Chapter VI (2)

I found Will had got neck and heels into one of his travellers stories; and there is no knowing how far he would have run his parallel between Billy Dimple and Tucky Squash, had not the music struck up from an adjoining apartment and summoned the company to a dance. The sound seemed to have an inspiring effect on honest Will, and he procured the hand of an old acquaintance for a country dance. It happened to be the fashionable one of “the Devil among the Tailors,” which is so vociferously demanded at every ball and assembly; and many a torn gown, and many an unfortunate toe did rue the dancing of that night; for Will thundered down the dance like a coach and six, sometimes right, sometimes wrong; now running over half a score of little Frenchmen, and now making sad inroads into ladies’ cobweb muslins and spangled tails. As every part of Will’s body partook of the exertion, he shook from his capacious head such volumes of powder that, like pious Æneas on his first interview with Queen Dido, he might be said to have been enveloped in a cloud. Nor was Will’s partner an insignificant figure in the scene; she was a young lady of most voluminous proportions, that quivered at every skip; and being braced up in the fashionable style, with whalebone, stay-tape, and buckram, looked like an apple-pudding tied in the middle; or, taking her flaming dress into consideration, like a bed and bolsters rolled up in a suit of red curtains. The dance finished, I would gladly have taken Will off; but no, he was now in one of his happy moods, and there was no doing anything with him. He insisted on my introducing him to Miss Sophy Sparkle, a young lady unrivaled for playful wit and innocent vivacity, and who like a brilliant adds lustre to the front of fashion. I accordingly presented him to her, and began a conversation in which, I thought, he might take a share; but no such thing. Will took his stand beside her, straddling like a Colossus, with his hands in his pockets, and an air of the most profound attention; nor did he pretend to open his lips for some time, until, upon some lively sally of hers, he electrified the whole company with a most intolerable burst of laughter. What was to be done with such an incorrigible fellow? To add to my distress, the first word he spoke was to tell Miss Sparkle that something she had said reminded him of a circumstance that happened to him in China; and at it he went in the true traveller style; described the Chinese mode of eating rice with chop-sticks; entered into a long eulogium on the succulent qualities of boiled bird’s nests; and I made my escape at the very moment when he was on the point of squatting down on the floor, to show how the little Chinese _Joshes_ sit cross-legged.

TO THE LADIES.

FROM THE MILL OF PINDAR COCKLOFT, ESQ.

