“patibulate” at Justice Hall, and eventually make that sad journey up -Holborn Hill in a cart, stopping for a refresher at the Bowl House, -St. Giles’s Pound--alas! it is not always staying for his liquor that -will save the saddler of Bawtree from hanging--and so end at Tyburn. -Some, too, go a-begging in Lincoln’s Inn, and manufacture some highly -remunerative mutilations and ulcers. And some, a very few, tired of the -draff and husks in Alsatia, go back to their fathers, and are forgiven. -In this hard world, whose members only see the application of parables -that teach us love and mercy on Sundays, it is easier to find prodigals -to repent than fathers to forgive. But for our hope and comfort, _that_ -parable has another and a higher meaning. - -Alsatia was linked hand in glove with the Court of the Restoration. -’Twas often but a chapel of ease to the backstairs of Whitehall, -and many a great courtier, ruined at basset with the king and his -beauties the night before, found his level on the morrow in this vile -slum-playing butt, playing cards on a broken pair of bellows. But now, -1697, Whitehall itself is gone. The major part of the enormous pile -went by fire in ’91; now the rest, or all but Holbein’s Gate, and the -blood-stained Banqueting-house, has fallen a prey to the “devouring -element.” - -Whitehall, then, has gone by the board. In vain now to look for Horn -Chamber, or Cabinet Room, or the stone gallery that flanked Privy -Garden, where the imperious, depraved Louise de la Quérouaille, Duchess -of Portsmouth, lived amid “French tapestry, Japan cabinets, screens, -pendule clocks, great vases of wrought plate, table stands, chimney -furniture, sconces, branches, braseners, all of massive silver, and out -of number.” All these things, worthy Master Evelyn, of Sayes Court, -Deptford (who about this time has let his said mansion and ground to -Peter Velikè, czar of Muscovy, and thinks him but an evil tenant, with -his uncouth, uncleanly Russian fashions, his driving of wheelbarrows -through neatly-trimmed hedges, and spitting over polished andirons, -and gorging himself with raw turnips sliced in brandy)--worthy, -sententious Evelyn shall see these things no more. Nay, nor that -“glorious gallery,” quoted from his description innumerable times, -where was the dissolute king “sitting toying with his concubines, -Portsmouth, Cleveland, and Mazarine, &c.; a French boy singing -love-songs, whilst about twenty of the great courtiers and others were -at basset round a large table, a bank of at least 2,000_l._ in gold -before them. Six days after, all was in the dust.” And worse. - -Little boy Hogarth, you shall often pass by the banqueting-house--ay, -and admire Hans Holbein’s wondrous gate of red brick, tesselated in -quaint and beauteous design; of which the fragments, when the gate -was pulled down in 1760, were begged by William, Duke of Cumberland, -and the pieces numbered, with the project of having them transferred -to Windsor park and there re-erected as a royal ducal lodge. But -the project was never carried out, and the duke probably forgot all -about it, or found something more worth begging for than a lot of old -building materials. So exit Whitehall palace: buttery, bakehouse, wood -and coal yards, spicery, charcoal-house, king’s privy cellar, council -chamber, hearth-money office, and other fripperies in stone. It must -have been a grand place, even as the heterogeneous pile that existed -in William Dutchman’s time; but if James or Charles had possessed -the funds to rebuild it according to Inigo Jones’s magnificent plan, -of which the banqueting-house is but an instalment, the palace of -Whitehall would have put to the blush the Baths of Diocletian, the -golden house of Nero--yea, and the temple which Erostratus burnt, to -prove that all things were vanity, even to incendiarism. - -Will it please you to walk into the city, now that we have done with -Westminster, any day in these three years of the moribund seventeenth -century. London is busy enough, noisy enough, dirty enough; but not so -smoky. There is little or no foot pavement; but there are plenty of -posts and plenty of kennels--three hundred and eleven, I think, between -Newgate and Charing Cross. When the humorous operation, resorted to -with ugly frequency about this time, of whipping a man at the cart’s -tail, takes place, the hangman gives the poor wretch a lash at every -kennel the near wheel of the cart grates against. Newgate to Ludgate, -Charing Cross to the “Cockpit” at Westminster, are considered the -mildest pilgrimages to be undergone by these poor flagellated knaves; -but Charing to Newgate is the real _via dolorosa_ of stripes. That -pilgrimage was reserved for the great objects of political hatred and -vengeance in James II.’s reign--for Titus Oates and Thomas Dangerfield. -The former abominable liar and perjurer, stripped of his ambrosial -periwig and rustling silk canonicals, turned out of his lodgings in -Whitehall, and reduced to the very last of the last, is tried and -sentenced, and is very nearly scourged to death. He is to pay an -enormous fine besides, and is to lie in Newgate for the remainder of -his life. I wonder that like “flagrant Tutchin,” when shuddering under -a sentence almost as frightful, he did not petition to be hanged: -yet there seems to be an indomitable bull-headed, bull-backed power -of endurance about this man Oates--this sham doctor of divinity, this -Judas spy of Douai and St. Omer, this broken chaplain of a man-of-war, -this living, breathing, incarnate Lie--that enables him to undergo -his punishment, and to get over its effects somehow. He has not lain -long in Newgate, getting his seared back healed as best he may, when -haply, in “pudding-time,” comes Dutch William the Deliverer. Oates’s -scourging was evidently alluded to when provision was made in the Bill -of Rights against “cruel and unusual punishments.” The heavy doors of -Newgate open wide for Titus, who once more dons his wig and canonicals. -Reflective persons do not believe in the perjured scoundrel any more, -and he is seldom sworn, I should opine, of the common jury or the -crowner’s quest. He has “taken the book in his right hand,” and kissed -it once too often. By a section of the serious world, who yet place -implicit faith in all Sir Edmondbury Godfrey’s wounds, and take the -inscription on the Monument of Fish Street Hill as law and gospel, -Titus Oates is regarded as a species of Protestant martyr--of a sorry, -slippery kind, may be, but, at all events, as one who has suffered -sorely for the good cause. The government repension him; he grows fat -and bloated, and if Tom Brown is to be believed (_Miscellanies_, 1697), -Doctor Oates, about the time of Hogarth’s birth, marries a rich city -widow of Jewin Street. - -Different, and not so prosperous, is the end of the assistant -villain, Dangerfield. He, too, is whipped nearly out of his skin, and -within a tattered inch of his miserable life; but his sentence ends -before Newgate is reached, and he is being taken to that prison in a -hackney-coach, when the hangman’s assistants stop the vehicle at the -Gray’s Inn Coffee-house, to give the poor, tired, mangled wretch a -drink. Steps out of the coffee-house one Mr. Francis, a counsel learned -in the law of Gray’s Inn aforesaid, and who has probably been taking -a flask too much at the coffee-house. He is an ardent anti-plot man, -and in a railing tone and Newmarket phrase asks Dangerfield whether -he has “run his heat and how he likes it.” The bleeding object in the -coach, revived to pristine ruffianism by the liquor his gaolers have -given him, answers with a flood of ribald execrations--bad language -could surely be tolerated in one so evilly intreated as he had been -that morning--whereupon the barrister in a rage makes a lunge at -Dangerfield’s face, with a bamboo cane, and strikes one of his eyes -out. In the fevered state of the man’s blood, erysipelas sets in, and -Dangerfield shortly afterwards gives the world a good riddance (though -it were better the hangman had done it outright with a halter) and -dies. The most curious thing is, that Francis was tried and executed at -Tyburn for the murder of this wretched, scourged, blinded perjurer. He -was most likely tried by a strong Protestant jury, who (very justly) -found him guilty on the facts, but would very probably have found him -guilty against the facts, to show their Protestant feeling and belief -in the Popish plot; but I say the thing is curious, seeing that the -Crown did not exercise its prerogative of mercy and pardon to Francis, -who was a gentleman of good family, and manifestly of the court way -of thinking. The conclusion is: either that there was more impartial -justice in the reign of James II. than we have given that bad time -credit for, or that the court let Francis swing through fear of the -mob. You see that the mob in those days did not like to be baulked of -a show, and that the mob derived equal pleasure from seeing Francis -hanged as from seeing Dangerfield whipped. The moral of this apologue -is, that Oates and Dangerfield being very much alike in roguery, -especially Oates, one got not quite so much as he deserved, and the -other not quite enough; which has been the case in many other instances -that have occurred in society, both vulgar and polite, since the days -of William III. - -There, I land you at Temple Bar, on whose gory spikes are the heads of -the last conspirators against William the Dutchman’s life. “_Forsitan -et nobis_,” whispered Goldsmith slyly to Johnson as they gazed up at -the heads which, late in the reign of George III., yet rotted on those -fatal spikes. We will not linger at Temple Bar now. Little boy Hogarth, -years hence, will take us backwards and forwards through it hundreds -of times. The three last years of century seventeen glide away from -me. Plumed hats, ye are henceforth to be cocked. Swords, ye shall be -worn diagonally, not horizontally. Puffed sleeves, ye must give place -to ruffles. Knickerbocker breeches, with rosettes at the knees, ye -must be superseded by smalls and rolled stockings. Shoe-bows, the -era of buckles is coming. Justaucorps, flapped waistcoats will drive -you from the field. Falling bands, your rivals are to be cravats of -Mechlin lace. Carlovingian periwigs, the Ramillies’ wig is imminent. -Elkanah Settles, greater city poets are to sing the praise of city -custards. Claude du Val and Colonel Jack, greater thieves will swing -in the greater reign that is to come. And wake up, little boy Hogarth, -for William the Dutchman has broken his collar-bone, and lies sick to -death at Kensington. The seventeenth century is gone and passed. In -1703 William dies, and the Princess of Denmark reigns in his stead. Up, -little boy Hogarth! grow stout and tall--you have to be bound ’prentice -and learn the mystery of the cross-hatch and the double cypher. Up, -baby Hogarth, there is glorious work for you to do! - - - - -Unspoken Dialogue. - - - Above the trailing mignonette - That deck’d the window-sill, - A lady sat, with lips firm-set, - And looks of earnest will: - Four decades o’er her life had met, - And left her lovely still. - - Not to the radiant firmament, - Not to the garden’s grace, - The courses of her mind were bent, - But where, with sweetest face, - Forth from the other window leant - The daughter of the place. - - Thus ran her thoughts: “O wretched day! - When She was born so fair: - Well could I let my charms decay, - If she were not their heir; - I loathe the sunbeams as they play - About her golden hair. - - “Yet why? she is too good, too mild, - So madly to aspire; - _He_ is no boy to be beguil’d - By sparks of colour’d fire: - I will not dream a pretty child - Can mar my deep desire. - - “Her fatherless and lonely days - Are sere before their time: - In scenes of gaiety and praise - She will regain her prime, - And cease to haunt these wooded ways - With sentimental rhyme.” - -[Illustration: - - “Dear child! he comes.--Nay, blush not so - To have your secret known:”] - - On to the conscious maiden pass’d - Those words without the tongue; - Half petulantly back she cast - The glist’ning curls that hung - About her neck, and answer’d fast: - “Yes, I am young--too young: - - “Yet am I graver than my wont, - Gravest when he is here; - Beneath the glory of his front - I tremble--not with fear: - But as I read, Bethesda’s font - Felt with the Angel near. - - “Must I mate only with my kind, - With something as unwise - As my poor self; and never find - Affection I can prize - At once with an adoring mind, - And with admiring eyes?” - - “My mother trusts to drag me down - To some low range of life, - By pleasures of the clam’rous town, - And vanity’s mean strife; - And in such selfish tumult drown - My hope to be _his_ wife.” - - Then darker round the lady grew - The meditative cloud,-- - And stormy thoughts began to brew - She dar’d not speak aloud; - For then without disguise she knew - That rivalry avow’d. - - “What is my being if I lose - My love’s last stake? while she - Has the fair future where to choose - Her woman’s destiny-- - Free scope those means and powers to use, - Which time denies to me. - - “Was it for this her baby arms - About my neck were flung? - Was it for this I found such charms - In her uncertain tongue? - Was it for this those vain alarms - My mother-soul unstrung? - - “Oh, horrible! to wish my child-- - My sole one left--unborn, - And, seeing her so meek and mild, - To hold such gifts in scorn; - My nature is grown waste and wild, - My heart with fury torn!” - - Speechless--enchanted to the spot-- - The girl could scarce divine - The whole disaster of her lot,-- - But without sound or sign - She cried, “O Mother! love him not;-- - Oh! let his love be mine! - - “You have had years of full delight, - Your girlhood’s passion-dream - Was realized to touch and sight - As bright as it could seem;-- - And now you interpose, like Night, - Before my life’s first gleam. - - “Yet you were once what I am now,-- - You wore your maiden prize; - You told me of my Father, how - You lived but in his eyes;-- - You spoke of the perpetual vow, - The troth that never dies. - - “Dear Mother! dearer, kinder far, - If by my childhood’s bed - Your care had never stood to bar - Misfortune from my head;-- - But laid me where my brothers are, - Among the quiet dead. - - “Ah! why not die? This cruel strife, - Can thus--thus only--cease? - Dear God! take home this erring life-- - This struggling soul release: - From Heaven, perchance, upon _his_ wife - I might look down in peace.” - - That prayer--like some electric flame, - Struck with resistless force - The lady’s agitated frame,-- - Nor halted in its course, - Till her hard pride was turn’d to shame, - Her passion to remorse. - - She spoke--her words were very low, - But resolute in tone-- - “Dear child! he comes.--Nay, blush not so - To have your secret known: - ’Tis best, ’tis best, that I should go-- - And leave you here alone.” - - Then, as his steps grew near and fast, - Her hand was on the door, - Her heart by holy grace had cast - The demon from its core,-- - And on the threshold calm she pass’d - The man she loved no more. - - R. MONCKTON MILNES. - - - - -Studies in Animal Life. - - “Authentic tidings of invisible things;-- - Of ebb and flow, and ever-during power, - And central peace subsisting at the heart - Of endless agitation.”--THE EXCURSION. - - -CHAPTER II. - - Ponds and rock-pools--Our necessary tackle--Wimbledon Common--Early - memories--Gnat larvæ--Entomostraca and their paradoxes--Races - of animals dispensing with the sterner sex--Insignificance of - males--Volvox globator: is it an animal?--Plants swimming like - animals--Animal retrogressions--The Dytiscus and its larva--The - dragon-fly larva--Molluscs and their eggs--Polypes, and how - to find them--A new polype, _Hydra rubra_--Nest-building - fish--Contempt replaced by reverence. - -The day is bright with a late autumn sun; the sky is clear with a keen -autumn wind, which lashes our blood into a canter as we press against -it, and the cantering blood sets the thoughts into hurrying excitement. -Wimbledon Common is not far off; its five thousand acres of undulating -heather, furze, and fern tempt us across it, health streaming in at -every step as we snuff the keen breeze. We are tempted also to bring -net and wide-mouthed jar, to ransack its many ponds for visible and -invisible wonders. - -Ponds, indeed, are not so rich and lovely as rock-pools; the heath is -less alluring than the coast--our dear-loved coast, with its gleaming -mystery, the sea, and its sweeps of sand, its reefs, its dripping -boulders. I admit the comparative inferiority of ponds; but, you see, -we are not near the coast, and the heath is close at hand. Nay, if -the case were otherwise, I should object to dwarfing comparisons. It -argues a pitiful thinness of nature (and the majority in this respect -are lean) when present excellence is depreciated because some greater -excellence is to be found elsewhere. We are not elsewhere; we must do -the best we can with what is here. Because ours is not the Elizabethan -age, shall we express no reverence for our great men, but reserve it -for Shakspeare, Bacon, and Raleigh, whose traditional renown must -overshadow our contemporaries? Not so. To each age its honour. Let -us be thankful for all greatness, past or present, and never speak -slightingly of noble work, or honest endeavour, because it is not, or -we choose to say it is not, equal to something else. No comparisons -then, I beg. If I said ponds were finer than rock-pools, you might -demur; but I only say ponds are excellent things, let us dabble in -them; ponds are rich in wonders, let us enjoy them. - -And first we must look to our tackle. It is extremely simple. A -landing-net, lined with muslin; a wide-mouthed glass jar, say a foot -high and six inches in diameter, but the size optional, with a bit of -string tied under the lip, and forming a loop over the top, to serve -as a handle which will let the jar swing without spilling the water; -a camel-hair brush; a quinine bottle, or any wide-mouthed phial, for -worms and tiny animals which you desire to keep separated from the -dangers and confusions of the larger jar; and when to these a pocket -lens is added, our equipment is complete. - -As we emerge upon the common, and tread its springy heather, what -a wild wind dashes the hair into our eyes, and the blood into our -cheeks! and what a fine sweep of horizon lies before us! The lingering -splendours and the beautiful decays of autumn vary the scene, and -touch it with a certain pensive charm. The ferns mingle harmoniously -their rich browns with the dark green of the furze, now robbed of its -golden summer-glory, but still pleasant to the eye, and exquisite to -memory. The gaunt windmill on the rising ground is stretching its -stiff, starred arms into the silent air: a landmark for the wanderer, -a landmark, too, for the wandering mind, since it serves to recall the -dim early feelings and sweet broken associations of a childhood when we -gazed at it with awe, and listened to the rushing of its mighty arms. -Ah! well may the mind with the sweet insistance of sadness linger on -those scenes of the irrecoverable past, and try, by lingering there, -to feel that it is not wholly lost, wholly irrecoverable, vanished for -ever from the Life which, as these decays of autumn and these changing -trees too feelingly remind us, is gliding away, leaving our cherished -ambitions still unfulfilled, and our deeper affections still but half -expressed. The vanishing visions of elapsing life bring with them -thoughts which lie too deep for tears; and this windmill recalls such -visions by the subtle laws of association. Let us go towards it, and -stand once more under its shadow. See the intelligent and tailless -sheep-dog which bounds out at our approach, eager and minatory; now his -quick eye at once recognizes that we are neither tramps, nor thieves, -and he ceases barking to commence a lively interchange of sniffs and -amenities with our Pug, who seems also glad of a passing interchange of -commonplace remarks. While these dogs travel over each other’s minds, -let us sun ourselves upon this bench, and look down on the embrowned -valley, with its gipsy encampment,--or abroad on the purple Surrey -hills, or the varied-tinted trees of Combe Wood and Richmond Park. -There are not many such prospects so near London. But, in spite of the -sun, we must not linger here: the wind is much too analytical in its -remarks; and, moreover, we came out to hunt. - -Here is a pond with a mantling surface of green promise. Dip the -jar into the water. Hold it now up to the light, and you will see -an immense variety of tiny animals swimming about. Some are large -enough to be recognized at once; others require a pocket-lens, unless -familiarity has already enabled you to _infer_ the forms you cannot -distinctly _see_. Here (Fig. 7) are two larvæ (or grubs) of the -common gnat. That large-headed fellow (A) bobbing about with such -grotesque movements, is very near the last stage of his metamorphosis; -and to-morrow, or the next day, you may see him cast aside this mask -(_larva_ means a mask), and emerge a perfect insect. The other (B) is -in a much less matured condition, but leads an active predatory life, -jerking through the water, and fastening to the stems of weed or sides -of the jar by means of the tiny hooks at the end of its tail. The -hairy appendage forming the angle is not another tail, but a breathing -apparatus. - -[Illustration: Fig. 7. - -LARVÆ OF THE GNAT in two different stages of development (Magnified).] - -[Illustration: Fig. 8. - -CYCLOPS - -_a_ large antennæ; _b_ smaller do.; _c_ egg-sacs (Magnified).] - -[Illustration: Fig. 9. - -DAPHNIA: _a_ pulsatile sac, or heart; _b_ eggs; _c_ digestive tube -(Magnified).] - -Observe, also, those grotesque _Entomostraca_,[17] popularly called -“water-fleas,” although, as you perceive, they have little resemblance -in form or manners to our familiar (somewhat _too_ familiar) -bedfellows. This (Fig. 8) is a _Cyclops_, with only one eye in the -centre of its forehead, and carrying two sacs, filled with eggs, -like panniers. You observe he has no legs; or, rather, legs and arms -are hoisted up to the head, and become antennæ (or feelers). Here -(Fig. 9) is a _Daphnia_, grotesque enough, throwing up his arms in -astonished awkwardness, and keeping his legs actively at work inside -the shell--as respirators, in fact. Here (Fig. 10) is an _Eurycercus_, -less grotesque, and with a much smaller eye. Talking of eyes, there is -one of these Entomostraca named _Polyphemus_, whose head is all eye; -and another, named _Caligus_, who has no head at all. Other paradoxes -and wonders are presented by this interesting group of animals;[18] but -they all sink into insignificance beside the paradox of the amazonian -entomostracon, the _Apus_--a race which dispenses with masculine -services altogether, a race of which there are no males! - -[Illustration: Fig. 10. - -EURYCERCUS: _a_ heart; _b_ eggs; _c_ digestive tube (Magnified).] - -I well remember the pleasant evening on which I first made the personal -acquaintance of this amazing amazon. It was at Munich, and in the house -of a celebrated naturalist, in whose garden an agreeable assemblage -of poets, professors, and their wives, sauntered in the light of a -setting sun, breaking up into groups and _têtes-à-têtes_, to re-form -into larger groups. We had taken coffee under the branching coolness of -trees, and were now loitering through the brief interval till supper. -Our host had just returned from an expedition of some fifty miles to a -particular pond, known to be inhabited by the Apus. He had made this -journey because the race, although prolific, is rare, and is not to be -found in every spot. For three successive years had he gone to the same -pond, in quest of the male: but no male was to be found among thousands -of egg-bearing