Though jogging down the hill of life,
Without the comfort of a wife;
And though I ne’er a helpmate chose,
To stock my house and mend my hose;
With care my person to adorn;
And spruce me up on Sunday morn;
Still do I love the gentle sex,
And still with cares my brain perplex.
To keep the fair ones of the age
Unsullied as the spotless page;
All pure, all simple, all refined,
The sweetest solace of mankind.
I hate the loose insidious jest
To beauty’s modest ear addrest,
And hold that frowns should never fail
To check each smooth, but fulsome tale;
But he whose impious pen should dare
Invade the morals of the fair;
To taint that purity divine
Which should each female heart enshrine;
Though soft his vicious strains should swell,
As those which erst from Gabriel fell,
Should yet be held aloft to shame,
And foul dishonor shade his name.
Judge then, my friends, of my surprise,
The ire that kindled in my eyes,
When I relate, that t’other day
I went a morning call to pay,
On two young nieces, just come down
To take the polish of the town:
By which I mean no more or less
Than _à la Française_ to undress;
To whirl the modest waltz’s rounds,
Taught by Duport for snug ten pounds;
To thump and thunder through a song,
Play _fortes_ soft and _dolces_ strong:
Exhibit loud _piano_ feats,
Caught from that crotchet-hero, Meetz;
To drive the rose-bloom from the face,
And fix the lily in its place;
To doff the white, and in its stead
To bounce about in brazen red.
While in the parlor I delay’d
Till they their persons had array’d,
A dapper volume caught my eye,
That on the window chanced to lie:
A book’s a friend—I always choose
To turn its pages and peruse;
It proved those poems known to fame
For praising every cyprian dame;
The bantlings of a dapper youth,
Renown’d for gratitude and truth;
A little pest, hight Tommy Moore,
Who hopp’d and skipp’d our country o’er;
Who sipp’d our tea and lived on sops,
Revel’d on syllabubs and slops,
And when his brain, of cobweb fine,
Was fuddled with five drops of wine,
Would all his puny loves rehearse,
And many a maid debauch—in verse.
Surprised to meet in open view,
A book of such lascivious hue,
I chid my nieces, but they say
’Tis all the passion of the day;
That many a fashionable belle
Will with enraptured accents dwell
On the sweet _morceau_ she has found
In this delicious, curst compound!
Soft do the tinkling numbers roll,
And lure to vice the unthinking soul;
They tempt by softer sounds away,
They lead entranced the heart astray;
And Satan’s doctrine sweetly sing,
As with a seraph’s heavenly string.
Such sounds, so good old Homer sung,
Once warbled from the Siren’s tongue;
Sweet melting tones were heard to pour
Along Ausonia’s sun-gilt shore;
Seductive strains in ether float,
And every wild, deceitful note
That could the yielding heart assail,
Were wafted on the breathing gale;
And every gentle accent bland,
To tempt Ulysses to their strand.
And can it be this book so base,
Is laid on every window-case?
O! fair ones, if you will profane
Those breasts where heaven itself should reign;
And throw those pure recesses wide,
Where peace and virtue should reside,
To let the holy pile admit
A guest unhallowed and unfit;
Pray, like the frail ones of the night,
Who hide their wanderings from the light,
So let your errors secret be,
And hide, at least, your fault from me;
Seek some by-corner to explore
The smooth polluted pages o’er:
There drink the insidious poison in,
There silly nurse your souls for sin;
And while that purity you blight,
Which stamps you messengers of light,
And sap those mounds the gods bestow,
To keep you spotless here below;
Still, in compassion to our race,
Who joy, not only in the face,
But in that more exalted part,
The sacred temple of the heart;
O! hide forever from our view
The fatal mischief you pursue;
Let MEN your praises still exalt,
And none but ANGELS mourn your fault.

NO. VI.—FRIDAY, MARCH 20, 1807.

FROM MY ELBOW-CHAIR.

The Cockloft family, of which I have made such frequent mention, is of great antiquity, if there be any truth in the genealogical tree which hangs up in my cousin’s library. They trace their descent from a celebrated Roman knight, cousin to the progenitor of his majesty of Britain, who left his native country on occasion of some disgust, and coming into Wales, became a great favorite of Prince Madoc, and accompanied that famous Argonaut in the voyage which ended in the discovery of this continent. Though a member of the family, I have sometimes ventured to doubt the authenticity of this portion of their annals, to the great vexation of cousin Christopher, who is looked up to as the head of our house, and who, though as orthodox as a bishop, would sooner give up the whole decalogue than lop off a single limb of the family tree. From time immemorial, it has been the rule for the Cocklofts to marry one of their own name; and, as they always bred like rabbits, the family has increased and multiplied like that of Adam and Eve. In truth, their number is almost incredible; and you can hardly go into any part of the country without starting a warren of genuine Cocklofts. Every person of the least observation or experience must have observed that where this practice of marrying cousins, and second cousins, prevails in a family every member, in the course of a few generations, becomes queer, humorous, and original; as much distinguished from the common race of mongrels as if he was of a different species. This has happened in our family, and particularly in that branch of it of which Mr. Christopher Cockloft, or, to do him justice, Mr. Christopher Cockloft, Esq., is the head. Christopher is, in fact, the only married man of the name who resides in town; his family is small, having lost most of his children, when young, by the excessive care he took to bring them up like vegetables. This was one of his first whimwhams, and a confounded one it was, as his children might have told, had they not fallen victims to this experiment before they could talk. He had got from some quack philosopher or other a notion that there was a complete analogy between children and plants, and that they ought to be both reared alike. Accordingly he sprinkled them every morning with water; laid them out in the sun, as he did his geraniums; and, if the season was remarkably dry, repeated this wise experiment three or four times of a morning. The consequence was, that the poor little souls died one after the other, except Jeremy and his two sisters; who, to be sure, are a trio of as odd, runty, mummy-looking originals as ever Hogarth fancied in his most happy moments. Mrs. Cockloft, the larger if not the better half of my cousin, often remonstrated against this vegetable theory; and even brought the parson of the parish, in which my cousin’s country house is situated, to her aid; but in vain: Christopher persisted, and attributed the failure of his plan to its not having been exactly conformed to. As I have mentioned Mrs. Cockloft, I may as well say a little more about her while I am in the humor. She is a lady of wonderful notability, a warm admirer of shining mahogany, clean hearths, and her husband, who she considers the wisest man in the world, bating Will Wizard and the parson of our parish, the last of whom is her oracle on all occasions. She goes constantly to church every Sunday and Saint’s-day; and insists upon it that no man is entitled to ascend a pulpit unless he has been ordained by a bishop: nay, so far does she carry her orthodoxy, that all the argument in the world will never persuade her that a Presbyterian or Baptist, or even a Calvinist, has any possible chance of going to Heaven. Above everything else, however, she abhors paganism; can scarcely refrain from laying violent hands on a pantheon when she meets with it; and was very nigh going into hysterics when my cousin insisted one of his boys should be christened after our laureate, because the parson of the parish had told her that Pindar was the name of a pagan writer, famous for his love of boxing-matches, wrestling, and horse-racing. To sum up all her qualifications in the shortest possible way, Mrs. Cockloft is, in the true sense of the phrase, a good sort of woman; and I often congratulate my cousin on possessing her. The rest of the family consists of Jeremy Cockloft, the younger, who has already been mentioned, and the two Miss Cocklofts, or rather the young ladies, as they have been called by the servants time out of mind; not that they are really young, the younger being somewhat on the shady side of thirty, but it has ever been the custom to call every member of the family young under fifty. In the southeast corner of the house I hold quiet possession of an old-fashioned apartment, where myself and my elbow-chair are suffered to amuse ourselves undisturbed, save at meal-times. This apartment old Cockloft has facetiously denominated Cousin Launce’s Paradise; and the good old gentleman has two or three favorite jokes about it, which are served up as regularly as the standing family dish of beef-steaks and onions, which every day maintains its station at the foot of the table, in defiance of mutton, poultry, or even venison itself.

Though the family is apparently small, yet, like most old establishments of the kind, it does not want for honorary members. It is the city rendezvous of the Cocklofts; and we are continually enlivened by the company of half a score of uncles, aunts, and cousins, in the fortieth remove, from all parts of the country, who profess a wonderful regard for Cousin Christopher, and overwhelm every member of his household, down to the cook in the kitchen, with their attentions. We have for three weeks past been greeted with the company of two worthy old spinsters, who came down from the country to settle a lawsuit. They have done little else but retail stories of their village neighbors, knit stockings, and take snuff all the time they have been here; the whole family are bewildered with churchyard tales of sheeted ghosts, white horses without heads, and with large goggle eyes in their buttocks; and not one of the old servants dare budge an inch after dark without a numerous company at his heels. My cousin’s visitors, however, always return his hospitality with due gratitude, and now and then remind him of their fraternal regard, by a present of a pot of apple sweetmeats, or a barrel of sour cider at Christmas. Jeremy displays himself to great advantage among his country relations, who all think him a prodigy, and often stand astounded, in “gaping wonderment,” at his natural philosophy. He lately frightened a simple old uncle almost out of his wits, by giving it as his opinion that the earth would one day be scorched to ashes by the eccentric gambols of the famous comet, so much talked of; and positively asserted that this world revolved round the sun, and that the moon was certainly inhabited.