females, some of which he had brought away with him, and -was showing us. We were amused to see them swimming about, sometimes -on their backs, using their long oars, sometimes floating, but always -incessantly agitating the water with their ten pairs of breathing legs; -and the ladies, gathered round the jar, were hugely elated at the idea -of animals getting rid altogether of the sterner sex--clearly a useless -incumbrance in the scheme of things! - -The fact that no male Apus has yet been found is not without precedent. -Léon Dufour, the celebrated entomologist, declares that he never found -the male of the gall insect (_Diplolepis gallæ tinctoriæ_), though he -has examined thousands: they were all females, and bore well-developed -eggs on emerging from the gall-nut in which their infancy had passed. -In two other species of gall insect--_Cynips divisa_ and _Cynips -folii_--Hartig says he was unable to find a male; and he examined -about thirteen thousand. Brogniart never found the male of another -entomostracon (_Limnadia gigas_), nor could Jurine find that of our -_Polyphemus_. These negatives prove, at least, that if the males -exist at all, they must be excessively rare, and their services can be -dispensed with; a conclusion which becomes acceptable when we learn -that bees, moths, plant-lice (_Aphides_), and our grotesque friend -_Daphnia_ (Fig. 9) lay eggs which may be reared apart, will develop -into females, and these will produce eggs which will in turn produce -other females, and so on, generation after generation, although each -animal be reared in a vessel apart from all others. - -While on this subject, I cannot forbear making a reflection. It must be -confessed that our sex cuts but a poor figure in some great families. -If the male is in some families grander, fiercer, more splendid, and -more highly endowed than the female, this occasional superiority is -more than counterbalanced by the still greater inferiority of the sex -in other families. The male is often but a contemptible partner, puny -in size, insignificant in powers, stinted even of a due allowance of -organs. If the peacock and the pheasant swagger in greater splendour, -what a pitiful creature is the male falcon--no falconer will look at -him. And what is the drone compared with the queen bee, or even with -the workers? What figure does the male spider make beside his large -and irascible female,--who not unfrequently eats him? Nay, worse than -this, what can be said for the male Rotifer, the male Barnacle, the -male Lernæa--gentlemen who cannot even boast of a perfect digestive -apparatus, sometimes not of a digestive organ at all? Nor is this -meagreness confined to the digestive system only. In some cases, as -in some male Rotifers, the usual organs of sense and locomotion are -wanting;[19] and in a parasitic Lernæa, the degradation is moral as -well as physical: the female lives in the gills of a fish, sucking its -juices, and the ignoble husband lives as a parasite upon her! - -[Illustration: Fig. 11. - -VOLVOX GLOBATOR, with eight volvoces enclosed (Magnified).] - -But this digression is becoming humiliating, and meanwhile our hands -are getting benumbed with cold. In spite of that, I hold the jar up -to the light, and make a background of my forefingers, to throw into -relief some of the transparent animals. Look at those light green -crystal spheres sailing along with slow revolving motion, like planets -revolving through space, except that their orbits are more eccentric. -Each of these spheres is a _Volvox globator_. Under the microscope -it looks like a crystalline sphere, studded with bright green specs, -from each of which arise two cilia (hairs), serving as oars to row the -animal through the water. The specs are united by a delicate network, -which is not always visible, however. Inside this sphere is a fluid, -in which several dark-green smaller spheres are seen revolving, as the -parent-sphere revolved in the water. Press this Volvox gently under -your compressorium, or between the two pieces of glass, and you will -see these internal spheres, when duly magnified, disclose themselves -as identical with their parent; and inside them, smaller Volvoces are -seen. This is one of the many illustrations of Life within Life, of -which something was said in the last chapter. - -Nor is this all. Those bright green specs which stud the surface, -if examined with high powers, will turn out to be not specs, but -animals,[20] and as Ehrenberg believes (though the belief is little -shared), highly organized animals, possessing a mouth, many stomachs, -and an eye. It is right to add that not only are microscopists at -variance with Ehrenberg on the supposed organization of these specs, -but the majority deny that the Volvox itself is an animal. Von Siebold -in Germany, and Professor George Busk and Professor Williamson in -England, have argued with so much force against the animal nature of -the Volvox, which they call a plant, that in most modern works you will -find this opinion adopted. But the latest of the eminent authorities -on the subject of Infusoria, in his magnificent work just published, -returns to the old idea that the Volvox is an animal after all, -although of very simple organization.[21] - -The dispute may perhaps excite your surprise. You are perplexed at the -idea of a plant (if plant it be) moving about, swimming with all the -vigour and dexterity of an animal, and swimming by means of animal -organs, the cilia. But this difficulty is one of our own creation. -We first employ the word Plant to designate a vast group of objects -which have no powers of locomotion, and then ask, with triumph, -How can a plant move? But we have only to enlarge our knowledge of -plant-life to see that locomotion is not absolutely excluded from it; -for many of the simpler plants--Confervæ and Algæ:--can, and do, move -spontaneously in the early stages of their existence: they escape from -their parents as free swimming rovers, and do not settle into solid -and sober respectability till later in life. In their roving condition -they are called, improperly enough, “zoospores,”[22] and once gave rise -to the opinion that they were animals in infancy, and became degraded -into plants as their growth went on. But locomotion is no true mark -of animal-nature, neither is fixture to one spot the true mark of -plant-nature. Many animals (Polypes, Polyzoa, Barnacles, Mussels, &c.), -after passing a vagabond youth, “settle” once and for ever in maturer -age, and then become as fixed as plants. Nay, human animals not -unfrequently exhibit a somewhat similar metempsychosis, and make up for -the fitful capriciousness of wandering youth, by the steady severity of -their application to business, when width of waistcoat and smoothness -of cranium suggest a sense of their responsibilities. - -Whether this loss of locomotion is to be regarded as a retrogression -on the part of the plant, or animal, which becomes fixed, may be -questioned; but there are curious indications of positive retrogression -from a higher standard in the metamorphoses of some animals. Thus the -beautiful marine worm, _Terebella_, which secretes a tube for itself, -and lives in it, fixed to the rock, or oyster-shell, has in early -life a distinct head, eyes, and feelers; but in growing to maturity, -it loses all trace of head, eyes, and even of feelers, unless the -beautiful tuft of streaming threads which it waves in the water be -considered as replacing the feelers. There are the Barnacles, too, -which in the first stage of their existence have three pairs of legs, a -very simple single eye, and a mouth furnished with a proboscis. In the -second stage they have six pairs of legs, two compound eyes, complex in -structure, two feelers, but _no mouth_. In the third, or final stage, -their legs are transformed into prehensile organs, they have recovered -a mouth, but have lost their feelers, and their two complex eyes are -degraded to a single and very simple eye-spot. - -[Illustration: Fig. 12. - -WATER BEETLE and its larva.] - -But to break up these digressions, let us try a sweep with our net. We -skim it along the surface, and draw up a quantity of duckweed, dead -leaves, bits of stick, and masses of green thread, of great fineness, -called Conferva by botanists. The water runs away, and we turn over -the mass. Here is a fine water-beetle, Dytiscus, and a larva of the -same beetle, called the “Water-tiger,” from its ferocity (Fig. 12). You -would hardly suspect that the slim, big-headed, long-tailed Water-tiger -would grow into the squat, small-headed, tailless beetle: nor would -you imagine that this Water-tiger would be so “high fantastical” as to -breathe by his tail. Yet he does both, as you will find if you watch -him in your aquarium. - -[Illustration: Fig. 13. - -DRAGON-FLY LARVÆ: A ordinary aspect; B with the huge nipper-like jaw -extended.] - -[Illustration: Fig. 14. - -A LIMNÆCA STAGNALIS, or water snail. - -B PLANORBIS.] - -[Illustration: Fig. 15. - -PALUDINA VIVIPARA.] - -Continuing our search, we light upon the fat, sluggish, ungraceful -larva of the graceful and brilliant Dragon-fly, the falcon of -insects (Fig. 13). He is useful for dissection, so pop him in. Among -the dead leaves you perceive several small leeches, and flat oval -_Planariæ_, white and brown; and here also is a jelly-like mass, of -pale yellow colour, which we know to be a mass of eggs deposited by -some shell-fish; and as there are few objects of greater interest -than an egg in course of development, we pop the mass in. Here (Fig. -14) are two molluscs, _Limnæus_ and _Planorbis_, one of which is -probably the parent of those eggs. And here is one which lays no -eggs, but brings forth its young alive: it is the _Paludina vivipara_ -(Fig. 15), of which we learned some interesting details last month. -Scattered over the surface of the net and dead leaves, are little -dabs of dirty-looking jelly--some of them, instead of the dirty hue, -are almost blood-red. Experience makes me aware that these dirty -dabs are certainly Polypes--the _Hydra fusca_ of systematists. I -can’t tell how it is I know them, nor how you may know them again. -The power of recognition must be acquired by familiarity: and it is -because men can’t _begin_ with familiarity, and can’t recognize these -Polypes without it, that so few persons really ever see them. But the -familiarity may be acquired by a very simple method. Make it a rule to -pop every unknown object into your wide-mouthed phial. In the water -it will probably at once reveal its nature: if it be a Polype, it -will expand its tentacles; if not, you can identify it at leisure on -reaching home, by the aid of pictures and descriptions. See, as I drop -one of these into the water, it at once assumes the well-known shape -of the Polype. And now we will see what these blood-red dabs may be; -in spite of their unusual colour, I cannot help suspecting them to be -Polypes also. Give me the camel-hair brush. Gently the dab is removed, -and transferred to the phial. Shade of Trembley! it _is_ a Polype![23] -Is it possible that this discovery leaves you imperturbable, even when -I assure you it is of a species hitherto undescribed in text-books? -Now, don’t be provokingly indifferent! rouse yourself to a little -enthusiasm, and prove that you have something of the naturalist in -you by delighting in the detection of a new species. “You didn’t know -that it was new?” _That_ explains your calmness. There must be a basis -of knowledge before wonder can be felt--wonder being, as Bacon says, -“broken knowledge.” Learn, then, that hitherto only three species -of fresh-water Polypes have been described: _Hydra viridis_, _Hydra -fusca_, and _Hydra grisea_. We have now a fourth to swell the list; we -will christen it _Hydra rubra_, and be as modest in our glory as we -can. If any one puts it to us, whether we seriously attach importance -to such trivialities as specific distinctions resting solely upon -colour, or size, we can look profound, you know, and repudiate the -charge. But this is a public and official attitude. In private, we can -despise the distinctions established by others, but keep a corner of -favouritism for our own.[24] - -I remember once showing a bottle containing Polypes to a philosopher, -who beheld them with great calmness. They appeared to him as -insignificant as so many stems of duckweed; and lest you should be -equally indifferent, I will at once inform you that these creatures -will interest you as much as any that can be found in ponds, if you -take the trouble of studying them. They can be cut into many pieces, -and each piece will grow into a perfect Polype; they may be pricked, -or irritated, and the irritated spot will bud a young Polype, as a -plant buds; they may be turned inside out, and their skin will become -a stomach, their stomach a skin. They have acute sensibility to light -(towards which they always move), and to the slightest touch; yet not -a trace of a nervous tissue is to be found in them. They have powers of -motion, and locomotion, yet their muscles are simply a network of large -contractile cells. If the water in which they are kept be not very -pure, they will be found infested with parasites; and quite recently I -have noticed an animal, or vegetal, parasite--I know not which--forming -an elegant sort of fringe to the tentacles: clusters of skittle-shaped -bodies, too entirely transparent for any structure whatever to be made -out, in active agitation, like leaves fluttering on a twig. Some day or -other we may have occasion to treat of the Polypes in detail, and to -narrate the amusing story of their discovery; but what has already been -said will serve to sharpen your attention and awaken some curiosity in -them. - -Again and again the net sweeps among the weed, or dredges the -bottom of the pond, bringing up mud, stones, sticks, with a fish, -worms, molluscs, and tritons. The fish we must secure, for it is a -stickleback--a pretty and interesting inhabitant of an aquarium, on -account of its nest-building propensities. We are surprised at a fish -building a nest, and caring for its young, like the tenderest of birds -(and there are two other fishes, the Goramy and the Hassar, which have -this instinct); but why not a fish, as well as a bird? The cat-fish -swims about in company with her young, like a proud hen with her -chickens; and the sun-fish hovers for weeks over her eggs, protecting -them against danger. - -The wind is so piercing, and _my_ fingers are so benumbed, I can -scarcely hold the brush. Moreover, continual stooping over the net -makes the muscles ache unpleasantly, and suggests that each cast shall -be the final one. But somehow I have made this resolution and broken -it twenty times: either the cast has been unsuccessful, and one is -provoked to try again, or it is so successful that, as _l’appétit -vient en mangeant_, one is seduced again. Very unintelligible this -would be to the passers-by, who generally cast contemptuous glances at -us, when they find we are not fishing, but are only removing Nothings -into a glass jar. One day an Irish labourer stopped and asked me if I -were fishing for salmon. I quietly answered, “Yes.” He drew near. I -continued turning over the weed, occasionally dropping an invisible -thing into the water. At last, a large yellow-bellied Triton was -dropped in. He begged to see it; and seeing at the same time how -alive the water was with tiny animals, became curious, and asked -many questions. I went on with my work; his interest and curiosity -increased; his questions multiplied; he volunteered assistance; and -remained beside me till I prepared to go away, when he said seriously: -“Och! then, and it’s a fine thing to be able to name all God’s -creatures.” Contempt had given place to reverence; and so it would be -with others, could they check the first rising of scorn at what they do -not understand, and patiently learn what even a roadside pond has of -Nature’s wonders. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[17] _Entomostraca_ (from _entomos_, an insect, and _ostracon_, a -shell) are not really insects, but belong to the same large group of -animals as the lobster, the crab, or the shrimp, _i.e._ crustaceans. - -[18] The student will find ample information in BAIRD’S _British -Entomostraca_, published by the Ray Society. - -[19] Compare GEGENBAUR: _Grundzüge der vergleichende Anatomie_, 1859, -pp. 229 _und_ 269; also LEYDIG _über Hydatina senta_, in _Müller’s -Archiv_, 1857, p. 411. - -[20] To avoid the equivoque of calling the parts of an animal, which -are capable of independent existence, by the same term as the whole -mass, we may adopt HUXLEY’S suggestion, and call all such individual -parts _zöoids_, instead of animals. DUGE’S suggested _zöonites_ in the -same sense.--_Sur la Conformité Organigue_, p. 13. - -[21] STEIN: _Der Organismus der Infusionsthiere_, 1859, pp. 36–38. - -[22] Zoospores, from _zoon_, an animal, and _sporos_, a seed. - -[23] TREMBLEY in his admirable work. _Mémoires pour servir à l’histoire -d’une genre de Polypes d’eau douce_, 1744, furnished science with the -fullest and most accurate account of fresh-water Polypes; but it is a -mistake to suppose that he was the original discoverer of this genus: -old LEUWENHOEK had been before him. - -[24] The editors of the _Annals of Natural History_ append a note to -the account I sent them of this new Polype, from which it appears that -Dr. Gray found this very species and apparently in the same spot nearly -thirty years ago. But the latest work of authority, VAN DER HOEVEN’S -_Handbook of Zoology_, only enumerates the three species. - - - - -Curious, if True. - -(EXTRACT FROM A LETTER FROM RICHARD WHITTINGHAM, ESQ.) - - -You were formerly so much amused at my pride in my descent from that -sister of Calvin’s, who married a Whittingham, Dean of Durham, that I -doubt if you will be able to enter into the regard for my distinguished -relation, that has led me to France, in order to examine registers and -archives, which, I thought, might enable me to discover collateral -descendants of the great reformer, with whom I might call cousins. I -shall not tell you of my troubles and adventures in this research; you -are not worthy to hear of them; but something so curious befell me one -evening last August, that if I had not been perfectly certain I was -wide awake, I might have taken it for a dream. - -For the purpose I have named it was necessary that I should make Tours -my head-quarters for a time. I had traced descendants of the Calvin -family out of Normandy into the centre of France; but I found it was -necessary to have a kind of permission from the bishop of the diocese -before I could see certain family papers, which had fallen into the -possession of the Church; and, as I had several English friends at -Tours, I awaited the answer to my request to Monseigneur de ----, at -that town. I was ready to accept any invitation; but I received very -few; and was sometimes a little at a loss what to do with my evenings. -The _table d’hôte_ was at five o’clock; I did not wish to go to the -expense of a private sitting-room, disliked the dinnery atmosphere -of the _salle à manger_, could not play either at pool or billiards, -and the aspect of my fellow guests was unprepossessing enough to make -me unwilling to enter into any _tête-à-tête_ gamblings with them. -So I usually rose from table early, and tried to make the most of -the remaining light of the August evenings in walking briskly off to -explore the surrounding country; the middle of the day was too hot -for this purpose, and better employed in lounging on a bench in the -Boulevards, lazily listening to the distant band, and noticing with -equal laziness the faces and figures of the women who passed by. - -One Thursday evening, the 18th of August it was, I think, I had gone -farther than usual in my walk, and I found that it was later than I had -imagined when I paused to turn back. I fancied I could make a round; -I had enough notion of the direction in which I was, to see that by -turning up a narrow straight lane to my left I should shorten my way -back to Tours. And so I believe I should have done, could I have found -an outlet at the right place, but field-paths are almost unknown in -that part of France, and my lane, stiff and straight as any street, -and marked into terrible vanishing perspective by the regular row of -poplars on each side, seemed interminable. Of course night came on, and -I was in darkness. In England I might have had a chance of seeing a -light in some cottage only a field or two off, and asking my way from -the inhabitants; but here I could see no such welcome sight; indeed, I -believe French peasants go to bed with the summer daylight, so if there -were any habitations in the neighbourhood I never saw them. At last--I -believe I must have walked two hours in the darkness,--I saw the dusky -outline of a wood on one side of the weariful lane, and, impatiently -careless of all forest laws and penalties for trespassers, I made my -way to it, thinking that if the worst came to the worst, I could find -some covert--some shelter where I could lie down and rest, until the -morning light gave me a chance of finding my way back to Tours. But -the plantation, on the outskirts of what appeared to me a dense wood, -was of young trees, too closely planted to be more than slender stems -growing up to a good height, with scanty foliage on their summits. -On I went towards the thicker forest, and once there I slackened my -pace, and began to look about me for a good lair. I was as dainty as -Lochiel’s grandchild, who made his grandsire indignant at the luxury of -his pillow of snow: this brake was too full of brambles, that felt damp -with dew; there was no hurry, since I had given up all hope of passing -the night between four walls; and I went leisurely groping about, and -trusting that there were no wolves to be poked up out of their summer -drowsiness by my stick, when all at once I saw a château before me, not -a quarter of a mile off, at the end of what seemed to be an ancient -avenue (now overgrown and irregular), which I happened to be crossing, -when I looked to my right, and saw the welcome sight. Large, stately, -and dark was its outline against the dusky night-sky; there were -pepper-boxes and tourelles and what-not fantastically going up into the -dim starlight. And more to the purpose still, though I could not see -the details of the building that I was now facing, it was plain enough -that there were lights in many windows, as if some great entertainment -was going on. - -“They are hospitable people at any rate,” thought I. “Perhaps they will -give me a bed. I don’t suppose French propriétaires have traps and -horses quite as plentiful as English gentlemen; but they are evidently -having a large party, and some of their guests may be from Tours, and -will give me a cast back to the Lion d’Or. I am not proud, and I am -dog-tired. I am not above hanging on behind, if need be.” - -So, putting a little briskness and spirit into my walk, I went up to -the door, which was standing open, most hospitably, and showing a large -lighted hall, all hung round with spoils of the chase, armour, &c., -the details of which I had not time to notice, for the instant I stood -on the threshold a huge porter appeared, in a strange, old-fashioned -dress, a kind of livery which well befitted the general appearance -of the house. He asked me, in French (so curiously pronounced that I -thought I had hit upon a new kind of _patois_), my name, and whence I -came. I thought he would not be much the wiser, still it was but civil -to give it before I made my request for assistance; so in reply I said-- - -“My name is Whittingham--Richard Whittingham, an English gentleman, -staying at ----.” To my infinite surprise a light of pleased -intelligence came over the giant’s face; he made me a low bow, and -said (still in the same curious dialect) that I was welcome, that I was -long expected. - -“Long expected!” What could the fellow mean? Had I stumbled on a nest -of relations by John Calvin’s side, who had heard of my genealogical -inquiries, and were gratified and interested by them? But I was too -much pleased to be under shelter for the night to think it necessary to -account for my agreeable reception before I enjoyed it. Just as he was -opening the great heavy _battants_ of the door that led from the hall -to the interior, he turned round and said,-- - -“Apparently Monsieur le Géanquilleur is not come with you.” - -“No! I am all alone; I have lost my way,”--and I was going on with my -explanation, when he, as if quite indifferent to it, led the way up -a great stone staircase, as wide as many rooms, and having on each -landing-place massive iron wickets, in a heavy framework; these the -porter unlocked with the solemn slowness of age. Indeed, a strange, -mysterious awe of the centuries that had passed away since this château -was built came over me as I waited for the turning of the ponderous -keys in the ancient locks. I could almost have fancied that I heard -a mighty rushing murmur (like the ceaseless sound of a distant sea, -ebbing and flowing for ever and for ever), coming forth from the great -vacant galleries that opened out on each side of the broad staircase, -and were to be dimly perceived in the darkness above us. It was as if -the voices of generations of men yet echoed and eddied in the silent -air. It was strange, too, that my friend the porter going before me, -ponderously infirm, with his feeble old hands striving in vain to keep -the tall flambeau he held steadily before him,--strange, I say, that he -was the only domestic I saw in the vast halls and passages, or met with -on the grand staircase. At length we stood before the gilded doors that -led into the saloon where the family--or it might be the company, so -great was the buzz of voices--was assembled. I would have remonstrated -when I found he was going to introduce me, dusty and travel-smeared, in -a morning costume that was not even my best, into this grand _salon_, -with nobody knew how many ladies and gentlemen assembled; but the -obstinate old man was evidently bent upon taking me straight to his -master, and paid no heed to my words. - -The doors flew open, and I was ushered into a saloon curiously full of -pale light, which did not culminate on any spot, nor proceed from any -centre, nor flicker with any motion of the air, but filled every nook -and corner, making all things deliciously distinct; different from our -light of gas or candle, as is the difference between a clear southern -atmosphere and that of our misty England. - -At the first moment my arrival excited no attention, the apartment -was so full of people, all intent on their own conversation. But my -friend the porter went up to a handsome lady of middle age, richly -attired in that antique manner which fashion has brought round again -of late years, and, waiting first in an attitude of deep respect till -her attention fell upon him, told her my name and something about me, -as far as I could guess from the gestures of the one and the sudden -glance of the eye of the other. - -She immediately came towards me with the most friendly actions of -greeting, even before she had advanced near enough to speak. Then,--and -was it not strange?