The family mansion bears equal marks of antiquity with its inhabitants. As the Cocklofts are remarkable for their attachment to everything that has remained long in the family, they are bigoted toward their old edifice, and I dare say would sooner have it crumble about their ears than abandon it. The consequence is, it has been so patched up and repaired, that it has become as full of whims and oddities as its tenants; requires to be nursed and humored like a gouty old codger of an alderman, and reminds one of the famous ship in which a certain admiral circumnavigated the globe, which was so patched and timbered, in order to preserve so great a curiosity, that at length not a particle of the original remained. Whenever the wind blows, the old mansion makes a most perilous groaning; and every storm is sure to make a day’s work for the carpenter, who attends upon it as regularly as the family physician. This predilection for everything that has been long in the family shows itself in every particular. The domestics are all grown gray in the service of our house. We have a little, old, crusty, gray-headed negro, who has lived through two or three generations of the Cocklofts, and of course has become a personage of no little importance in the household. He calls all the family by their Christian names; tells long stories about how he dandled them on his knee when they were children; and is a complete Cockloft chronicle for the last seventy years. The family carriage was made in the last French war, and the old horses were most indubitably foaled in Noah’s ark: resembling marvelously, in gravity of demeanor, those sober animals which may be seen any day of the year in the streets of Philadelphia walking their snail’s pace, a dozen in a row, and harmoniously jingling their bells. Whimwhams are the inheritance of the Cocklofts, and every member of the household is a humorist _sui generis_, from the master down to the footman. The very cats and dogs are humorists; and we have a little runty scoundrel of a cur, who whenever the church bells ring, will run to the street door, turn up his nose in the wind, and howl most piteously. Jeremy insists that this is owing to a peculiar delicacy in the organization of his ears, and supports his position by many learned arguments which nobody can understand; but I am of opinion that it is a mere Cockloft whimwham, which the little cur indulges, being descended from a race of dogs which has flourished in the family ever since the time of my grandfather. A propensity to save everything that bears the stamp of family antiquity has accumulated an abundance of trumpery and rubbish with which the house is encumbered from the cellar to the garret; and every room, and closet, and corner is crammed with three-legged chairs, clocks without hands, swords without scabbards, cocked hats, broken candlesticks, and looking-glasses with frames carved into fantastic shapes of feathered sheep, woolly birds, and other animals that have no name except in books of heraldry. The ponderous mahogany chairs in the parlors are of such unwieldy proportions that it is quite a serious undertaking to gallant one of them across the room, and sometimes make a most equivocal noise when you sit down in a hurry; the mantel-piece is decorated with little lacquered earthen shepherdesses, some of which are without toes, and others without noses; and the fire-place is garnished out with Dutch tiles, exhibiting a great variety of Scripture pieces, which my good old soul of a cousin takes infinite delight in explaining. Poor Jeremy hates them as he does poison; for, while a younker, he was obliged by his mother to learn the history of a tile every Sunday morning before she would permit him to join his playmates; this was a terrible affair for Jeremy, who, by the time he had learned the last, had forgotten the first, and was obliged to begin again. He assured me the other day, with a round college oath, that if the old house stood out till he inherited it, he would have these tiles taken out, and ground into powder, for the perfect hatred he bore them.

My cousin Christopher enjoys unlimited authority in the mansion of his forefathers; he is truly what may be termed a hearty old blade; has a florid, sunshine countenance; and if you will only praise his wine and laugh at his long stories, himself and his house are heartily at your service. The first condition is indeed easily complied with; for, to tell the truth, his wine is excellent; but his stories, being not of the best, and often repeated, are apt to create a disposition to yawn—being, in addition to their other qualities, most unreasonably long. His prolixity is the more afflicting to me, since I have all his stories by heart; and when he enters upon one, it reminds me of Newark causeway, where the traveller sees the end at the distance of several miles. To the great misfortune of all his acquaintance, Cousin Cockloft is blest with a most provokingly retentive memory; and can give day and date, and name, and age, and circumstance, with the most unfeeling precision. These, however, are but trivial foibles, forgotten, or remembered only with a kind of tender, respectful pity, by those who know with what a rich, redundant harvest of kindness and generosity his heart is stored. It would delight you to see with what social gladness he welcomes a visitor into his house; and the poorest man that enters his door never leaves it without a cordial invitation to sit down, and drink a glass of wine. By the honest farmers round his country-seat he is looked up to with love and reverence; they never pass him by without his inquiring after the welfare of their families, and receiving a cordial shake of his liberal hand. There are but two classes of people who are thrown out of the reach of his hospitality, and these are Frenchmen and Democrats. The old gentleman considers it treason against the majesty of good breeding to speak to any visitor with his hat on; but the moment a Democrat enters his door, he forthwith bids his man Pompey bring his hat, puts it on his head, and salutes him with an appalling “Well, sir, what do you want of me?”

He has a profound contempt for Frenchmen, and firmly believes that they eat nothing but frogs and soupe-maigre in their own country. This unlucky prejudice is partly owing to my great-aunt Pamela having been many years ago run away with by a French count, who turned out to be the son of a generation of barbers; and partly to a little vivid spark of toryism which burns in a secret corner of his heart. He was a loyal subject of the crown, has hardly yet recovered the shock of independence; and, though he does not care to own it, always does honor to his majesty’s birthday, by inviting a few cavaliers, like himself, to dinner, and gracing his table with more than ordinary festivity. If by chance the Revolution is mentioned before him, my cousin shakes his head; and you may see, if you take good note, a lurking smile of contempt in the corner of his eye which marks a decided disapprobation of the sound. He once, in the fullness of his heart, observed to me that green peas were a month later than they were under the old government. But the most eccentric manifestation of loyalty he ever gave was making a voyage to Halifax for no other reason under heaven but to hear his majesty prayed for in church, as he used to be here formerly. This he never could be brought fairly to acknowledge; but it is a certain fact, I assure you. It is not a little singular that a person so much given to long story-telling as my cousin, should take a liking to another of the same character; but so it is with the old gentleman. His prime favorite and companion is Will Wizard, who is almost a member of the family; and will sit before the fire, with his feet on the massy andirons, and smoke his cigar, and screw his phiz, and spin away tremendous long stories of his travels, for a whole evening, to the great delight of the old gentleman and lady, and especially of the young ladies, who, like Desdemona, do “seriously incline,” and listen to him with innumerable “O dears,” “Is it possibles,” “Goody graciouses,” and look upon him as a second Sinbad the sailor.