--her words and accent were that of the commonest -peasant of the country. Yet she herself looked high-bred, and would -have been dignified had she been a shade less restless, had her -countenance worn a little less lively and inquisitive expression. I -had been poking a good deal about the old parts of Tours, and had had -to understand the dialect of the people who dwelt in the Marché an -Vendredi and similar places, or I really should not have understood -my handsome hostess, as she offered to present me to her husband, a -henpecked, gentlemanly man, who was more quaintly attired than she in -the very extreme of that style of dress. I thought to myself that in -France, as in England, it is the provincials who carry fashion to such -an excess as to become ridiculous. - -However, he spoke (still in the _patois_) of his pleasure in making -my acquaintance, and led me to a strange uneasy easy-chair, much of a -piece with the rest of the furniture, which might have taken its place -without any anachronism by the side of that in the Hôtel Cluny. Then -again began the clatter of French voices, which my arrival had for an -instant interrupted, and I had leisure to look about me. Opposite to -me sat a very sweet-looking lady, who must have been a great beauty in -her youth I should think, and would be charming in old age, from the -sweetness of her countenance. She was, however, extremely fat, and on -seeing her feet laid up before her on a cushion, I at once perceived -that they were so swollen as to render her incapable of walking, which -probably brought on her excessive _embonpoint_. Her hands were plump -and small, but rather coarse-grained in texture, not quite so clean as -they might have been, and altogether not so aristocratic-looking as the -charming face. Her dress was of superb black velvet, ermine-trimmed, -with diamonds thrown all abroad over it. - -Not far from her stood the least little man I had ever seen; of such -admirable proportions no one could call him a dwarf, because with that -word we usually associate something of deformity; but yet with an -elfin look of shrewd, hard, worldly wisdom in his face that marred the -impression which his delicate regular little features would otherwise -have conveyed. Indeed, I do not think he was quite of equal rank -with the rest of the company, for his dress was inappropriate to the -occasion (and he apparently was an invited, while I was an involuntary -guest); and one or two of his gestures and actions were more like -the tricks of an uneducated rustic than anything else. To explain -what I mean: his boots had evidently seen much service, and had been -re-topped, re-heeled, re-soled to the extent of cobbler’s powers. Why -should he have come in them if they were not his best--his only pair? -And what can be more ungenteel than poverty? Then again he had an -uneasy trick of putting his hand up to his throat, as if he expected to -find something the matter with it; and he had the awkward habit--which -I do not think he could have copied from Dr. Johnson, because most -probably he had never heard of him--of trying always to retrace his -steps on the exact boards on which he had trodden to arrive at any -particular part of the room. Besides, to settle the question, I once -heard him addressed as Monsieur Poucet, without any aristocratic “de” -for a prefix; and nearly every one else in the room was a marquis at -any rate. - -I say, “nearly every one;” for some strange people had the entrée; -unless indeed they were like me benighted. One of the guests I should -have taken for a servant, but for the extraordinary influence he -seemed to have over the man I took for his master, and who never did -anything without, apparently, being urged thereto by this follower. -The master, magnificently dressed, but ill at ease in his clothes, as -if they had been made for some one else, was a weak-looking, handsome -man, continually sauntering about, and I almost guessed an object of -suspicion to some of the gentlemen present, which, perhaps, drove him -on the companionship of his follower, who was dressed something in the -style of an ambassador’s chasseur; yet it was not a chasseur’s dress -after all; it was something more thoroughly old-world; boots half way -up his ridiculously small legs, which clattered as he walked along, as -if they were too large for his little feet; and a great quantity of -grey fur, as trimming to coat, court-mantle, boots, cap--everything. -You know the way in which certain countenances remind you perpetually -of some animal, be it bird or beast! Well, this chasseur (as I will -call him for want of a better name) was exceedingly like the great -Tom-cat that you have seen so often in my chambers, and laughed at -almost as often for his uncanny gravity of demeanour. Grey whiskers has -my Tom--grey whiskers had the chasseur: grey hair overshadows the upper -lip of my Tom--grey mustachios hid that of the chasseur. The pupils of -Tom’s eyes dilate and contract as I had thought cats’ pupils only could -do, until I saw those of the chasseur. To be sure, canny as Tom is, -the chasseur had the advantage in the more intelligent expression. He -seemed to have obtained most complete sway over his master or patron, -whose looks he watched, and whose steps he followed with a kind of -distrustful interest that puzzled me greatly. - -There were several other groups in the more distant part of the saloon, -all of the stately old school, all grand and noble, I conjectured from -their bearing. They seemed perfectly well acquainted with each other, -as if they were in the habit of meeting. But I was interrupted in my -observations by the tiny little gentleman on the opposite side of the -room coming across to take a place beside me. It is no difficult matter -to a Frenchman to slide into conversation, and so gracefully did my -pigmy friend keep up the character of the nation, that we were almost -confidential before ten minutes had elapsed. - -Now I was quite aware that the welcome which all had extended to me, -from the porter up to the vivacious lady and meek lord of the castle, -was intended for some other person. But it required either a degree -of moral courage, of which I cannot boast, or the self-reliance and -conversational powers of a bolder and cleverer man than I, to undeceive -people who had fallen into so fortunate a mistake for me. Yet the -little man by my side insinuated himself so much into my confidence, -that I had half a mind to tell him of my exact situation and to turn -him into a friend and an ally. - -“Madame is perceptibly growing older,” said he, in the midst of my -perplexity, glancing at our hostess. - -“Madame is still a very fine woman,” replied I. - -“Now, is it not strange,” continued he, lowering his voice, “how -women almost invariably praise the absent, or departed, as if they -were angels of light, while as for the present, or the living”--here -he shrugged up his little shoulders, and made an expressive pause. -“Would you believe it! Madame is always praising her late husband to -monsieur’s face; till, in fact, we guests are quite perplexed how -to look: for you know, the late M. de Retz’s character was quite -notorious,--everybody has heard of him.” All the world of Touraine, -thought I, but I made an assenting noise. - -At this instant, monsieur our host came up to me, and with a civil -look of tender interest (such as some people put on when they inquire -after your mother, about whom they do not care one straw) asked if I -had heard lately how my cat was? “How my cat was!” What could the man -mean? My cat! Could he mean the tailless Tom, born in the Isle of Man, -and now supposed to be keeping guard against the incursions of rats -and mice into my chambers in London? Tom is, as you know, on pretty -good terms with some of my friends, using their legs for rubbing-posts -without scruple, and highly esteemed by them for his gravity of -demeanour, and wise manner of winking his eyes. But could his fame have -reached across the Channel? However, an answer must be returned to the -inquiry, as monsieur’s face was bent down to mine with a look of polite -anxiety; so I, in my turn, assumed an expression of gratitude, and -assured him that, to the best of my belief, my cat was in remarkably -good health. - -“And the climate agrees with her?” - -“Perfectly,” said I, in a maze of wonder at this deep solicitude in a -tailless cat who had lost one foot and half an ear in some cruel trap. -My host smiled a sweet smile, and, addressing a few words to my little -neighbour, passed on. - -“How wearisome these aristocrats are!” quoth my neighbour with a -slight sneer. “Monsieur’s conversation rarely extends to more than two -sentences to any one. By that time his faculties are exhausted, and he -needs the refreshment of silence. You and I, monsieur, are at any rate -indebted to our own wits for our rise in the world!” - -Here again I was bewildered! As you know, I am rather proud of my -descent from families which, if not noble themselves, are allied to -nobility,--and as to my “rise in the world”--if I had risen, it would -have been rather for balloon-like qualities than for mother-wit, to -being unencumbered with heavy ballast either in my head or my pockets. -However, it was my cue to agree: so I smiled again. - -“For my part,” said he, “if a man does not stick at trifles, if -he knows how to judiciously add to, or withhold facts, and is not -sentimental in his parade of humanity, he is sure to do well; sure to -affix a _de_ or _von_ to his name, and end his days in comfort. There -is an example of what I am saying”--and he glanced furtively at the -weak-looking master of the sharp, intelligent servant, whom I have -called the chasseur. - -“Monsieur le Marquis would never have been anything but a miller’s son, -if it had not been for the talents of his servant. Of course you know -his antecedents?” - -I was going to make some remarks on the changes in the order of the -peerage since the days of Louis XVI.--going, in fact, to be very -sensible and historical--when there was a slight commotion among the -people at the other end of the room. Lacqueys in quaint liveries -must have come in from behind the tapestry, I suppose (for I never -saw them enter, though I sate right opposite to the doors), and were -handing about the slight beverages and slighter viands which are -considered sufficient refreshments, but which looked rather meagre -to my hungry appetite. These footmen were standing solemnly opposite -to a lady,--beautiful, splendid as the dawn, but--sound asleep in a -magnificent settee. A gentleman who showed so much irritation at her -ill-timed slumbers, that I think he must have been her husband, was -trying to awaken her with actions not far removed from shakings. All -in vain; she was quite unconscious of his annoyance, or the smiles of -the company, or the automatic solemnity of the waiting footmen, or the -perplexed anxiety of monsieur and madame. - -My little friend sat down with a sneer as if his curiosity was quenched -in contempt. - -“Moralists would make an infinity of wise remarks on that scene,” said -he. “In the first place note the ridiculous position into which their -superstitious reverence for rank and title puts all these people. -Because monsieur is a reigning prince over some minute principality -the exact situation of which no one has as yet discovered, no one must -venture to take their glass of eau sucré till Madame la Princesse -awakens; and, judging from past experience, those poor lacqueys may -have to stand for a century before that happens. Next--always speaking -as a moralist, you will observe--note how difficult it is to break off -bad habits acquired in youth!” - -Just then the prince succeeded, by what means I did not see, in awaking -the beautiful sleeper. But at first she did not remember where she was, -and looking up at her husband with loving eyes, she smiled and said: - -“Is it you, my prince!” - -But he was too conscious of the suppressed amusement of the spectators -and his own consequent annoyance, to be reciprocally tender, and -turned away with some little French expression best rendered into -English by “Pooh pooh, my dear!” - -After I had had a glass of delicious wine of some unknown quality, my -courage was in rather better plight than before, and I told my cynical -little neighbour--whom I must say I was beginning to dislike--that I -had lost my way in the wood, and had arrived at the château quite by -mistake. - -He seemed mightily amused at my story; said that the same thing had -happened to himself more than once; and told me that I had better luck -than he had had on one of these occasions, when, from his account, -he must have been in considerable danger of his life. He ended his -story by making me admire his boots, which he said he still wore, -patched though they were, and all their excellent quality lost by -patching,--because they were of such a first-rate make for long -pedestrian excursions. “Though indeed,” he wound up by saying, “the new -fashion of railroads would seem to supersede the necessity for this -description of boots.” - -When I consulted him as to whether I ought to make myself known to -my host and hostess as a benighted traveller, instead of the guest -whom they had taken me for, he exclaimed, “By no means! I hate such -squeamish morality.” And he seemed much offended by my innocent -question, as if it seemed by implication to condemn something in -himself. He was offended and silent; and just at this moment I caught -the sweet, attractive eyes of the lady opposite,--that lady whom I -named at first as being no longer in the bloom of youth, but as being -somewhat infirm about the feet, which were supported on a raised -cushion before her. Her looks seemed to say, “Come here, and let us -have some conversation together;” and with a bow of silent excuse to my -little companion, I went across to the lame old lady. She acknowledged -my coming with the prettiest gesture of thanks possible; and half -apologetically said, “It is a little dull to be unable to move about -on such evenings as this; but it is a just punishment to me for my -early vanities. My poor feet, that were by nature so small, are now -taking their revenge for my cruelty in forcing them into such little -slippers.... Besides, monsieur,” with a pleasant smile, “I thought it -was possible you might be weary of the malicious sayings of your little -neighbour. He has not borne the best character in his youth, and such -men are sure to be cynical in their old age.” - -“Who is he?” asked I, with English abruptness. - -“His name is Poucet, and his father was, I believe, a wood-cutter, or -charcoal-burner, or something of the sort. They do tell sad stories -of connivance at murder, ingratitude, and obtaining money on false -pretences--but you will think me as bad as he if I go on with my -slanders. Rather let us admire the lovely lady coming up towards us, -with the roses in her hand--I never see her without roses, they are so -closely connected with her past history, as you are doubtless aware. -Ah beauty!” said my companion to the lady drawing near to us, “it is -like you to come to me, now that I can no longer go to you.” Then -turning to me, and gracefully drawing me into the conversation, she -said, “You must know that although we never met until we were both -married, we have been almost like sisters ever since. There have been -so many points of resemblance in our circumstances, and I think I may -say in our characters. We had each two elder sisters--mine were but -half-sisters, though--who were not so kind to us as they might have -been.” - -“But have been sorry for it since,” put in the other lady. - -“Since we have married princes,” continued the same lady, with an arch -smile that had nothing of unkindness in it, “for we both have married -far above our original stations in life; we are both unpunctual in our -habits, and in consequence of this failing of ours we have both had to -suffer mortification and pain.” - -“And both are charming,” said a whisper close behind me. “My lord the -marquis, say it--say, ‘And both are charming.’” - -“And both are charming,” was spoken aloud by another voice. I turned, -and saw the wily cat-like chasseur, prompting his master to make civil -speeches. - -The ladies bowed with that kind of haughty acknowledgment which shows -that compliments from such a source are distasteful. But our trio of -conversation was broken up, and I was sorry for it. The marquis looked -as if he had been stirred up to make that one speech, and hoped that he -would not be expected to say more; while behind him stood the chasseur, -half impertinent and half servile in his ways and attitudes. The -ladies, who were real ladies, seemed to be sorry for the awkwardness -of the marquis, and addressed some trifling questions to him, adapting -themselves to the subjects on which he could have no trouble in -answering. The chasseur, meanwhile, was talking to himself in a -growling tone of voice. I had fallen a little into the background at -this interruption in a conversation which promised to be so pleasant, -and I could not help hearing his words. - -“Really, De Carabas grows more stupid every day. I have a great mind to -throw off his boots, and leave him to his fate. I was intended for a -court, and to a court I will go, and make my own fortune as I have made -his. The emperor will appreciate my talents.” - -And such are the habits of the French, or such his forgetfulness -of good manners in his anger, that he spat right and left on the -parquetted floor. - -Just then a very ugly, very pleasant-looking man, came towards the -two ladies to whom I had lately been speaking, leading up to them a -delicate fair woman dressed all in the softest white, as if she were -_vouée au blanc_. I do not think there was a bit of colour about her. -I thought I heard her making, as she came along, a little noise of -pleasure, not exactly like the singing of a tea-kettle, nor yet like -the cooing of a dove, but reminding me of each sound. - -“Madame de Mioumiou was anxious to see you,” said he, addressing -the lady with the roses, “so I have brought her across to give you -a pleasure!” What an honest good face! but oh! how ugly! And yet I -liked his ugliness better than most persons’ beauty. There was a look -of pathetic acknowledgment of his ugliness, and a deprecation of your -too hasty judgment, in his countenance that was positively winning. -The soft white lady kept glancing at my neighbour the chasseur, as if -they had had some former acquaintance, which puzzled me very much, -as they were of such different rank. However, their nerves were -evidently strung to the same tune, for at a sound behind the tapestry, -which was more like the scuttering of rats and mice than anything -else, both Madame de Mioumiou and the chasseur started with the most -eager look of anxiety on their countenances, and by their restless -movements--madame’s panting, and the fiery dilation of his eyes--one -might see that commonplace sounds affected them both in a manner very -different to the rest of the company. The ugly husband of the lovely -lady with the roses now addressed himself to me. - -“We are much disappointed,” he said, “in finding that monsieur is not -accompanied by his countryman--le grand Jean d’Angleterre; I cannot -pronounce his name rightly”--and he looked at me to help him out. - -“Le grand Jean d’Angleterre!” now who was le grand Jean d’Angleterre? -John Bull? John Russell? John Bright? - -“Jean--Jean”--continued the gentleman, seeing my embarrassment. “Ah, -these terrible English names--‘Jean de Géanquilleur!’” - -I was as wise as ever. And yet the name struck me as familiar, but -slightly disguised. I repeated it to myself. It was mighty like John -the Giant-killer, only his friends always call that worthy “Jack.” I -said the name aloud. - -“Ah, that is it!” said he. “But why has he not accompanied you to our -little reunion to-night?” - -I had been rather puzzled once or twice before, but this serious -question added considerably to my perplexity. Jack the Giant-killer had -once, it is true, been rather an intimate friend of mine, as far as -(printer’s) ink and paper can keep up a friendship, but I had not heard -his name mentioned for years; and for aught I knew he lay enchanted -with King Arthur’s knights, who lie entranced until the blast of the -trumpets of four mighty kings shall call them to help at England’s -need. But the question had been asked in serious earnest by that -gentleman, whom I more wished to think well of me than I did any other -person in the room. So I answered respectfully that it was long since