The Misses Cockloft, whose pardon I crave for not having particularly introduced them before, are a pair of delectable damsels, who, having purloined and locked up the family Bible, pass for just what age they please to plead guilty to. Barbara, the eldest, has long since resigned the character of a belle, and adopted that staid, sober, demure, snuff-taking air becoming her years and discretion. She is a good-natured soul, whom I never saw in a passion but once, and that was occasioned by seeing an old favorite beau of hers kiss the hand of a pretty, blooming girl; and, in truth, she only got angry because, as she very properly said, it was spoiling the child. Her sister Margery, or Maggie, as she is familiarly termed, seemed disposed to maintain her post as a belle, until a few months since; when accidentally hearing a gentleman observe that she broke very fast, she suddenly left off going to the assembly, took a cat into high favor, and began to rail at the forward pertness of young misses. From that moment I set her down for an old maid; and so she is, “by the hand of my body.” The young ladies are still visited by some half dozen of veteran beaux, who grew and flourished in the _haut ton_, when the Miss Cocklofts were quite children; but have been brushed rather rudely by the hand of time, who, to say the truth, can do almost anything but make people young. They are, notwithstanding, still warm candidates for female favor; look venerably tender, and repeat over and over the same honeyed speeches and sugared sentiments to the little belles that they poured so profusely into the ears of their mothers. I beg leave here to give notice that by this sketch I mean no reflection on old bachelors; on the contrary, I hold that next to a fine lady, the _ne plus ultra_, an old bachelor to be the most charming being upon earth; inasmuch as by living in “single blessedness,” he of course does just as he pleases; and if he has any genius, must acquire a plentiful stock of whims, and oddities, and whalebone habits; without which I esteem a man to be mere beef without mustard—good for nothing at all but to run on errands for ladies, take boxes at the theatre, and act the part of a screen at tea-parties, or a walking-stick in the streets. I merely speak of these old boys who infest public walks, pounce upon ladies from every corner of the street, and worry, and frisk, and amble, and caper before, behind, and round about the fashionable belles, like old ponies in a pasture, striving to supply the absence of youthful whim and hilarity, by grimaces and grins, and artificial vivacity. I have sometimes seen one of these “reverend youths” endeavoring to elevate his wintry passions into something like love, by basking in the sunshine of beauty; and it did remind me of an old moth, attempting to fly through a pane of glass toward a light, without ever approaching near enough to warm itself, or scorch its wings.

Never, I firmly believe, did there exist a family that went more by tangents than the Cocklofts. Everything is governed by whim; and if one member starts a new freak, away all the rest follow on like wild geese in a string. As the family, the servants, the horses, cats, and dogs have all grown old together, they have accommodated themselves to each other’s habits completely; and though every body of them is full of odd points, angles, rhomboids, and ins and outs, yet some how or other they harmonize together like so many straight lines; and it is truly a grateful and refreshing sight to see them agree so well. Should one, however, get out of tune, it is like a cracked fiddle, the whole concern is ajar; you perceive a cloud over every brow in the house and even the old chairs seem to creak, affetuoso. If my cousin, as he is rather apt to do, betray any symptoms of vexation or uneasiness, no matter about what, he is worried to death with inquiries, which answer no other end but to demonstrate the good will of the inquirer, and put him in a passion; for everybody knows how provoking it is to be cut short in a fit of the blues, by an impertinent question about “what is the matter?” when a man can’t tell himself. I remember a few months ago the old gentleman came home in quite a squall; kicked poor Cæsar the mastiff, out of his way, as he came through the hall, threw his hat on the table with most violent emphasis, and pulling out his box, took three huge pinches of snuff, and threw a fourth into the cat’s eyes as he sat purring his astonishment at the fireside. This was enough to set the body politic going; Mrs. Cockloft began “my dearing” it as fast as tongue could move; the young ladies took each a stand at an elbow of his chair; Jeremy marshaled in the rear; the servants came tumbling in; the mastiff put up an inquiring nose; and even grimalkin, after he had cleaned his whiskers and finished sneezing, discovered indubitable signs of sympathy. After the most affectionate inquiries on all sides, it turned out that my cousin, in crossing the street, had got his silk stockings bespattered with mud by a coach, which, it seems, belonged to a dashing gentleman who had formerly supplied the family with hot rolls and muffins! Mrs. Cockloft thereupon turned up her eyes, and the young ladies their noses; and it would have edified a whole congregation to hear the conversation which took place concerning the insolence of upstarts, and the vulgarity of would-be gentlemen and ladies, who strive to emerge from low life by dashing about in carriages to pay a visit two doors off; giving parties to people who laugh at them, and cutting all their old friends.

THEATRICS.

BY WILLIAM WIZARD, ESQ.