I -had heard anything of my countryman; but that I was sure it would have -given him as much pleasure as it was doing myself to have been present -at such an agreeable gathering of friends. He bowed, and then the lame -lady took up the word. - -“To-night is the night when, of all the year, this great old forest -surrounding the castle is said to be haunted by the phantom of a little -peasant girl who once lived hereabouts; the tradition is that she was -devoured by a wolf. In former days I have seen her on this night out -of yonder window at the end of the gallery. Will you, ma belle, take -monsieur to see the view outside by the moonlight (you may possibly see -the phantom-child); and leave me to a little _tête-à-tête_ with your -husband?” - -With a gentle movement the lady with the roses complied with the -other’s request, and we went to a great window, looking down on the -forest, in which I had lost my way. The tops of the far-spreading and -leafy trees lay motionless beneath us in that pale, wan light, which -shows objects almost as distinct in form, though not in colour, as by -day. We looked down on the countless avenues, which seemed to converge -from all quarters to the great old castle; and suddenly across one, -quite near to us, there passed the figure of a little girl, with the -“capuchon” on, that takes the place of a peasant girl’s bonnet in -France. She had a basket on one arm, and by her, on the side to which -her head was turned, there went a wolf. I could almost have said it was -licking her hand, as if in penitent love, if either penitence or love -had ever been a quality of wolves,--but though not of living, perhaps -it may be of phantom wolves. - -“There, we have seen her!” exclaimed my beautiful companion. “Though -so long dead, her simple story of household goodness and trustful -simplicity still lingers in the hearts of all who have ever heard -of her; and the country-people about here say that seeing that -phantom-child on this anniversary brings good luck for the year. Let us -hope that we shall share in the traditionary good fortune. Ah! here is -Madame de Retz--she retains the name of her first husband, you know, as -he was of higher rank than the present.” We were joined by our hostess. - -“If monsieur is fond of the beauties of nature and art,” said she, -perceiving that I had been looking at the view from the great window, -“he will perhaps take pleasure in seeing the picture.” Here she sighed, -with a little affectation of grief. “You know the picture I allude -to,” addressing my companion, who bowed assent, and smiled a little -maliciously, as I followed the lead of madame. - -I went after her to the other end of the saloon, noting by the way -with what keen curiosity she caught up what was passing either in -word or action on each side of her. When we stood opposite to the end -wall, I perceived a full-length picture of a handsome peculiar-looking -man, with--in spite of his good looks--a very fierce and scowling -expression. My hostess clasped her hands together as her arms hung down -in front, and sighed once more. Then, half in soliloquy, she said-- - -“He was the love of my youth; his stern yet manly character first -touched this heart of mine. When--when shall I cease to deplore his -loss!” - -Not being acquainted with her enough to answer this question (if, -indeed, it were not sufficiently answered by the fact of her second -marriage), I felt awkward; and, by way of saying something, I -remarked,-- - -“The countenance strikes me as resembling something I have seen -before--in an engraving from an historical picture, I think; only, it -is there the principal figure in a group: he is holding a lady by her -hair, and threatening her with his scimitar, while two cavaliers are -rushing up the stairs, apparently only just in time to save her life.” - -“Alas, alas!” said she, “you too accurately describe a miserable -passage in my life, which has often been represented in a false -light. The best of husbands”--here she sobbed, and became slightly -inarticulate with her grief--“will sometimes be displeased. I was young -and curious, he was justly angry with my disobedience--my brothers were -too hasty--the consequence is, I became a widow!” - -After due respect for her tears, I ventured to suggest some commonplace -consolation. She turned round sharply:-- - -“No, monsieur: my only comfort is that I have never forgiven the -brothers who interfered so cruelly, in such an uncalled-for manner, -between my dear husband and myself. To quote my friend Monsieur -Sganarelle--‘Ce sont petites choses qui sont de temps en temps -nécessaires dans l’amitié; et cinq ou six coups d’épée entre gens -qui s’aiment ne font que ragaillardir l’affection.’ You observe the -colouring is not quite what it should be?” - -“In this light the beard is of rather a peculiar tint,” said I. - -“Yes: the painter did not do it justice. It was most lovely, and gave -him such a distinguished air, quite different from the common herd. -Stay, I will show you the exact colour, if you will come near this -flambeau!” And going near the light, she took off a bracelet of hair, -with a magnificent clasp of pearls. It was peculiar, certainly. I did -not know what to say. “His precious lovely beard!” said she. “And the -pearls go so well with the delicate blue!” - -Her husband, who had come up to us, and waited till her eye fell upon -him before venturing to speak, now said, “It is strange Monsieur Ogre -is not yet arrived!” - -“Not at all strange,” said she tartly. “He was always very stupid, -and constantly falls into mistakes, in which he comes worse off; and -it is very well he does, for he is a credulous and cowardly fellow. -Not at all strange! If you will”--turning to her husband, so that I -hardly heard her words, until I caught--“Then everybody would have -their rights, and we should have no more trouble. Is it not, monsieur?” -addressing me. - -“If I were in England, I should imagine madame was speaking of the -reform bill, or the millennium,--but I am in ignorance.” - -And just as I spoke, the great folding-doors were thrown open wide, and -every one started to their feet to greet a little old lady, leaning on -a thin black wand--and-- - -“Madame la Féemarraine,” was announced by a chorus of sweet shrill -voices. - -And in a moment I was lying in the grass close by a hollow oak tree, -with the slanting glory of the dawning day shining full in my face, and -thousands of little birds and delicate insects piping and warbling out -their welcome to the ruddy splendour. - - - - -Life among the Lighthouses. - - -A minister of state, whose duties brought him into constant attendance -upon royalty, once made a memorandum in his diary to watch the king -into a good humour, _that he might ask him for a Lighthouse_. It is -probable that the wish of Lord Grenville (for it was he) was not to -learn what living in a lighthouse would be like, but rather to realize -the very considerable living to be got out of one. - -Whether his lordship ever got what he desired, we do not know; but -could he have foreseen the serious penalties the nation would have -to pay for having the “well-beloved cousins and councillors” of its -kings quartered in this free and easy way upon its mercantile marine, -surely he would have been too generous to seek it. Henry VIII. and his -daughter Elizabeth were alive to the true policy in such matters, for -he put the custody of such things into the charge of a chartered body, -whose interests were made identical with the public welfare; and she, -making her Lord High Admiral Howard surrender his authority in regard -to beacons, buoys, marks and signs for the sea to their custody, gave -the Elder Brethren of the Trinity House their first Act of Parliament, -and set them forward upon an ever-widening career of usefulness, which -has resulted in our channels being almost as well lighted as our -streets. - -Not but what among the proprietors of “private lights,” as those not -under the control of the Trinity House were called, there were men -of sagacity, energy, and self-devotion. Men who were proud of the -means whereby they lived, and took the same pleasure in having their -lighthouse a credit to them that an opulent manufacturer does in having -his mills up to the mark with all the most recent improvements. But -the same motive did not exist in the one case as does in the other. If -a manufacturer does not keep in the front rank as regards machinery, -the character of his goods is degraded in the market. He must choose -between spinning well or not at all. But with the private manufacturers -of light for bewildered sailors the case was different: they were -authorized to levy tolls on all vessels passing, using, or deriving -benefit from the light in question; a certain range of distance -appears to have been assumed within which the vessel was liable; and -although at one lighthouse the oil might be bad, at another the candles -unsnuffed, whilst at a third the coal fire would be reeking in its -embers, still so long as the light was there the dues were chargeable. - -Things came to a crisis at last. In districts where at the time when -the king’s good-humour had been availed of vessels from fishing-village -to fishing-village crept round by twos and threes, the waters got -crowded daily and hourly with ships of mighty tonnage, and every -ton had to pay. It was difficult to tell what the recipients of the -royal benevolence were making; but from the style in which their mere -collectors throve, it was evidently something far too good to be -talked about. It must have been very hard to have been insulted with -an offer of three hundred and fifty thousand pounds for a barren rock -in the ocean, nothing like that number of feet square, subjecting the -proprietor to the necessity of making a pathetic rejoinder to the -effect “that if he must sell, it must be for five hundred and fifty -thousand pounds, and that would not pay him;” but a jury was appealed -to, and four hundred and forty-five thousand pounds was carried off as -the vested right in one lighthouse, with a heavy sigh that it was so -little. Another leviathan of the deep realized three hundred thousand -pounds; and if these were whales among the tritons, the tritons and the -minnows too, all plethoric of their kind, fared well. The scale was -freighted heavily with compulsory purchase-money before they were all -bought out, and the shipping interest had to pay surplus light dues for -many years before the official custodians of the lighthouse fund had -got quit of their huge debt. - -Even on these terms it was the right thing to do. When the lighthouse -on the Smalls rock in the Bristol Channel was in private hands, the -annual consumption of oil, which is another way of stating the annual -amount of light produced, was as little as two hundred gallons; at this -present time fifteen hundred gallons are burnt within the year. The -dues payable in those days were twopence per ton, whilst now vessels -pay at the rate of one halfpenny per ton over-sea, and one-sixteenth -part of a penny per ton for coasting voyages, less an abatement in -the latter cases of thirty-five per cent. But bad lighting, private -proprietorship, public debt, and, to a great extent, even surplus light -dues, have gone for ever, and lighthouses have got back to what Queen -Elizabeth meant them to be--public trusts in public hands for public -uses. - -And yet it was private enterprise that built and rebuilt, and again -rebuilt the Eddystone, and it was private courage that established -that which will soon be a thing of the past, the strange wooden-legged -Malay-looking barracoon of a lighthouse in the Bristol Channel, on a -rock called the “Smalls.” - -The wooden structure at the Smalls was conceived originally by a Mr. -Phillips, of Liverpool, a member of the Society of Friends. He set -himself to establish “a great holy good to serve and save humanity,” -and even in this world he had his reward; for sixty years afterwards, -when his representatives had to surrender it to the Trinity House, they -got one hundred and seventy thousand pounds by way of compensation for -it. - -Like most sagacious men, he knew how to choose his instruments. At that -time there resided in Liverpool a young man of the name of Whiteside, -a maker of “violins, spinettes, and upright harpsichords,” with a -strongly marked mechanical genius. - -In the summer of 1772, this young fiddle-maker found himself at Solva, -twenty miles from the rock, with a gang of Cornish miners, who were to -quarry sockets into the stone, into which it was originally intended -that iron pillars should be soldered. The first essay was sufficiently -appalling. The surface of the rock is called twelve feet above the -level of high water, that is, in smooth weather; but in tempestuous -seas, and when the waves are rolling in from the south-west, it is as -many feet below it. The party had landed from their cutter, and had -got a long iron rod worked a few feet into the rock, when the weather -suddenly got “dirty.” The wind and the sea rose together, and the -cutter had to sheer off lest she should be wrecked. The men on the rock -clung, as best they might, to the half-fastened shaft, and a desperate -struggle ensued between brute nature and that passive fortitude which -is greater than brute nature,--all through the night into the morning, -all through the day into the night again, until the third day, when the -storm abated and they were saved. - -Nothing daunted, it was agreed that it was just as well to know the -worst. One hint was immediately taken, and rings and holding bars -were let into various parts of the rock, to which the men could lash -themselves and each other on similar occasions. It was soon found that -iron pillars would not do, that they were not sufficiently elastic; -and great pains were taken to find heart of oak that would be equal to -resist the angry forces of the waters. That the present structure would -stand for ever, may be doubted, except by a process analogous to the -repair of the Irishman’s stocking,--first a new foot, and then a fresh -leg. Anyhow, it has been recently thought better to build a granite -tower, which, once well done, may be said, humanly speaking, to be done -for ever. The light will be exhibited at a greater elevation, which -gives it an extended range, and the size of the lantern will admit of a -larger and more powerful apparatus. The mode of procedure is of course -very different from that adopted by Mr. Whiteside. Where formerly there -was a poor fiddle-maker, with half-a-dozen Cornish miners, and a ship’s -carpenter or two, there is now a civil engineer, a clerk, thirty-eight -granite masons, four carpenters, eight smiths, thirteen seamen, four -bargemen, two miners and eight labourers; a commodious wharf, a steam -vessel, a tender, and some barges. There may be nothing so pathetic or -so heroic as that long cling of nine forlorn human creatures round the -first iron bar; it would be shame to the engineer if it should be so; -but there is real work to do, and it is being thoroughly well done. - -The story of the present structure at the Eddystone has been told -with quaint simplicity by the man who raised it. Smeaton had this -advantage over Whiteside, that he had precursors in his work: but -then the work was harder, and was done more enduringly. Whiteside’s -work at the Smalls is coming away in the course of a season or two; -Smeaton’s, at the Eddystone, is to remain the pattern lighthouse -of the world for ever. The first Eddystone, built in 1696, was a -strange affair--something like a Chinese pagoda, or a belvedere in -some suburban tea-gardens, with open galleries and projecting cranes. -The architect was Henry Winstanley, and he has depicted himself -complacently fishing out of his kitchen window; but how he ever -expected his queer mansion to stand the winter storms is simply a -marvel. It was completed in 1699, and it was destroyed in 1703. The -necessity for repairs had taken him to the rock at the time, a dreadful -storm set in on the 26th November, and the next morning there was -nothing left of the lighthouse or its occupants but some of the large -irons whereby the work had been fixed in the rock. A narrative of -the occurrence, printed in the following year, states:--“It was very -remarkable that, as we are informed, at the same time the lighthouse -abovesaid was blown down, the model of it, in Mr. Winstanley’s house at -Littlebury, in Essex, above 200 miles from the lighthouse, fell down -and was broke to pieces.” Upon which, Smeaton shrewdly remarks: “This, -however, may not appear extraordinary, if we consider, that the same -general wind that blew down the lighthouse near Plymouth might blow -down the model at Littlebury.” - -The next structure at the Eddystone, commenced in 1706, was a very -different thing. Mr. John Rudyerd was doomed by fortune to be a silk -mercer, and keep a shop on Ludgate Hill; but Nature had made him -an engineer. Smeaton speaks with great admiration of many of his -arrangements; and if the lighthouse had not been destroyed by fire, -about forty-six years after its erection, there appears no reason why -it should not have been standing to this day. While Winstanley’s was -all external ornament, with numberless nooks and angles for the wind -and sea to gripe it by, Rudyerd’s was a snug, smooth, solid cone, -round which the sea might rage, but on which it could hardly fasten. -But fire conquered what the water could not. Luckily for the keepers, -it broke out in the very top of the lantern, and burnt downwards, and -there was time to save the men, although one of them, looking upwards -at the burning mass, not only got burnt on the shoulders and head -with some molten lead, but while gazing upwards with his mouth open, -received some of the liquid metal down his throat, and yet survived, to -the incredulity of all Plymouth, for twelve days, when seven ounces of -lead, “of a flat, oval form,” was taken from his stomach. - -The lessees of the Eddystone, in those days, seem to have been -liberal-minded people. The tolls ceased with the extinction of the -light, and could not be renewed until it was again exhibited. It was -their apparent interest, therefore, to get a structure run up on the -old model as quickly as possible. It was true it had been destroyed by -fire, but a little modification of the old arrangements would probably -have prevented such a calamity recurring, and it had proved itself -stable and seaworthy. Nevertheless, they not only consulted the ablest -engineer of the day, but submitted to the delay and extra cost involved -in the adoption of his advice to build of stone and granite. - -The point of most enduring interest connected with the present -Eddystone is the peculiarity of its form, which is familiar, probably, -to everybody in the kingdom, from the child, who has seen it in a -magic-lantern, to the civil engineer who knows Smeaton’s stately folio -by heart. Until he built so, the form was almost unknown to us; and -since he built so, all the ocean lighthouses have been modifications of -it. It is interesting to contrast the reasoning of Mr. Alan Stevenson, -the builder of the “Skerryvore,” another of these deep-sea lamp-posts, -as they have been called, off the western coast of Scotland,--with -the _instincts_ of Smeaton, so to speak, on the same subject. It may -not be very edifying to the general reader to learn “that, as the -stability of a sea-tower depends, _cæteris paribus_, on the lowness -of its centre of gravity, the general notion of its form is that of a -cone; but that, as the forces to which its several horizontal sections -are opposed decrease towards its top in a rapid ratio, the solid should -be generated by the revolution of some curve line convex to the axis -of the tower, and gradually approaching to parallelism with it; and -that this, in fact, is a general description of the Eddystone Tower, -devised by Smeaton.” Neither is it a thing likely to be remembered, -without saying it over a good many times to oneself, that “the shaft -of the Skerryvore pillar is a solid, generated by the revolution of -a rectangular hyperbola about its asymptote as a vertical axis.” -But if we understand the respective narratives of the constructors -rightly, Smeaton worked from analogy, and Stevenson from mathematical -calculation. Smeaton tells us of his desire to make his lighthouse -resemble the trunk of a stately tree, and he gives drawings both of a -trunk and of a branch, to show how they start, the one from the ground, -and the other from the main stem. He is also constantly recurring to -the idea of the elasticity of stone, and he quotes a report from one of -the keepers, that on one occasion “the house did shake as if a man had -been up in a great tree.” Certainly, the effect to the eye in looking -at the Eddystone, corroborates the conception with which his mind was -evidently possessed; it emerges from the sea; the curve of the natural -rock is continued in a singularly felicitous manner; the Skerryvore is -a fine shaft, but one sees that it has been stuck in a hole, thoroughly -well fastened in, and (relying on its weight and coherence) likely to -remain there till doomsday; but the Eddystone is homogeneous to the -rock, as well as to itself; and gazing on it, one gets into the same -train of contemplation as Topsy did upon her wickedness, and supposes -it grew there. Nevertheless the Skerryvore is a noble structure, and -the memoir of its construction by Mr. Stevenson is almost exhaustive -of all that is at present known about lighthouses and lighthouse -illumination. - -And if these be the lighthouses, and the mode of life among those by -whom they are builded, let us try to realize the daily work of those by -whom the structures are inhabited. “You are to light the lamps every -evening at sun-setting, and keep them constantly burning, bright and -clear, till sun-rising.” That is the first article of instructions to -light-keepers, as may be seen by any visitors to a station. Whatever -else happens, you are to do that. It may be you are isolated, through -the long night-watches, twenty miles from land, fifty or a hundred feet -above the level of the sea, with the winds and waves howling round you, -and the sea-birds dashing themselves to death against the gleaming -lantern, like giant-moths against a candle; or it may be a calm, -voluptuous, moonlight night, the soft landairs laden with the perfumes -of the highland heather or the Cornish gorse, tempting you to keep your -watch outside the lantern, in the open gallery, instead of in your -watch-room chair within; the Channel may be full of stately ships, each -guided by your light, or the horizon may be bare of all sign of life, -except, remote and far beneath you, the lantern of some fishing-boat at -sea,--but, whatever may be going on outside, there is within for you -the duty, simple and easy, by virtue of your moral method and orderly -training, “to light the lamps every evening at sun-setting, and keep -them constantly burning, bright and clear, till sun-rising.” You shall -be helped to do this easily and well by abundant discipline, first, -on probation, at head-quarters, where you shall gain familiarity with -all your materials--lamps, oil, wicks, lighting apparatus, revolving -machinery, and cleaning stores; you shall be looked at, and over, and -through, by keen medical eyes, before you can be admitted to this -service, lest, under the exceptional nature of your future life, you, -not being a sound man, should break down, to the public detriment and -your own; you shall be enjoined “to the constant habit of cleanliness -and good order in your own person, and to the invariable exercise -of temperance and morality in your habits and proceedings, so that, -by your example, you may enforce, as far as lies in your power, the -observance of the same laudable conduct by your wife and family.” You -shall be well paid while you are hale and active, and well pensioned -when you are past work; you shall be ennobled, by compulsion, into -provident consideration for your helpmate and your children by an -insurance on your life; but when all this is done for you, and the -highest and completest satisfaction that can fall to the best of us -on this side the grave--the sense of being useful to our fellows--is -ordered for you in abundant measure, it all recurs to what, as regards -the specialty of your life, is the be-all and the end-all of your -existence, and this is the burden to the ballad of your story:--“You -are to light the lamps every evening at sun-setting, and keep them -constantly burning, bright and clear, till sun-rising.” - -To do this implies a perpetual watch. “He whose watch is about to end -is to trim the lamps and leave them burning in perfect order before he -quits the lantern and calls the succeeding watch, and he who has the -watch at sun-rise, when he has extinguished the lamps, is to commence -all necessary preparations for the exhibition of the light at the -ensuing sunset;” and, moreover, “no bed, sofa, or other article on -which to recline, can be permitted, either in the lantern, or in the -apartment under the lantern, known as the watch-room.” - -Thus far we have a common denominator to the life of every -light-keeper; but in other respects it varies much. At such stations -as the Forelands or Harwich, where there are gardens to cultivate and -plenty of land room for the men to stretch their legs and renovate -themselves after the night watches; where visitors from neighbouring -watering-places are constantly coming and going, to talk, to praise, -to listen, and, perhaps, to fee, it is all very well; but there are -also places “remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow,” where the walk is -limited to the circle of the gallery-railing, or the diameter of the -lighthouse column; where the only incidents are the inspections of the -committee, the visits of the district superintendent, or the monthly -relief which takes the men back to shore. At these stations, when the -sea is making fun of them, it sweeps up clean over the roof, and makes -the lantern-glasses ring again, and in calmer weather the men may creep -carefully out upon the rock to solace themselves with a little fishing; -or if of more nervous temperament, may do it, as Winstanley did, with -greater security from the kitchen window. - -Not but what some people like that sort of life. Smeaton tells a story -of a shoemaker who went out as light-keeper to the Eddystone because -he did not like confinement, having found himself in effect a greater -prisoner at his lapstone than he would be at the rock; but then Smeaton -confesses a few pages farther on that at times the keepers have been so -short of provisions as to be compelled to eat the candles. - -In the old days of private proprietorship, when every owner had his -system of management, and when the desire to make a profit set the aims -of efficiency and economy into antagonism, exceptional cases of very -terrible tragic significance occasionally occurred. For instance, here -is a letter from the heroic fiddle-maker himself, dated “Smalls, 1st -February, 1777,” written in triplicate, put into a corked bottle, and -that into a cask inscribed, “Open this, and you will find a letter:”-- - - “TO MR. WILLIAMS. - - “_Smalls, February 1st, 1777._ - - “SIR,--Being now in a most dangerous and distressed condition - upon the Smalls, do hereby trust Providence will bring to your - hand this, which prayeth for your immediate assistance to fetch - us off the Smalls before the next spring, or we fear we shall - perish; our water near all gone, our fire quite gone, and our - house in a most melancholy manner. I doubt not but you will fetch - us from here as fast as possible; we can be got off at some part - of the tide almost any weather. I need say no more, but remain - your distressed, - - “Humble servant, - “HY. WHITESIDE. - - “We were distressed in a gale of wind upon the 13th of January, - since which have not been able to keep any light; but we could - not have kept any light above sixteen nights longer for want of - oil and candles, which make us murmur and think we are forgotten. - - “ED. EDWARDES. - “GEO. ADAMS. - “JNO. PRICE. - - “We doubt not but that whoever takes up this will be so merciful - as to cause it to be sent to Thos. Williams, Esq., Trelethin, - near St. David’s, Wales.” - -Again, a quarter of a century later, the watch was kept by two keepers; -and for four months the weather shut them off from all communication -with the land. The method of talking by signals was not developed -anywhere into the complete system it has now become, and does not -appear to have been in use at all among the lighthouse people; but in -the course of a week or two after the storm had set in, it was rumoured -at several of the western ports that something was wrong at the Smalls. -Passing vessels reported that a signal of distress was out, but that -was all they knew. Many attempts to approach the rock were made, but -fruitlessly. The boats could not get near enough to hail, they could -only return to make the bewildered agent and the anxious relatives of -the keepers more bewildered and more anxious by the statement that -there was always what seemed to be the dim figure of a man in one -corner of the outside gallery, but whether he spoke or moved, or not, -they could not tell. Night after night the light was watched for with -great misgiving whether it would ever show again. But the light failed -not. Punctually as the sun set it seemed to leave a fragment of its -fire gleaming in the lantern glasses, which burnt there till it rose -again, showing this much at least, that some one was alive at the -Smalls; but whether both the men, or which, no anxious mother or loving -wife could tell. Four months of this, and then, in calmer weather, a -Milford boat brought into the agency at Solva one light-keeper and one -dead man. - -What the living man had suffered can never now be known. Whether, when -first he came distinctly to believe his comrade would die he stood in -blank despair, or whether he implored him on his knees, in an agony -of selfish terror, to live; whether when, perhaps for the first time -in his life, he stood face to face, and so very close, to death, he -thought of immediate burial, or whether he rushed at once to the -gallery to shout out to the nearest sail, perhaps a mile away;--at -what exact moment it was that the thought flashed across him that he -must not bury the body in the sea, lest those on shore should question -him as Cain was questioned for his brother, and he, failing to produce -him, should be branded with Cain’s curse and meet a speedier fate--is -unrecorded. What he did was to make a coffin. He had been a cooper by -trade, and by breaking up a bulk-head in the living room, he got the -dead man covered in; then, with infinite labour he took him to the -gallery and lashed him there. Perhaps with an instinctive wisdom he set -himself to work, cleaned and re-cleaned his lamps, unpacked and packed -his stores. Perhaps he made a point of walking resolutely up to the -coffin three or four times a day, perhaps he never went near it, and -even managed to look over it rather than at it, when he was scanning -the whole horizon for a sail. In his desperation it may have occurred -to him that as his light was a warning to keep vessels off, so its -absence would speedily betray some ship to a dangerous vicinity to his -forlornness, whose crew would be companions to him even though he had -caused them to be wrecked. But this he did not do. No lives were risked -to alleviate his desolation, but when he came on shore with his dead -companion he was a sad, reserved, emaciated man, so strangely worn that -his associates did not know him. - -The immediate result of this sad occurrence was, that three men were -always kept at the lighthouse, and this wise rule pertains in the -public service. - -Among the minor miseries of life at the Smalls would be such things -as a storm, in which the central flooring was entirely displaced, the -stove thrown from its position “into the boiling surf below, and the -time-piece hurled into a sleeping berth opposite the place it usually -hung.” - -Midway between a rock lighthouse and a shore station, both as to -structure and as to the experiences of life in it, is that mongrel -breed amongst edifices, the Pile Lighthouse. There are many sands at -the mouths of tidal rivers where the water is not deep enough, nor are -the channels sufficiently wide to make a light-vessel suitable, and -which yet need marking, and marking, too, at a spot where not only -the ordinary foundations of masonry, but even the pile foundations -used for many purposes, would be at fault. Here it is that two very -ingenious plans have been of service. The one is to fit the lower -extremity of piles with broad-flanged screws, something like the screw -of a steam-vessel, and then setting them upright in the sand, screw -them down with capstans worked from the decks of dumb lighters. These -bottom piles once secured, the spider legs are bolted on to them, and -the spider bodies on the top; a ladder draws up, and a boat swings -ready to be lowered. The other mode of meeting the difficulty of mud or -loose silt and sand, is by hollow cylinders, which, placed upright on -the sand, have the air exhausted from the inside of them, and on the -principle that nature abhors a vacuum (at all events in cylinders), -the weight of the atmosphere on the sand outside forces it up into the -exhausted receiver, and the pile sinks at a rate which, until one gets -accustomed to it, is rather surprising. Here, as in the screw pile, the -foundation once established, the superstructure, whether of straight -shafts or spider legs, is only a matter of detail. - -These, then, be the variations of lighthouse structure: rock -lighthouses, solitary giants rising from the ocean deeps; pile -lighthouses, stuck about the shallow estuaries on long red legs, like -so many flamingoes fishing; safer, but with less of dignity and more -of ague;--and lastly, the real _bonâ fide_ shore lighthouse, with its -broad sweep of down, its neat cottages, and trim inclosures. If my -Lord Grenville had had any thought of occupying the residence that he -calculated to eliminate from the king’s good-humour, we take it there -is very little doubt on which class in the foregoing category he would -have fixed his choice. - -The remaining contribution to the complement of the lighting service is -the light-vessel. There are, unfortunately, too many outlying dangers -on our coasts where it is either impossible to fix a lighthouse, or -where, from the shifting character of the shoal, it is necessary to -move the light from time to time. Of these the most notable are the -Goodwin Sands. There are constantly propositions for lighthouses on the -Goodwin; and some men, mortified that dry lands once belonging to the -men of Kent should be water-wastes for ever, have proposed boldly to -reclaim them, believing that the scheme would pay, not merely by the -acreage added to the county, but by the buried treasures to be exhumed. -At present they are marked with three light-vessels, one at each end -and one in the middle. There are other floating stations still farther -remote from land; and at one--the Seven Stones, between the Scilly -Islands and the main--the vessel is in forty fathoms water. These -light-ships ride by chains of a peculiarly prepared and toughened iron; -and in heavy weather the strain on the moorings is relieved by paying -out fathom after fathom, until sometimes the whole cable (at the Seven -Stones, 315 fathoms) is in the water. These vessels, of course, are -manned by sailors, and the discipline is that of shipboard; but here, -as on shore, the burden of the main story meets us at the first clause -of the instructions--“You are to light the lamps every evening at -sun-setting, and keep them constantly burning, bright and clear, till -sun-rising,” unless you break adrift, and then, if you have shifted -your position before you could bring up with your spare anchor, you are -to put them out and wait till you can be replaced. - -Among the curiosities of lighthouse experience are these two. The -one that it is an occupation in which the modern claim for feminine -participation has been forestalled. There is at this moment a woman -light-keeper, and as she retains her employment it may be inferred that -she does her duty properly. The other is an odd fact, namely, that so -far back as the last century the rationale of the cod-liver oil fashion -was foreshadowed at the “Smalls.” As in the wool-combing districts of -Yorkshire, where the wool is dressed with oil, consumption and strumous -affections of the like character are rare, so it is said that people -going out to the “Smalls” as keepers, thin, hectic and emaciated, have -returned plump, jocund, and robust, on account of living in an unctuous -atmosphere, where every breath was laden with whale oil, and every meal -might be enriched with fish. - -The French, from economical reasons, early gave their attention to -the use of seed oils, and the first developments of the moderator -lamp of the drawing-room are exclusively French. There were many -difficulties in the way of applying it to lighthouses until it had -been greatly simplified, because the fact of the carcel lamp being a -somewhat complicated piece of machinery was against its use in places -where, if anything went wrong, it might be a month or two before the -weather would admit of the light-keepers being relieved, and give them -an opportunity of exchanging old lamps for new. The thing was done at -last by a simple but very beautiful adjustment of the argand reservoir, -under which the prime condition for all good combustion was attained, -namely, that the oil just about to be burnt, should be rarefied and -prepared for burning by the action of the heat of that which is at the -moment being consumed. And so great is the quantity of oil used in the -three kingdoms, that this change from sperm to rapeseed oil must have -made a saving of many thousands a year. - -But if oil from its portability and comparative simplicity has become -the standard material for light in lighthouses, and has been the object -of a thousand and one nice adaptations in regard to its preparation and -the machinery by which it is consumed, the attention of very able men -has been given to other sources of illumination. - -One of these was known as the Bude light, and consisted of jets of -oxygen introduced into the centre of oil wicks, producing an intense -combustion, which turned steel wire into fireworks, but requiring great -management to avoid smoking and charring. It was finally regarded as -unsuitable on account of the manufacture of the gas and its niceties of -chemical manipulation. - -The Lime lights, of which there are several, are substantially the -same in this, that oxygen and hydrogen gases have to be made (in the -vicinity of gas-works, the common gas will do for the hydrogen) and are -burnt together upon lime or some analogous preparation; and there is -a magnificent adaptation of the Electric light at this moment at the -South Foreland. - -The first electric lights were galvanic. The light, developed between -carbon points, was generated by a galvanic battery. Flickering, -intermittent, and uncertain, the light was yet sufficiently -astonishing, and when it came to be discovered that the residuum from -the decomposition was valuable for making costly colours, “The Electric -Power Light and Colour Company” offered to sell the mere light at a -very low rate; but the difficulties in the way were insuperable, the -manipulation of the batteries was somewhat nice and markedly unhealthy, -the flickering was objectionable, and the light, though intense, -was so extremely minute that the shadows of the framework of the -lantern-glasses widened outwards in a way that would have covered the -horizon seaward with broad bands of dark. - -But the matter was not to stop here. In 1831 it had been discovered -by Faraday that when a piece of soft iron surrounded by a metallic -wire was passed by the poles of a magnet, an electric current was -produced in the wire, which could be exalted so as to give a spark; -and upon this hint an apparatus has been constructed, consisting of an -accumulation of powerful magnets and iron cores with surrounding coils. -This apparatus, driven by steam-engines, and fitted with a subtle -ingenuity of resource always tending to simplicity that seems a marked -feature in the mind of the patentee, is, as we have said, at this -moment at work, and very glorious it is to the eye of the observer; a -piece of sunlight poured out upon the night. - -The chief point to be determined is its power over fogs. That any -light will penetrate through some fogs is out of the question. The Sun -himself can’t do it. But the artificial light that can hold out longest -and pierce the farthest is clearly the light at all costs for the -turning points in the great ocean highways. - -A success of this kind would create something of a revolution in a -branch of lighthouse art on which a vast amount of ingenuity and even -genius has been expended; that is, the apparatus by which the light -should be exhibited. There may be divisions among scientific men as -to the abstract nature and action of light, but sufficient of its -secondary laws are known to make various arrangements in regard to the -management of a generated light most valuable. - -The old plan known in scientific nomenclature as the Catoptric system -is by reflection. - -Take a bowl of copper, something like a wash-hand basin, and having -shaped it carefully into a parabolic curve, and then silvered and -polished the interior, set it up on its side and introduce an argand -lamp into it, so that the flame of the lamp shall be in true focus, and -we have a reflecting apparatus. These may be multiplied in double and -triple rows, and may be either placed upon flat faces, or curved to the -circle, but a lamp in the centre of a reflector is the basis of the -arrangement. - -If a light were put upon a rock in the ocean without a reflector, -it would be seen dimly, but all round. Dimly, because the light, -spreading in all directions, would be weak and diluted, but visible -all round because there would be nothing to obstruct it. But put this -light into a twenty-one inch reflector, and we have two distinct -consequences;--one that we obstruct the radiation of all the rays -except those that escape from the mouth of the reflector; the other, -that we reflect into the same direction as the rays that are escaping -all those we have obstructed from their natural radiation. - -A twenty-one inch reflector allows the rays issuing from it to diverge -fifteen degrees. So that we have the light of the 360 degrees (the -whole of the circle) gathered into fifteen (a twenty-fourth part of -the circle). It does not quite follow that within that area the light -will be twenty-four times as strong as if allowed to dissipate itself -all round, because something must be allowed for absorption and waste; -but we believe this allowance has been greatly overstated, and that -where there are no mechanical difficulties in the way, the reflecting -system is decidedly the best. Of course where it is necessary to light -more than fifteen degrees of the circle, it will be necessary to use -more reflectors, placing them side by side round a shaft, and if these -are set into revolving motion, focus after focus of each reflector -comes before the eye of the mariner, and the effect is all that can be -desired. - -The dioptric or refracting system of lighting is the reverse of this. -In the reflector the light is caught into a basin and thrown out again. -In the refracting system, in its passage through the glass prisms, -it is bent up or down and falls full upon the eye of the mariner, -instead of wasting itself among the stars or down among the rocks -at the lighthouse foot. For light, falling upon glass at a certain -angle, does not go straight on, but gets deflected and transmitted -in an altered line, as it does through water. And here comes the -weakness of the dioptric system, in close vicinity to its strength. -It is true that prisms and lenses send the light in the direction -which is desired, but they charge a toll for the transmission; the -glass is thick, and somewhat of the nature of a sponge. If we write on -blotting-paper the marks appear on the other side, but some of the ink -has soaked sideways, and there is very little doubt, that when light is -transmitted through glass, a good deal of it is absorbed and retained. - -To those who have never seen a dioptric apparatus, or a diagram of -one, it would be very difficult to make any written description -intelligible. The reader must imagine a central lamp, with three or -four circular wicks, making up a core of light four inches across, and -as many high. Round this, and on a level with it, at a distance of -three feet from it, go belts of glass. From these belts, or panels, -the light goes straight out to sea, but as there is a great quantity -of light which goes up to the ceiling and down to the floor, rings of -prisms are put above and below the main panels, and these catch the -upper and lower light, and bend it out to sea, parallel to the main -central beam. When a revolving light has to be made by the dioptric -apparatus, the lenses are so constructed that the light, in going -through them, is gathered up into the exact similitude of a ray, as -it would leave the mouth of a reflector, and of course with the same -result; the central lamp remains stationary, and the lenses move -round it, and focus after focus, flash after flash, come upon the eye -of the mariner. Both the systems admit of peculiar adaptations, and -they have been occasionally combined into a hybrid apparatus, called -Cata-dioptric. - -This, then, is, in brief, the history of the development of the -lighthouse system of the United Kingdom. We think it has fairly kept -pace with the development of the mercantile marine. When there were -coal fires at some lighthouses, and wax candles at others, the vessels -that passed them, and were guided by them, were not such as modern -shipwrights would look at with much complacency. But the age that has -produced the _Great Eastern_ can also point to the Skerryvore and the -Bishop Rock lighthouses, to the Electric light, and to a first-class -Lighting apparatus. - -Whatever the future in store for the English lighthouse system, one -thing is certain, that it cannot, and was never meant to supersede -seamanship. No amount of lighting will dispense with the necessity for -eyes, no extent of warning is so good as the capacity for grappling -with a danger. The lighthouse authorities may cheer a sailor on his way -with leading lights and beacon warnings, but he must still be a sailor -to turn their warnings to account. - -When Rudyerd’s Eddystone was building, Louis XIV. was at war with -England, and a French privateer took the men at work upon the rock, -and carried them to a French prison. When that monarch heard of it, he -immediately ordered them to be released, and the captors to be put in -their place; declaring that, though at enmity with England, he was not -at war with mankind. Extremes meet. The most gorgeous monarch in Europe -and the plain Quaker of Liverpool had one point in common;--they both -agreed that the erection of a Lighthouse was “a great holy good, to -serve and save humanity.” - - - - -[Illustration: BESSY’S SPECTACLES.] - - - - -Lovel the Widower. - - -CHAPTER II. - -IN WHICH MISS PRIOR IS KEPT AT THE DOOR. - -[Illustration] - -Of course we all know who she was, the Miss Prior of Shrublands, whom -papa and grandmamma called to the unruly children. Years had passed -since I had shaken the Beak Street dust off my feet. The brass plate -of “Prior” was removed from the once familiar door, and screwed, for -what I can tell, on to the late reprobate owner’s coffin. A little -eruption of mushroom-formed brass knobs I saw on the door-post when -I passed by it last week, and CAFÉ DES AMBASSADEURS was thereon -inscribed, with three fly-blown blue teacups, a couple of coffee-pots -of the well-known Britannia metal, and two freckled copies of the -_Indépendance Belge_ hanging over the window blind. Were those their -Excellencies the Ambassadors at the door, smoking cheroots? Pool and -Billiards were written on their countenances, their hats, their elbows. -They may have been ambassadors down on their luck, as the phrase is. -They were in disgrace, no doubt, at the court of her imperial majesty -Queen Fortune. Men as shabby have retrieved their disgraces ere now, -washed their cloudy faces, strapped their dingy waistcoats with -cordons, and stepped into fine carriages from quarters not a whit more -reputable than the Café des Ambassadeurs. If I lived in the Leicester -Square neighbourhood, and kept a café, I would always treat foreigners -with respect. They may be billiard-markers now, or doing a little -shady police business; but why should they not afterwards be generals -and great officers of state? Suppose that gentleman is at present a -barber, with his tongs and stick of fixature for the mustachios, how -do you know he has not his epaulettes and his _bâton de maréchal_ in -the same pouch? I see engraven on the second-floor bell, on my rooms, -“Plugwell.” Who can Plugwell be, whose feet now warm at the fire where -I sate many a long evening? And this gentleman with the fur collar, -the straggling beard, the frank and engaging leer, the somewhat husky -voice, who is calling out on the door-step, “Step in, and ’ave it done. -Your correct likeness, only one shilling”--is he an ambassador, too? -Ah, no: he is only the _Chargé d’affaires_ of a photographer who lives -upstairs: no doubt where the little ones used to be. Law bless me! -Photography was an infant, and in the nursery, too, when _we_ lived in -Beak Street. - -Shall I own that, for old time’s sake, I went upstairs, and “’ad it -done”--that correct likeness, price one shilling? Would Some One (I -have said, I think, that the party in question is well married in a -distant island) like to have the thing, I wonder, and be reminded of -a man whom she knew in life’s prime, with brown curly locks, as she -looked on the effigy of this elderly gentleman, with a forehead as bare -as a billiard ball? As I went up and down that darkling stair, the -ghosts of the Prior children peeped out from the banisters; the little -faces smiled in the twilight: it may be wounds (of the heart) throbbed -and bled again,--oh, how freshly and keenly! How infernally I have -suffered behind that door in that room--I mean that one where Plugwell -now lives. Confound Plugwell! I wonder what that woman thinks of me as -she sees me shaking my fist at the door? Do you think me mad, madam? I -don’t care if you do. Do you think when I spoke anon of the ghosts of -Prior’s children, I mean that any of them are dead? None are, that I -know of. A great hulking Bluecoat boy, with fluffy whiskers, spoke to -me not long since, in an awful bass voice, and announced his name as -“Gus Prior.” And “How’s Elizabeth?” he added, nodding his bullet head. -Elizabeth, indeed, you great vulgar boy! Elizabeth,--and, by the way, -how long we have been keeping her waiting! - -You see, as I beheld her, a heap of memories struck upon me, and I -could not help chattering; when of course--and you are perfectly right, -only you might just as well have left the observation alone: for I knew -quite well what you were going to say--when I had much better have -held my tongue. Elizabeth means a history to me. She came to me at a -critical period of my life. Bleeding and wounded from the conduct of -that other individual (by her present name of Mrs. O’D--her present -_O’D_-ous name--I say, I will never--never call her)--desperately -wounded and miserable on my return from a neighbouring capital, I went -back to my lodgings in Beak Street, and there there grew up a strange -intimacy between me and my landlady’s young daughter. I told her my -story--indeed, I believe I told anybody who would listen. She seemed -to compassionate me. She would come wistfully into my rooms, bringing -me my gruel and things (I could scarcely bear to eat for awhile -after--after that affair to which I may have alluded before)--she used -to come to me, and she used to pity me, and I used to tell her all, and -to tell her over and over again. Days and days have I passed tearing -my heart out in that second-floor room which answers to the name of -Plugwell now. Afternoon after afternoon have I spent there, and poured -out my story of love and wrong to Elizabeth, showed her that waistcoat -I told you of--that glove (her hand wasn’t so very small either)--her -letters, those two or three vacuous, meaningless letters, with “My dear -sir, mamma hopes you will come to tea;” or, “If dear Mr. Batchelor -_should_ be riding in the Phœnix Park near the _Long Milestone_, about -2, my sister and I will be in the car, and,” &c.; or, “Oh, you kind -man! the tickets (she called it _tickuts_--by heaven! she did) were -too welcome, and the _bouquays_ too lovely” (this word, I saw, had -been operated on with a penknife. I found no faults, not even in her -spelling--then); or--never mind what more. But more of this _puling_, -of this _humbug_, of this _bad spelling_, of this infernal jilting, -swindling, heartless hypocrisy (all her mother’s doing, I own; for -until he _got his place_, my rival was not so well received as I -was)--more of this RUBBISH, I say, I showed Elizabeth, and she pitied -me! - -She used to come to me day after day, and I used to talk to her. She -used not to say much. Perhaps she did not listen; but I did not care -for that. On--and on--and on I would go with my prate about my passion, -my wrongs, and despair; and untiring as my complaints were, still more -constant was my little hearer’s compassion. Mamma’s shrill voice would -come to put an end to our conversation, and she would rise up with an -“Oh, bother!” and go away: but the next day the good girl was sure to -come to me again, when we would have another repetition of our tragedy. - -I daresay you are beginning to suppose (what, after all, is a very -common case, and certainly _no conjuror_ is wanted to make the guess) -that out of all this crying and sentimentality, which a soft-hearted -old fool of a man poured out to a young girl--out of all this -whimpering and pity, something which is said to be akin to pity might -arise. But in this, my good madam, you are utterly wrong. Some people -have the small-pox twice, _I do not_. In my case, if a heart is broke, -it’s broke: if a flower is withered, it’s withered. If I choose to -put my grief in a ridiculous light, why not? Why do you suppose I am -going to make a tragedy of such an old, used-up, battered, stale, -vulgar, trivial, every-day subject as a jilt who plays with a man’s -passion, and laughs at him, and leaves him? Tragedy indeed! Oh, yes! -poison--black-edged note-paper--Waterloo Bridge--one more unfortunate, -and so forth! No: if she goes, let her go!--_si celeres quatit pennas_, -I puff the what-d’ye-call away! But I’ll have no _tragedy_, mind you! - -Well! it must be confessed that a man desperately in love (as I fear -I must own I then was, and a good deal cut up by Glorvina’s conduct) -is a most selfish being: whilst women are so soft and unselfish that -they can forget or disguise their own sorrows for awhile, whilst they -minister to a friend in affliction. I did not see, though I talked -with her daily, on my return from that accursed Dublin, that my little -Elizabeth was pale and _distraite_, and sad, and silent. She would sit -quite dumb whilst I chattered, her hands between her knees, or draw -one of them over her eyes. She would say, “Oh, yes! Poor fellow--poor -fellow!” now and again, as giving a melancholy confirmation of my -dismal stories; but mostly she remained quiet, her head drooping -towards the ground, a hand to her chin, her feet to the fender. - -I was one day harping on the usual string. I was telling Elizabeth -how, after presents had been accepted, after letters had passed -between us (if her scrawl could be called letters, if my impassioned -song could be so construed), after everything but the actual word -had passed our lips--I was telling Elizabeth how, on one accursed -day, Glorvina’s mother greeted me on my arrival in M-rr-n Square, by -saying, “Dear--dear Mr. Batchelor, we look on you quite as one of the -family! Congratulate me--congratulate my child! Dear Tom has got his -appointment as Recorder of Tobago; and it is to be a match between him -and his cousin Glory.” - -“His cousin _What!_” I shriek with a maniac laugh. - -“My poor Glorvina! Sure the children have been fond of each other ever -since they could speak. I knew your kind heart would be the first to -rejoice in their happiness!” - -And so, say I--ending the story--I, who thought myself loved, was -left without a pang of pity: I, who could mention a hundred reasons -why I thought Glorvina well disposed to me, was told she regarded me -as an _uncle_! Were her letters such as nieces write? Whoever heard -of an uncle walking round Merrion Square for hours of a rainy night, -and looking up to a bedroom window, because his _niece_, forsooth, -was behind it? I had set my whole heart on the cast, and this was the -return I got for it. For months she cajoles me--her eyes follow me, her -cursed smiles welcome and fascinate me, and at a moment, at the beck of -another--she laughs at me and leaves me! - -At this, my little pale Elizabeth, still hanging down, cries, “Oh, the -villain! the villain!” and sobs so that you might have thought her -little heart would break. - -“Nay,” said I, “my dear, Mr. O’Dowd is no villain. His uncle, Sir -Hector, was as gallant an old officer as any in the service. His aunt -was a Molloy, of Molloy’s Town, and they are of excellent family, -though, I believe, of embarrassed circumstances; and young Tom----” - -“_Tom?_” cries Elizabeth, with a pale, bewildered look. “_His name -wasn’t Tom_, dear Mr. Batchelor; _his name was Woo-woo-illiam_!” and -the tears begin again. - -Ah, my child! my child! my poor young creature! and you, too, have -felt the infernal stroke. You, too, have passed the tossing nights of -pain--have heard the dreary hours toll--have looked at the cheerless -sunrise with your blank sleepless eyes--have woke out of dreams, mayhap -in which the beloved was smiling on you, whispering love-words--oh! -how sweet and fondly remembered! What!--your heart has been robbed, -too, and your treasury is rifled and empty!--poor girl! And I looked -in that sad face, and saw no grief there! You could do your little -sweet endeavour to soothe my wounded heart, and I never saw yours was -bleeding! Did you suffer more than I did, my poor little maid? I hope -not. Are you so young, and is all the flower of life blighted for you? -the cup without savour, the sun blotted, or almost invisible over your -head? The truth came on me all at once: I felt ashamed that my own -selfish grief should have made me blind to hers. - -“What!” said I, “my poor child. Was it...?” and I pointed with my -finger _downwards_. - -She nodded her poor head. - -I knew it was the lodger who had taken the first floor shortly after -Slumley’s departure. He was an officer in the Bombay Army. He had had -the lodgings for three months. He had sailed for India shortly before I -returned home from Dublin. - -Elizabeth is waiting all this time--shall she come in? No, not yet. I -have still a little more to say about the Priors. - -You understand that she was no longer Miss Prior of Beak Street, and -that mansion, even at the time of which I write, had been long handed -over to other tenants. The captain dead, his widow with many tears -pressed me to remain with her, and I did, never having been able to -resist that kind of appeal. Her statements regarding her affairs -were not strictly correct.--Are not women sometimes incorrect about -money matters?--A landlord (not unjustly indignant) quickly handed -over the mansion in Beak Street to other tenants. The Queen’s taxes -swooped down on poor Mrs. Prior’s scanty furniture--on hers?--on mine -likewise: on my neatly-bound college books, emblazoned with the effigy -of Bonifacius, our patron, and of Bishop Budgeon, our founder; on my -elegant Raphael Morghen prints, purchased in undergraduate days--(ye -Powers! what _did_ make us boys go tick for fifteen-guinea proofs of -Raphael, Dying Stags, Duke of Wellington Banquets, and the like?); my -harmonium, at which SOME ONE has warbled songs of my composition--(I -mean the words, artfully describing my passions, my hopes, or my -despair); on my rich set of Bohemian glass, bought on the Zeil, -Frankfort O. M.; on my picture of my father, the late Captain Batchelor -(Hopner), R.N., in white ducks, and a telescope, pointing, of course, -to a tempest, in the midst of which was a naval engagement; on my -poor mother’s miniature, by old Adam Buck, in pencil and pink, with -no waist to speak of at all; my tea and cream pots (bullion), with a -hundred such fond knicknacks as decorate the chamber of a lonely man. -I found all these household treasures in possession of the myrmidons -of the law, and had to pay the Priors’ taxes with this hand, before I -could be redintegrated in my own property. Mrs. Prior could only pay -me back with a widow’s tears and blessings (Prior had quitted ere this -time a world where he had long ceased to be of use or ornament). The -tears and blessings, I say, she offered me freely, and they were all -very well. But why go on tampering with the tea-box, madam? Why put -your finger--your finger?--your whole paw--in the jam-pot? And it is a -horrible fact that the wine and spirit bottles were just as leaky after -Prior’s decease as they had been during his disreputable lifetime. One -afternoon, having a sudden occasion to return to my lodgings, I found -my wretched landlady in the very act of marauding sherry. She gave an -hysterical laugh, and then burst into tears. She declared that since -her poor Prior’s death she hardly knew what she said or did. She may -have been incoherent; she was; but she certainly spoke truth on _this_ -occasion. - -I am speaking lightly--flippantly, if you please--about this old Mrs. -Prior, with her hard, eager smile, her weazened face, her frowning -look, her cruel voice; and yet, goodness knows, I could, if I liked, be -serious as a sermonizer. Why, this woman had once red cheeks, and was -well-looking enough, and told few lies, and stole no sherry, and felt -the tender passions of the heart, and I daresay kissed the weak old -beneficed clergyman her father very fondly and remorsefully that night -when she took leave of him to skip round to the back garden-gate and -run away with Mr. Prior. Maternal instinct she had, for she nursed her -young as best she could from her lean breast, and went about hungrily, -robbing and pilfering for them. On Sundays she furbished up that -threadbare black silk gown and bonnet, ironed the collar, and clung -desperately to church. She had a feeble pencil drawing of the vicarage -in Dorsetshire, and _silhouettes_ of her father and mother, which were -hung up in the lodgings wherever she went. She migrated much: wherever -she went she fastened on the gown of the clergyman of the parish; spoke -of her dear father the vicar, of her wealthy and gifted brother the -Master of Boniface, with a reticence which implied that Dr. Sargent -might do more for his poor sister and her family, if he would. She -plumed herself (oh! those poor moulting old plumes!) upon belonging to -the clergy; had read a good deal of good sound old-fashioned theology -in early life, and wrote a noble hand, in which she had been used to -copy her father’s sermons. She used to put cases of conscience, to -present her humble duty to the Rev. Mr. Green, and ask explanation of -such and such a passage of his admirable sermon, and bring the subject -round so as to be reminded of certain quotations of Hooker, Beveridge, -Jeremy Taylor. I think she had an old commonplace book with a score of -these extracts, and she worked them in very amusingly and dexterously -into her conversation. Green would be interested: perhaps pretty young -Mrs. Green would call, secretly rather shocked at the coldness of old -Dr. Brown, the rector, about Mrs. Prior. Between Green and Mrs. Prior -money transactions would ensue: Mrs. Green’s visits would cease: Mrs. -Prior was an expensive woman to know. I remember Pye of Maudlin, just -before he “went over,” was perpetually in Mrs. Prior’s back parlour -with little books, pictures, medals, &c. &c.--you know. They called -poor Jack a Jesuit at Oxbridge; but one year at Rome I met him (with a -half-crown shaved out of his head, and a hat as big as Don Basilio’s); -and he said, “My dear Batchelor, do you know that person at your -lodgings? I think she was an artful creature! She borrowed fourteen -pounds of me, and I forget how much of--seven, I think--of Barfoot, -of Corpus, just--just before we were received. And I believe she -absolutely got another loan from Pummel, to be able to get out of the -hands of us Jesuits. Are you going to hear the Cardinal? Do--do go and -hear him--everybody does: it’s the most fashionable thing in Rome.” And -from this I opine that there are slyboots in other communions besides -that of Rome. - -Now Mamma Prior had not been unaware of the love passages between -her daughter and the fugitive Bombay captain. Like Elizabeth, she -called Captain Walkingham “villain” readily enough; but, if I know -woman’s nature in the least (and I don’t), the old schemer had thrown -her daughter only too frequently in the officer’s way, had done no -small portion of the flirting herself, had allowed poor Bessy to -receive presents from Captain Walkingham, and had been the manager -and directress of much of the mischief which ensued. You see, in this -humble class of life, unprincipled mothers _will_ coax and wheedle and -cajole gentlemen whom they suppose to be eligible, in order to procure -an establishment for their darling children! What the Prioress did was -done from the best motives of course. “Never--never did the monster see -Bessy without me, or one or two of her brothers and sisters, and Jack -and dear Ellen are as sharp children as any in England!” protested the -indignant Mrs. Prior to me; “and if one of my boys had been grown up, -Walkingham never would have dared to act as he did--the unprincipled -wretch! My poor husband would have punished the villain as he deserved; -but what could he do in his shattered state of health? Oh! you -men,--you men, Mr. Batchelor! how _unprincipled_ you are!” - -“Why, my good Mrs. Prior,” said I, “you let Elizabeth come to my room -often enough.” - -“To have the conversation of her uncle’s friend, of an educated man, -of a man so much older than herself! Of course, dear sir! Would not a -mother wish every advantage for her child? and whom could I trust, if -not you, who have ever been such a friend to me and mine?” asks Mrs. -Prior, wiping her dry eyes with the corner of her handkerchief, as -she stands by my fire, my monthly bills in hand,--written in her neat -old-fashioned writing, and calculated with that prodigal liberality -which she always exercised in compiling the little accounts between -us. “Why, bless me!” says my cousin, little Mrs. Skinner, coming to -see me once when I was unwell, and examining one of the just-mentioned -documents,--“bless me! Charles, you consume more tea than all my -family, though we are seven in the parlour, and as much sugar and -butter,--well, it’s no wonder you are bilious!” - -“But then, my dear, I like my tea so _very_ strong,” says I; “and you -take yours uncommonly mild. I have remarked it at your parties.” - -“It’s a shame that a man should be robbed so,” cried Mrs. S. - -“How kind it is of you to cry thieves, Flora!” I reply. - -“It’s my duty, Charles!” exclaims my cousin. “And I should like to know -who that great, tall, gawky red-haired girl in the passage is!” - -Ah me! the name of the only woman who ever had possession of this heart -was not Elizabeth; though I own I did think at one time that my little -schemer of a landlady would not have objected if I had proposed to make -Miss Prior Mrs. Batchelor. And it is not only the poor and needy who -have this mania, but the rich, too. In the very highest circles, as -I am informed by the best authorities, this match-making goes on. Ah -woman--woman!--ah wedded wife!--ah fond mother of fair daughters! how -strange thy passion is to add to thy titles that of mother-in-law! I am -told, when you have got the title, it is often but a bitterness and a -disappointment. Very likely the son-in-law is rude to you, the coarse, -ungrateful brute! and very possibly the daughter rebels, the thankless -serpent! And yet you will go on scheming: and having met only with -disappointment from Louisa and her husband, you will try and get one -for Jemima, and Maria, and down even to little Toddles coming out of -the nursery in her red shoes! When you see her with little Tommy, your -neighbour’s child, fighting over the same Noah’s ark, or clambering -on the same rocking-horse, I make no doubt, in your fond silly head, -you are thinking, “Will those little people meet some twenty years -hence?” And you give Tommy a very large piece of cake, and have a fine -present for him on the Christmas tree--you know you do, though he is -but a rude, noisy child, and has already beaten Toddles, and taken her -doll away from her, and made her cry. I remember, when I myself was -suffering from the conduct of a young woman in--in a capital which -is distinguished by a viceregal court--and from _her_ heartlessness, -as well as that of her relative, who I once thought would be _my_ -mother-in-law--shrieking out to a friend who happened to be spouting -some lines from Tennyson’s _Ulysses_:--“By George! Warrington, I -have no doubt that when the young syrens set their green caps at the -old Greek captain and his crew, waving and beckoning him with their -white arms and glancing smiles, and wheedling him with their sweetest -pipes--I make no doubt, sir, that _the mother syrens_ were behind the -rocks (with their dyed fronts and cheeks painted, so as to resist -water), and calling out--‘Now, Halcyone, my child, that air from the -Pirata! Now, Glaukopis, dear, look well at that old gentleman at the -helm! Bathykolpos, love, there’s a young sailor on the maintop, who -will tumble right down into your lap if you beckon him!’ And so on--and -so on.” And I laughed a wild shriek of despair. For I, too, have been -on the dangerous island, and come away thence, mad, furious, wanting a -strait-waistcoat. - -And so, when a white-armed syren, named Glorvina, was bedevilling _me_ -with her all too tempting ogling and singing, I did not see at the -time, but _now_ I know, that her artful mother was egging that artful -child on. - -How when the captain died, bailiffs and executions took possession of -his premises, I have told in a previous page, nor do I care to enlarge -much upon the odious theme. I think the bailiffs were on the premises -before Prior’s exit: but he did not know of their presence. If I had -to buy them out, ’twas no great matter: only I say it _was_ hard of -Mrs. Prior to represent me in the character of Shylock to the Master of -Boniface. Well--well! I suppose there are other gentlemen besides Mr. -Charles Batchelor who have been misrepresented in this life. Sargent -and I made up matters afterwards, and Miss Bessy was the cause of our -coming together again. “Upon my word, my dear Batchelor,” says he one -Christmas, when I went up to the old college, “I did not know how much -my--ahem!--my family was obliged to you! My--ahem!--niece, Miss Prior, -has informed me of various acts of--ahem!--generosity which you showed -to my poor sister, and her still more wretched husband. You got my -second--ahem!--nephew--pardon me if I forget his Christian name--into -the what-d’you-call’em--Bluecoat school; you have been, on various -occasions, of considerable pecuniary service to my sister’s family. A -man need not take high university honours to have a good--ahem!--heart; -and, upon my word, Batchelor, I and my--ahem!--wife, are sincerely -obliged to you!” - -“I tell you what, Master,” said I, “there _is_ a point upon which you -ought really to be obliged to me, and in which I have been the means of -putting money into your pocket too.” - -“I confess I fail to comprehend you,” says the Master, with his -grandest air. - -“I have got you and Mrs. Sargent a very good governess for your -children, at the very smallest remuneration,” says I. - -“Do you know the charges that unhappy sister of mine and her family -have put me to already?” says the Master, turning as red as his hood. - -“They have formed the frequent subject of your conversation,” I -replied. “You have had Bessy as a governess....” - -“A nursery governess--she has learned Latin, and a great deal more, -since she has been in my house!” cries the Master. - -“A nursery governess at the wages of a housemaid,” I continued, as bold -as Corinthian brass. - -“Does my niece, does my--ahem!--children’s governess, complain of my -treatment in my college?” cries the Master. - -“My dear Master,” I asked, “you don’t suppose I would have listened to -her complaints, or, at any rate, have repeated them, until now?” - -“And why now, Batchelor, I should like to know?” says the Master, -pacing up and down his study in a fume, under the portraits of Holy -Bonifacius, Bishop Budgeon, and all the defunct bigwigs of the college. -“And why now, Batchelor, I should like to know?” says he. - -“Because, though after staying with you for three years, and having -improved herself greatly, as every woman must in your society, my dear -Master, Miss Prior is worth at least fifty guineas a year more than you -give her, I would not have had her speak until she had found a better -place.” - -“You mean to say she proposes to go away?” - -“A wealthy friend of mine, who was a member of our college, by the way, -wants a nursery governess, and I have recommended Miss Prior to him, at -seventy guineas a year.” - -“And pray who’s the member of my college who will give my niece seventy -guineas?” asks the Master, fiercely. - -“You remember Lovel, the gentleman-pensioner?” - -“The sugar-baking man--the man who took you out of ga...?” - -“One good turn deserves another,” says I, hastily. “I have done as much -for some of your family, Sargent!” - -The red Master, who had been rustling up and down his study in his -gown and bands, stopped in his walk as if I had struck him. He -looked at me. He turned redder than ever. He drew his hand over his -eyes. “Batchelor,” says he, “I ask your pardon. It was I who forgot -myself--may heaven forgive me!--forgot how good you have been to my -family, to my--ahem!--_humble_ family, and--and how devoutly thankful -I ought to be for the protection which they have found in you.” His -voice quite fell as he spoke; and of course any little wrath which I -might have felt was disarmed before his contrition. We parted the best -friends. He not only shook hands with me at the study door, but he -actually followed me to the hall door, and shook hands at his lodge -porch, _sub Jove_, in the quadrangle. Huckles, the tutor (Highlow -Huckles we used to call him in our time), and Botts (Trumperian -professor), who happened to be passing through the court at the time, -stood aghast as they witnessed the phenomenon. - -“I say, Batchelor,” asks Huckles, “have you been made a marquis by any -chance?” - -“Why a marquis, Huckles?” I ask. - -“Sargent never comes to his lodge-door with any man under a marquis,” -says Huckles, in a low whisper. - -“Or a pretty woman,” says that Botts (he _will_ have his joke). -“Batchelor, my elderly Tiresias, are you turned into a lovely young -lady _par hasard_?” - -“Get along, you absurd Trumperian professor!” say I. But the -circumstance was the talk not only in Compotation Room that evening -over our wine, but of the whole college. And further, events happened -which made each man look at his neighbour with wonder. For that whole -term Sargent did not ask our nobleman Lord Sackville (Lord Wigmore’s -son) to the lodge. (Lord W.’s father, you know, Duff, was baker to -the college.) For that whole term he was rude but twice to Perks, the -junior tutor, and then only in a very mild way: and what is more, he -gave his niece a present of a gown, of his blessing, of a kiss, and a -high character, when she went down;--and promised to put one of her -young brothers to school--which promise, I need not say, he faithfully -kept: for he has good principles, Sargent has. He is rude: he is -ill-bred: he is _bumptious_ beyond almost any man I ever knew: he is -spoiled not a little by prosperity;--but he is magnanimous: he can own -that he has been in the wrong; and oh me! what a quantity of Greek he -knows! - -Although my late friend the captain never seemed to do aught but spend -the family money, his disreputable presence somehow acted for good in -the household. “My dear husband kept our family together,” Mrs. Prior -said, shaking her lean head under her meagre widow’s cap. “Heaven -knows how I shall provide for these lambs now he is gone.” Indeed, it -was not until after the death of that tipsy shepherd that the wolves -of the law came down upon the lambs--myself included, who have passed -the age of lambhood and mint sauce a long time. They came down upon -our fold in Beak Street, I say, and ravaged it. What was I to do? -Could I leave that widow and children in their distress? I was not -ignorant of misfortune, and knew how to succour the miserable. Nay, I -think, the little excitement attendant upon the seizure of my goods, -&c., the insolent vulgarity of the low persons in possession--with -one of whom I was very near coming to a personal encounter--and other -incidents which occurred in the bereft household, served to rouse -me, and dissipate some of the languor and misery under which I was -suffering, in consequence of Miss Mulligan’s conduct to me. I know I -took the late captain to his final abode. My good friends the printers -of the _Museum_ took one of his boys into their counting-house. A blue -coat and a pair of yellow stockings were procured for Augustus; and -seeing the Master’s children walking about in Boniface gardens with -a glum-looking old wretch of a nurse, I bethought me of proposing to -him to take his niece Miss Prior--and, heaven be good to me! never -said one word to her uncle about Miss Bellenden and the Academy. I -daresay I drew a number of long bows about her. I managed about the -bad grammar pretty well, by lamenting that Elizabeth’s poor mother had -been forced to allow the girl to keep company with ill-educated people: -and added, that she could not fail to mend her English in the house -of one of the most distinguished scholars in Europe, and one of the -best-bred women. I did say so, upon my word, looking that half-bred -stuck-up Mrs. Sargent gravely in the face; and I humbly trust, if that -bouncer has been registered against me, the Recording Angel will be -pleased to consider that the motive was good, though the statement was -unjustifiable. But I don’t think it was the compliment: I think it was -the temptation of getting a governess for next to nothing that operated -upon Madam Sargent. And so Bessy went to her aunt, partook of the bread -of dependence, and drank of the cup of humiliation, and ate the pie of -humility, and brought up her odious little cousins to the best of her -small power, and bowed the head of hypocrisy before the don her uncle, -and the pompous little upstart her aunt. _She_ the best-bred woman in -England, indeed! She, the little vain skinflint! - -Bessy’s mother was not a little loth to part with the fifty pounds a -year which the child brought home from the Academy; but her departure -thence was inevitable. Some quarrel had taken place there, about which -the girl did not care to talk. Some rudeness had been offered to Miss -Bellenden, to which Miss Prior was determined not to submit: or was it -that she wanted to go away from the scenes of her own misery, and to -try and forget that Indian captain? Come, fellow-sufferer! Come, child -of misfortune, come hither! Here is an old bachelor who will weep with -thee tear for tear! - -I protest here is Miss Prior coming into the room at last. A pale face, -a tawny head of hair combed back, under a black cap: a pair of blue -spectacles, as I live! a tight mourning dress, buttoned up to her white -throat; a head hung meekly down: such is Miss Prior. She takes my hand -when I offer it. She drops me a demure little curtsey, and answers my -many questions with humble monosyllabic replies. She appeals constantly -to Lady Baker for instruction, or for confirmation of her statements. -What! have six years of slavery so changed the frank daring young girl -whom I remember in Beak Street? She is taller and stouter than she was. -She is awkward and high-shouldered, but surely she has a very fine -figure. - -“Will Miss Cecy and Master Popham have their teas here or in the -schoolroom?” asks Bedford, the butler, of his master. Miss Prior looks -appealingly to Lady Baker. - -“In the sch----” Lady Baker is beginning. - -“Here--here!” bawl out the children. “Much better fun down here: and -you’ll send us out some fruit and things from dinner, papa!” cries Cecy. - -“It’s time to dress for dinner,” says her ladyship. - -“Has the first bell rung?” asks Lovel. - -“Yes, the first bell has rung, and grandmamma must go, for it always -takes her a precious long time to dress for dinner!” cries Pop. And, -indeed, on looking at Lady Baker, the connoisseur might perceive that -her ladyship was a highly composite person, whose charms required very -much care and arrangement. There are some cracked old houses where the -painters and plumbers and puttyers are always at work. - -“Have the goodness to ring the bell!” she says, in a majestic manner, -to Miss Prior, though I think Lady Baker herself was nearest. - -I sprang towards the bell myself, and my hand meets Elizabeth’s there, -who was obeying her ladyship’s summons, and who retreats, making me the -demurest curtsey. At the summons, enter Bedford the butler (he was an -old friend of mine, too) and young Buttons, the page under that butler. - -Lady Baker points to a heap of articles on a table, and says to -Bedford: “If you please, Bedford, tell my man to give those things to -Pinhorn, my maid, to be taken to my room.” - -“Shall not I take them up, dear Lady Baker?” says Miss Prior. - -But Bedford, looking at his subordinate, says: “Thomas! tell Bulkeley, -her ladyship’s man, to take her ladyship’s things, and give them to -her ladyship’s maid.” There was a tone of sarcasm, even of parody, -in Monsieur Bedford’s voice; but his manner was profoundly grave and -respectful. Drawing up her person, and making a motion, I don’t know -whether of politeness or defiance, exit Lady Baker, followed by page, -bearing bandboxes, shawls, paper parcels, parasols--I know not what. -Dear Popham stands on his head as grandmamma leaves the room. “Don’t be -vulgar!” cries little Cecy (the dear child is always acting as a little -Mentor to her brother). “I shall, if I like,” says Pop; and he makes -faces at her. - -“You know your room, Batch?” asks the master of the house. - -“Mr. Batchelor’s old room--always has the blue room,” says Bedford, -looking very kindly at me. - -“Give us,” cries Lovel, “a bottle of that Sau....” - -“... Terne, Mr. Batchelor used to like. Château Yquem. All right!” -says Mr. Bedford. “How will you have the turbot done you brought -down?--Dutch sauce?--Make lobster into salad? Mr. Bonnington likes -lobster salad,” says Bedford. Pop is winding up the butler’s back at -this time. It is evident Mr. Bedford is a privileged person in the -family. As he had entered it on my nomination several years ago, and -had been ever since the faithful valet, butler, and major-domo of -Lovel, Bedford and I were always good friends when we met. - -“By the way, Bedford, why wasn’t the barouche sent for me to the -bridge?” cries Lovel. “I had to walk all the way home, with a bat and -stumps for Pop, with the basket of fish, and that bandbox with my -lady’s----” - -“He--he!” grins Bedford. - -“‘He--he!’ Confound you, why do you stand grinning there? Why didn’t I -have the carriage, I say?” bawls the master of the house. - -“_You_ know, sir,” says Bedford. “_She_ had the carriage.” And he -indicated the door through which Lady Baker had just retreated. - -“Then why didn’t I have the phaeton?” asks Bedford’s master. - -“Your ma and Mr. Bonnington had the phaeton.” - -“And why shouldn’t they, pray? Mr. Bonnington is lame: I’m at my -business all day. I should like to know why they _shouldn’t_ have the -phaeton?” says Lovel, appealing to me. As we had been sitting talking -together previous to Miss Prior’s appearance, Lady Baker had said -to Lovel, “Your mother and Mr. Bonnington are coming to dinner _of -course_, Frederick;” and Lovel had said, “Of course they are,” with a -peevish bluster, whereof I now began to understand the meaning. The -fact was, these two women were fighting for the possession of this -child; but who was the Solomon to say which should have him? Not I. -_Nenni._ I put my oar in no man’s boat. Give me an easy life, my dear -friends, and row me gently over. - -“You had better go and dress,” says Bedford sternly, looking at his -master; “the first bell has rung this quarter of an hour. Will you have -some 34?” - -Lovel started up; he looked at the clock. “You are all ready, Batch, -I see. I hope you are going to stay some time, ain’t you?” And he -disappeared to array himself in his sables and starch. I was thus alone -with Miss Prior, and her young charges, who resumed straightway their -infantine gambols and quarrels. - -“My dear Bessy!” I cry, holding out both hands, “I am heartily glad -to----” - -“_Ne m’appelez que de mon nom paternel devant tout ce monde s’il vous -plait, mon cher ami, mon bon protecteur!_” she says, hastily, in very -good French, folding her hands and making a curtsey. - -“_Oui, oui, oui! Parlez-vous Français? J’aime, tu aimes, il aime!_” -cries out dear Master Popham. “What are you talking about? Here’s the -phaeton!” and the young innocent dashes through the open window on to -the lawn, whither he is followed by his sister, and where we see the -carriage containing Mr. and Mrs. Bonnington rolling over the smooth -walk. - -Bessy advances towards me, and gives me readily enough now the hand she -had refused anon. - -“I never thought you would have refused it, Bessy,” said I. - -“Refuse it to the best friend I ever had!” she says, pressing my hand. -“Ah, dear Mr. Batchelor, what an ungrateful wretch I should be, if I -did!” - -“Let me see your eyes. Why do you wear spectacles? You never wore them -in Beak Street,” I say. You see I was very fond of the child. She had -wound herself around me in a thousand fond ways. Owing to a certain -Person’s conduct my heart may be a ruin--a Persepolis, sir--a perfect -Tadmor. But what then? May not a traveller rest under its shattered -columns? May not an Arab maid repose there till the morning dawns and -the caravan passes on? Yes, my heart is a Palmyra, and once a queen -inhabited me (O Zenobia! Zenobia! to think thou shouldst have been -led away captive by an O’D.!) Now, I am alone, alone in the solitary -wilderness. Nevertheless, if a stranger comes to me I have a spring for -his weary feet, I will give him the shelter of my shade. Rest thy cheek -awhile, young maiden, on my marble--then go thy ways, and leave me. - -This I thought, or something to this effect, as in reply to my remark, -“Let me see your eyes,” Bessy took off her spectacles, and I took -them up and looked at her. Why didn’t I say to her, “My dear brave -Elizabeth! as I look in your face, I see you have had an awful deal of -suffering. Your eyes are inscrutably sad. We who are initiated, know -the members of our Community of Sorrow. We have both been wrecked in -different ships, and been cast on this shore. Let us go hand-in-hand, -and find a cave and a shelter somewhere together.” I say, why didn’t I -say this to her? She would have come, I feel sure she would. We would -have been semi-attached as it were. We would have locked up that room -in either heart where the skeleton was, and said nothing about it, and -pulled down the party-wall and taken our mild tea in the garden. I live -in Pump Court now. It would have been better than this dingy loneliness -and a snuffy laundress who bullies me. But for Bessy? Well--well, -perhaps better for her too. - -I remember these thoughts rushing through my mind whilst I held -the spectacles. What a number of other things too? I remember two -canaries making a tremendous concert in their cage. I remember the -voices of the two children quarrelling on the lawn, the sound of the -carriage-wheels grinding over the gravel; and then of a little old -familiar cracked voice in my ear, with a “La, Mr. Batchelor! are _you_ -here?” And a sly face looks up at me from under an old bonnet. - -“It is mamma,” says Bessy. - -“And I’m come to tea with Elizabeth and the dear children; and -while you are at dinner, dear Mr. Batchelor, thankful--thankful for -all mercies! And, dear me! here is Mrs. Bonnington, I do declare! -Dear madam, how well you look--not twenty, I declare! And dear Mr. -Bonnington! Oh, sir! let me--let me, I _must_ press your hand. What a -sermon last Sunday! All Putney was in tears!” - -And the little woman, flinging out her lean arms, seizes portly Mr. -Bonnington’s fat hand: as he and kind Mrs. Bonnington enter at the -open casement. The little woman seems inclined to do the honours of -the house. “And won’t you go upstairs, and put on your cap? Dear me, -what a lovely ribbon! How blue does become Mrs. Bonnington! I always -say so to Elizabeth,” she cries, peeping into a little packet which -Mrs. Bonnington bears in her hand. After exchanging friendly words and -greetings with me, that lady retires to put the lovely cap on, followed -by her little jackal of an aide-de-camp. The portly clergyman surveys -his pleased person in the spacious mirror. “Your things are in your -old room--like to go in, and brush up a bit?” whispers Bedford to me. -I am obliged to go, you see, though, for my part, I had thought, until -Bedford spoke, that the ride on the top of the Putney omnibus had left -me without any need of brushing; having aired my clothes, and given my -young cheek a fresh and agreeable bloom. - -My old room, as Bedford calls it, was that snug apartment communicating -by double doors with the drawing-room, and whence you can walk on to -the lawn out of the windows. - -“Here’s your books, here’s your writing-paper,” says Bedford, leading -the way into the chamber. “Does sore eyes good to see _you_ down here -again, sir. You may smoke now. Clarence Baker smokes when he comes. -Go and get some of that wine you like for dinner.” And the good -fellow’s eyes beam kindness upon me as he nods his head, and departs to -superintend the duties of his table. Of course you understand that this -Bedford was my young printer’s boy of former days. What a queer fellow! -I had not only been kind to him, but he was grateful. - - - - -An Essay without End. - - -To some reader, perhaps, an essay without end may appear odd, and -opposed to the regular order of things; but if he will kindly imagine -the line written on his gravestone--and it is an epitaph which my own -ghost would regard with particular satisfaction--he will at once see -that it is by no means singular. And whatever propriety there may be in -its application to human life, extends to any process of thought; for -thought, like life, is essential, without beginning and without end. - -It is this which makes abstract reflection so unsatisfying. An -abstract thought is a sort of disembodied spirit; and when matched -with its kind, the result is generally a progeny of ghosts and -chimeras--numerous, but incapable. In fact, we do not often get so -much as that out of it. Abstract thought generally travels backward. -Childless itself, it goes upon its own pedigree; and as that becomes -mysterious in proportion as it is remote, we soon find ourselves in -a company of shadows, too vast to contemplate and too subtle for -apprehension. - -Again it is with thought as it is with life (I should say “soul,” if -the word had not been hackneyed out of all endurance--but then the -poets have exhausted nature)--it must be married to something material -before you can hope to get good fruit from it--capable of continuing -the species. Luckily, anything will do. It seems to have been foreseen -from the creation that thought would scarcely prove prolific, unless -it might be kindled at every sense and by every object in the world. -Experience more than proves the justness of that foresight, and thus -we have sermons in stones. By a bountiful provision, the human mind is -capable of immediate and fruitful alliance with a bough, a brook, a -cloud--all that the eye may see or the ear echo. It may be observed, -too, that just as Sir Cassian Creme strengthens the blood of his -ancient and delicate house by an alliance with his dairy-woman, so a -cultivated mind may produce more vigorous progeny by intimacy with -an atom than with any long-descended speculation on the Soul, say. -Coleridge’s method of thinking is much to the purpose, and what came of -it as a whole? - -For amusement’s sake, let us carry theory into practice. Let us try -what course of reflection we may get by contemplating the first -natural object that comes to hand. The field is wide enough: there is -Parnassus, and there is Holborn Hill. But there are too many squatters -on the former eminence already, perhaps; and besides, a kind of Bedlam -is said to have arisen about the base of it lately, beyond which few -adventurers are known to proceed. Our aspirations are humble--we may -choose the lesser hill. - -“Alas, then!” says the dear reader, “we are to have some antiquarian -reflections. Better Parnassus and Bedlam!”--Fear not. Providence, -which has otherwise been very good to me, gave me a Protestant -mind; and while therein exists no disposition to adore St. Botolph’s -toes, or to worship St. Pancras’s well-preserved tibia, I am equally -unenthusiastic about Pope’s nightcap, I don’t care a fig for Queen -Anne’s farthings, and I would not go round the corner to behold the -site of the Chelsea bunhouse. There is little, after all, in bricks, -bones, and the coffins of men; but a glimpse into the lives of men, or -into the eyes of nature--that is another thing. - -The one may always be had in London, the other never could be had, were -it not for Holborn Hill. Circumstances permitting, every city ought to -be built on a hill; for reasons of morality, and therefore for reasons -of state. No doubt, there is a certain agreeable monotony in levels, -gentle gradients, and a perspicuous network of streets; they may even -impose a wholesome contrast upon the minds of well-to-do citizens, who -go “out of town.” But what of the ill-to-do citizen, who never leaves -its walls? Not only do the bare hard streets present to him no natural -thing, but with strait lines of brick on every side, a stony plane at -his feet, and a flat dull roof over all, he gets no hint of a natural -thing; and all that is artificial in him is hardened and encouraged. -But suppose the city streets wind up and down and round about a hill? -Then by no devices of brick or stone can you keep out the country. -Then Nature defies your macadamization and your chimney stacks; it is -impossible to forget her, or to escape her religious gaze. - -When did it occur to any ordinary person walking Bond Street, that once -there had been turf there, and a running about of beetles? On the other -hand, what man of any kind looks over the little Fleet valley to where -Holborn Hill rises on the other side, without wondering how the houses -came there--without feeling that they are only another sort of tents, -pitched upon the earth for a time? “They, too, have to be struck,” says -he, “and there is everywhere wandering away!” - -The result is, then, that he hits upon a reflection, which is, I do not -say profound, but at the bottom of all profundity, so far as we have -plumbed it. This reflection is to be found in the sap, fibre, and fruit -of all morality, all law, philosophy, and religion. There is nothing -like it to move the hearts of men; the heart it _cannot_ move belongs -to an atheist (which creature, and not the ape, as some have supposed, -is the link between brutes and men), the heart which it _has not_ -moved, to one quite unawakened. For instance, those who fill the gaols; -the society of thieves; the scum of the population, as it is termed, -fermenting in alleys and poisoning the state. We have reformatories -for the young of this breed, whom we endeavour to reclaim by reading, -writing, and arithmetic--attendance at chapel, and book-keeping by -double entry. But when you have put the young reprobate through all -these exercises, you have only succeeded in making gravel walks in a -wilderness; and though from those trim avenues you may scatter good -seed enough, it perishes on the soil, or withers in a tangle of weeds. -After all our labour and seed-scattering, we still complain that it -is so hard to reach the heart. Now here we have the best means of -touching it, perhaps. Let there be found some Professor of Time and -Eternity, skilled to show how the world goes--and _is going_: who -should exhibit, as in a wizard’s glass, the unending procession of -human life. The Roman in his pride, a hundred million Romans in their -pride--all perished; millions of elegant Greeks, with their elegant -wives and mistresses, all perished; Attila’s thundering hosts riding -off the scene--vanished: the clatter of their spears, the fury of their -eyes, the tossing of their shaggy hair, the cloud of thoughts that -moved upon their faces--they and all that belonged to them. - -Not that these personages make the most affecting groups in the series -of dissolving views which illustrate the history of the world. I -would rather confine myself to Holborn Hill, were I professor, in a -penitentiary, of Time and Eternity; and between the period when it lay -solitary in the moonlight, clothed with grass, crowned with trees, -bitterns booming by the river below, while some wild mother lay under -the branches singing to her baby in a tongue dead as herself now--from -that time to the present there has been a very pretty striking of -tents and wandering away. Quite enough for any professor’s purpose. -Quite enough, if impressed upon an ignorant vicious heart, to prepare -it for a better--certainly for a more responsible life. Your young -reprobate will never perceive his relations to his Creator, till he -has discovered the relations of mankind to creation, and his own place -among mankind. You desire him to contemplate the Future: he cannot do -it till he is shown the Past. - -There is a Scripture text apropos of this, which I have longed many a -day to sermonize upon, but we are far enough from Holborn Hill already; -and apart from moral and mental considerations, it is a sufficient -reason for building cities in hilly places, if the hard-worked, captive -people are thus kept in remembrance of the country, and its peace and -health. This is a luxury as well as a good; delight to the senses, as -well as medicine for the mind. Some of us love nature with a large -and personal love. I am sure I do, for one. Thinking of her, immured -in London as I am, I think also of that prisoner in the Bastille, who -prayed Monseigneur for “some tidings of my poor wife, were it only her -name upon a card.” Were I a prisoner long, I should pray not only for -that, but for some tidings of my mistress Nature, were it only her name -in a leaf. And whereas some of us who have sweethearts go prowling -about the dear one’s house, searching through the walls for her, so at -favourable opportunities I search for my mistress through the bricks -and stones of Holborn Hill. In the noon of a midsummer day, with the -roar of carts, waggons, Atlas and other omnibusses rattling in my ears, -with that little bill of Timmins’s on my mind, how have I seen it clad -in green, the stream running in the hollow, and white dandelion tufts -floating in the air. There a grasshopper chirped; a bee hummed, going -his way; and countless small creatures, burrowing in the grass, buzzed -and whirred like a company of small cotton-spinners with all their -looms at work. Practically, there is no standing timber within several -miles of the place; but if I have not seen trees where an alamode beef -business is supposed to be carried on, I am blind. I have seen trees, -and heard the blackbird whistle. - -There is much significance, under the circumstances, in hearing the -blackbird whistle. It is a proof that to me there was perfect silence. -The peculiarity of this animal is, that he _makes_ silence. The more -he whistles, the more still is all nature beside. It is not difficult -to imagine him a sort of fugleman, herald, or black rod, going between -earth and heaven in the interest of either. Take a case: an evening in -autumn. About six o’clock there comes a shower of rain, a bountiful -shower, all in shilling drops. The earth drinks and drinks, holding its -breath; while the trees make a pleasant noise, their leaves kissing -each other for joy. Presently the rain ceases. Drops fall one by one, -lazily, from the satisfied boughs, and sink to the roots of the grass, -lying there in store. Then the blackbird, already on duty in his -favourite tree, sounds his bugle-note. “Attention!” sings he to the -winds big and little; “the earth will return thanks.” Whereupon there -is a stillness deep as--no, not as death, but a silence so profound -that it seems as if it were itself the secret of life, that profoundest -thing. This your own poor carcase appears to recognize. The little -life therein--not more than a quart pot full--knows the presence of -the great ocean from which it was taken, and yearns. It stirs in its -earthen vessel; you feel it moving in your very fingers; you may almost -hear your right hand calling to the left, “I live! I live!” Silence -proclaimed, thanksgiving begins. There is a sensation of the sound of -ten thousand voices, and the swinging of ten thousand censers; besides -the audible singing of birds, the humming of beetles, and the noise of -small things which praise the Lord by rubbing their legs together. - -This bird seems to take another important part in the scheme of nature, -worth mentioning. - -Everybody--everybody at least who has watched by a sick-bed--knows that -days have their appointed time, and die as well as men. There is one -awful minute in the twenty-four hours when the day palpably expires, -and then there is a reach of utter vacancy, of coldness and darkness; -and then a new day is born, and earth, reassured, throbs again. This -is not a fancy; or if so, is it from fancy that so many people die -in this awful hour (“between the night and the morning,” nurses call -it), or that sick men grow paler, fainter, more insensible? I think -not. To appearance they are plainly washed down by the ebbing night, -and plainly stranded so near the verge of death that its waters wash -over them. Now, in five minutes, the sick man is floated away and is -gone; or the new day comes, snatches him to its bosom, and bears him -back to us; and we know that he will live. I hope I shall die between -the night and the morning, so peacefully do we drift away then. But -ah! blessed Morning, I am not ungrateful. That long-legged daughter of -mine, aged eight at present, did you not bring her back to me in your -mysterious way? At half-past two, we said, “Gone!” and began to howl. -Three minutes afterward, a breath swept over her limbs; five minutes -afterward there was a blush like a reflected light upon her face; -seven minutes, and whose eyes but hers should open, bright and pure as -two blue stars? We had studied those stars; and read at a glance that -our little one had again entered the House of Life. - -Our baby’s dying and her new birth is an exact type of the death and -birth of the day. One description serves for both. As she sank away, -fainting and cold, so night expires. This takes place at various -times, according to the season; but generally about two o’clock in the -morning in these latitudes. If you happen to be watching or working -within doors, you may note the time by a coldness and shuddering in -your limbs, and by the sudden waning of the fire, in spite of your -best efforts to keep it bright and cheerful. Then a wind--generally -not a very gentle one--sweeps through the streets--_once_: it does not -return, but hurries straight on, leaving all calm behind it: that is -the breath that passed over the child. Now a blush suffuses the East, -and then open the violet eyes of the day, bright and pure as if there -were no death in the world, nor sin. All which the blackbird seems to -announce to the natural world below. The wind we spoke of warns him; -whereupon he takes his head from under his wing, and keeps a steady -look-out toward the East. As soon as the glory of the morning appears, -he sings his soldierly song; as soon as he sings, smaller fowl wake and -listen, and peep about quietly; when--there comes the day overhead, -sailing in the topmost air, in the golden boat with the purple sails. -And the little winds that blow in the sails--here come they, swooping -over the meadows, scudding along hedgerows, bounding into the big -trees, and away to fill those purple sails again, not only with a -wind, but with a hundred perfumes, and airs heavy with the echoes of a -hundred songs.[25] - -I wish I were a poet; you should have a description of all this in -verses, and welcome. But if I were a musician! Let us see what we -should do as musicians. First, you should hear the distant sound of -a bugle, which sound should float away: that is one of the heralds -of the morning, flying southward. Then another should issue from the -eastern gates; and now the grand _reveillé_ should grow, sweep past -your ears (like the wind aforesaid), and go on, dying as it goes. -When as it dies, my stringed instruments come in. These to the left -of the orchestra break into a soft slow movement, the music swaying -drowsily from side to side, as it were, with a noise like the rustling -of boughs. It must not be much of a noise, however, for my stringed -instruments to the right have begun the very song of the morning. -The bows tremble upon the strings, like the limbs of a dancer, who, -a-tiptoe, prepares to bound into her ecstacy of motion. Away! The song -soars into the air as if it had the wings of a kite. Here swooping, -there swooping, wheeling upward, falling suddenly, checked, poised -for a moment on quivering wings, and again away. It is waltz time, -and you hear the Hours dancing to it. Then the horns. Their melody -overflows into the air richly, like honey of Hybla; it wafts down in -lazy gusts, like the scent of the thyme from that hill. So my stringed -instruments to the left cease rustling, listen a little while, catch -the music of those others, and follow it. Now for the rising of the -lark! Henceforward it is a chorus, and he is the leader thereof. Heaven -and earth agree to follow him. I have a part for the brooks--their -notes drop, drop, drop, like his: for the woods--they sob like him. -At length, nothing remains but to blow the hautboys; and just as the -chorus arrives at its fulness, they come maundering in. They have a -sweet old blundering “cow-song” to themselves--a silly thing, made of -the echoes of all pastoral sounds. There’s a warbling waggoner in it, -and his team jingling their bells. There’s a shepherd driving his flock -from the fold, bleating; and the lowing of cattle.--Down falls the lark -like a stone: it is time he looked for grubs. Then the hautboys go -out, gradually; for the waggoner is far on his road to market; sheep -cease to bleat and cattle to low, one by one; they are on their grazing -ground, and the business of the day is begun. Last of all, the heavenly -music sweeps away to waken more westering lands, over the Atlantic and -its whitening sails. - -And to think this goes on every day, and every day has been repeated -for a thousand years! Generally, though, we don’t like to think about -that, as Mr. Kingsley has remarked, among others; for when he wrote, -“Is it not a grand thought, the silence and permanence of nature amid -the perpetual noise and flux of human life!--a grand thought, that one -generation goeth and another cometh, and the earth abideth for ever?” -he also meant, “Isn’t it a melancholy thought?” For my part, I believe -this reflection to be the fount of all that melancholy which is in man. -I speak in the broadest sense, meaning that whereas whenever you find a -man you find a melancholy animal, this is the secret of his melancholy. -The thought is so common and so old; it has afflicted so many men in -so many generations with a sort of philosophical sadness, that it -comes down to us like an hereditary disease, of which we have lost the -origin, and almost the consciousness. It is an universal disposition -to melancholy madness, in short. Savages who run wild in woods are -not less liable to its influence than we who walk in civilized Pall -Mall. On the contrary, a savage of any brains at all is the most -melancholy creature in the world. Not Donizetti, nor Mendelssohn, -nor Beethoven himself ever composed such sad songs as are drummed -on tom-toms, or piped through reeds, or chanted on the prairies and -lagoons of savage land. No music was ever conceived within the walls of -a city so profoundly touching as that which Irish pipers and British -harpers made before an arch was built in England. Now this bears out -our supposition; for the savage with the tom-tom, the piper with his -pipe, the harper with his harp, lived always in sight of nature. Their -little fussy lives and noisy works were ever in contrast with its -silence and permanence; change and decay with the constant seasons and -the everlasting hills. Who cannot understand the red man’s reverence -for inanimate nature read by this light--especially his reverence for -the setting sun? For the night cometh, reminding him of his own little -candle of an existence, while he knows that the great orb has risen -upon a hundred generations of hunters, and will rise upon a hundred -more. As for him and his works, his knife will be buried with him, and -there an end of him and his works. - -And we Europeans to-day are in the same case with regard to the -silence and permanence of Nature, contrasted with the perpetual flux -and noise of human life. Who thinks of his death without thinking of -it? who thinks of it without thinking of his death? Mother, whose -thoughts dwell about her baby in churchyard lying; Mary, of sister -Margaret who died last year, or of John who was lost at sea, say first -and last--“There the sea rolls, ever as ever; and rages and smiles, -and surges and sighs just the same; and were you and I and the whole -world to be drowned to-day, and all the brave ships to go down with -standing sails, to-morrow there would not be a drop the more in the -ocean, nor on its surface a smile the less. Doesn’t the rain rain upon -my baby’s grave, and the sun shine upon it, as indifferent as if there -were neither babies nor mothers in the world?” Why, this strain is to -be found in all the poetry that ever was written. Walter Mapes may be -quoted, with his, “I propose to end my days in a tavern drinking,” but -his and all such songs merely result from a wild effort to divorce this -“grand thought” from the mind. - -But we need not go to America for a red Indian, nor afield to the -hills for illustration; that is to be found in the impression produced -on many thoughtful minds by the contemplation of social life in any -two periods. We behold Sir Richard Steele boozing unto maudlinness in -purple velvet and a laced hat; Captain Mohock raging through Fleet -Street with a drawn rapier; reprobate old duchesses and the damsels who -were to be our grandmothers sitting in the same pew, and then looking -about us, say--“Here we are again!--the duchess on the settee, Mohock -lounging against the mantelpiece, Dick Steele hiccuping on the stairs -in a white neckcloth. There they go through the little comedy of life, -in ruffles and paste buckles; here go we in swallow-tails and patent -leathers. Mohock married, and was henpecked: young Sanglant is to be -married to-morrow. The duchess being dead, one of those demure little -damsels takes up the tradition, and certain changes of costume having -been accomplished, becomes another wicked old woman; and so it goes -on. They die, and we die; and meanwhile the world goes steadily round. -There is sowing and reaping, and there are select parties, and green -peas in their season, and oh! this twopenny life!” - -Mind you, I have other ideas. What is all this melancholy, at bottom, -but stupidity and ingratitude? Are we miserable because He who made -all beautiful things preserves them to us for ever? True, He has set -bounds to intellect, and to aspirations which, when they are most -largely achieved, do not always work for pure and useful ends; true, -He does not permit us to become too impious in our pride by giving -eternity to the Parthenons and telegraphs that we make such a noise -about; _but_, all that is really good, and beautiful, and profitable -for man, is everlastingly his. The lovely world that Adam beheld is -not only the same to-day, it is created and given to us anew every -day. What have we said about morning, which is born again (for _us_, -for little ones, the ignorant, the blind, who could not see at all -yesterday) three hundred and sixty-five times in a year--every time -as fresh, and new, and innocent as that which first dawned over Eden? -Now, considering how much iniquity and blindness all the _nights_ have -fallen upon, I must think this a bountiful arrangement, and one which -need not make us unhappy. I love to think the air I breathe through -my open window is the same that wandered through Paradise before our -first mother breathed; that the primroses which grow to-day in our dear -old woods are such as decked the bank on which she slept before sin -and death came into the world; and that our children shall find them, -neither better nor worse, when our names are clean forgotten. And is -it nothing that if we have all death, we have all youth?--brand-new -affections and emotions--a mind itself a new and separate creation, as -much as is any one star among the rest? In the heavens there is a tract -of light called the Milky Way, which to the common eye appears no more -than a luminous cloud. But astronomers tell us that this vast river -of light is a universe, in which individual stars are so many that -they are like the sands on the shore. We cannot see each grain of sand -here on Brighton beach, we cannot see the separate stars of the Milky -Way, nor its suns and great planets, with all our appliances; and yet -each of those orbs has its path, rolling along on its own business--a -world. On learning which we are bewildered with astonishment and awe. -But here below is another shifting cloud, called “the human race.” -Thousands of years it has swept over the earth in great tracts, coming -and going. And this vast quicksand is made up of millions and millions -of individual _I_’s, each a man, a separate, distinct creation; each -travelling its path, which none other can travel; each bearing its own -life, which is no other’s--a world. I think this ought to strike us -with as much awe as that other creation. I think we ought to be filled -with as much gratitude for our own planetary being as astonishment at -the spectacle of any Milky Way whatever. And I only wish that we, the -human race, shone in the eyes of heaven with the light of virtue like -another Milky Way. - -Created, then, so purely of ourselves, this is the result with -regard to the natural world about us: that with our own feelings and -affections, we _discover_, each for himself, all the glory of the -universe. And therefore is nature eternal, unchangeable--that all men -may know the whole goodness of God. Whose eyes but mine first saw the -sun set? Some old Chaldean, some dweller in drowned Atlantis, imagined -the feelings of Adam when _he_ first saw the sun go down; ever -since when, this poetical imagining has been going about the world, -and people have envied Adam that one grandest chance of getting a -“sensation.” Why, the Chaldean was Adam! I’m Adam! The sun was created -with me, with you; and by and by, when we had got over the morning of -infancy, we sat on a wall, in a field, on a hill, at our own little -bedroom window, and our childish eyes being by that time opened, we saw -the sun go down for the first time. - -Nor are these pleasures and advantages confined to the external world, -to the sensations it inspires, or the influence it exerts upon us. No -human passion, no emotion, the fiercest or the tenderest, comes to us -at second hand. The experience and observation of a thousand years, -all the metaphysical, and poetical, and dramatic books that ever were -written, cannot add a jot to the duration or intensity of any emotion -of ours. They may exercise it, but they cannot form it, nor instruct -it; nor, were they fifty times as many and as profound, could they -dwarf it. It lies in our hearts an original creation, complete, alone: -like my life and yours. Now see how this arrangement works. When, dear -madam, your little Billy was born, all that wondering delight, that -awful tremor of joy, which possessed the heart of the first mother, -was _yours_. You may have seen a piece of sculpture called the First -Cradle. There sits Eve, brooding over her two boys, rocking them -backward and forward in her arms and on her knees--wondering, awe-full, -breathless with joy, drowned in a new flood of love. “Ah!” says the -tender, child-loving female spectator, “what would not one give to -have been that first mother, to have made with one’s arms the first -cradle!” Ignorant soul! One would think, to hear her talk, that the -gifts of heaven grow threadbare by course of time, and that in 1860 -we have only the rags thereof! Don’t believe it, for there is another -side to the question! If the gifts and rewards of heaven are paid in -new coin, minted for you, with your effigies stamped upon it, so are -the punishments. The flight of Cain when Abel was killed--Bill Sykes’s -was every way as terrible; and any incipient poisoner who may happen to -read this page may assure himself, that his new and improved process -of murder--whatever advantages it may otherwise offer--is not specific -against the torments of him who first shed blood: no, nor against any -one of them. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[25] This paper was written a year ago. Mr. Mattieu Williams, in his -book _Through Norway with a Knapsack_, has since confirmed my fancy -that every day dies a natural death. In Scandinavia, there is a -midnight sun; and Mr. Williams says that although the altitude of the -sun is the same ten minutes before twelve as ten minutes after, there -is a perceptible difference in atmospheric tone and colour--“the usual -difference between evening and morning, sunset and sunrise; the light -having a warmer tint before than after midnight.” - - - - -Transcriber’s Notes - - -Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a -predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they -were not changed. 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