I went a few evenings since to the theatre, accompanied by my friend ’Sbidlikens, the cockney, who is a man deeply read in the history of Cinderella, Valentine and Orson, Blue Beard, and all those recondite works so necessary to enable a man to understand the modern drama. ’Sbidlikens is one of those intolerable fellows who will never be pleased with anything until he has turned and twisted it divers ways, to see if it corresponds with his notions of congruity; and as he is none of the quickest in his ratiocinations, he will sometimes come out with his approbation, when everybody else has forgotten the cause which excited it. ’Sbidlikens is, moreover, a great critic, for he finds fault with everything; this being what I understand by modern criticism. He, however, is pleased to acknowledge that our theatre is not so despicable, all things considered; and really thinks Cooper one of our best actors. The play was “Othello” and to speak my mind freely, I think I have seen it performed much worse in my time. The actors, I firmly believe, did their best; and whenever this is the case, no man has a right to find fault with them, in my opinion. Little Rutherford, the Roscius of the Philadelphia theatre, looked as big as possible; and what he wanted in size he made up in frowning. I like frowning in tragedy; and if a man but keeps his forehead in proper wrinkle, talks big, and takes long strides on the stage, I always set him down as a great tragedian; and so does my friend ’Sbidlikens.

Before the first act was over, ’Sbidlikens began to flourish his critical wooden sword like a harlequin. He first found fault with Cooper for not having made himself as black as a negro, “for,” said he, “that Othello was an arrant black, appears from several expressions of the play; as for instance, ‘thick lips,’ ‘sooty bosom,’ and a variety of others. I am inclined to think,” continued he, “that Othello was an Egyptian by birth, from the circumstance of the handkerchief given to his mother by a native of that country; and, if so, he certainly was as black as my hat; for Herodotus has told us, that the Egyptians had flat noses and frizzled hair—a clear proof that they were all negroes.” He did not confine his strictures to this single error of the actor, but went on to run him down in toto. In this he was seconded by a red-hot Philadelphian, who proved by a string of most eloquent logical puns, that Fennel was unquestionably in every respect a better actor than Cooper. I knew it was in vain to contend with them, since I recollected a most obstinate trial of skill these two great _Roscii_ had last spring in Philadelphia. Cooper brandished his blood-stained dagger at the theatre—Fennel flourished his snuff-box and shook his wig at the Lyceum, and the unfortunate Philadelphians were a long time at a loss to decide which deserved the palm. The literati were inclined to give it to Cooper, because his name was the most fruitful in puns; but then, on the other side, it was contended that Fennel was the best Greek scholar. Scarcely was the town of Strasburgh in a greater hubbub about the courteous stranger’s nose; and it was well that the doctors of the University did not get into the dispute, else it might have became a battle of folios. At length, after much excellent argument had been expended on both sides, recourse was had to Cocker’s Arithmetic and a carpenter’s rule; the rival candidates were both measured by one of their most steady-handed critics, and by the most exact measurement it was proved that Mr. Fennel was the greater actor by three inches and a quarter. Since this demonstration of inferiority, Cooper has never been able to hold up his head in Philadelphia.

In order to change a conversation in which my favorite suffered so much, I made some inquiries of the Philadelphian concerning the two heroes of his theatre, Wood and Cain; but I had scarcely mentioned their names, when, whack! he threw a whole handful of puns in my face; ’twas like a bowl of cold water. I turned on my heel, had recourse to my tobacco-box, and said no more about Wood and Cain; nor will I ever more, if I can help it, mention their names in the presence of a Philadelphian. Would that they could leave off punning! for I love every soul of them, with a cordial affection, warm as their own generous hearts, and boundless as their hospitality.

During the performance, I kept an eye on the countenance of my friend, the cockney; because, having come all the way from England, and having seen Kemble once, on a visit which he made from the button-manufactory to _Lunnun_, I thought his phiz might serve as a kind of thermometer to direct my manifestations of applause or disapprobation. I might as well have looked at the back side of his head; for I could not, with all my peering, perceive by his features that he was pleased with anything—except himself. His hat was twitched a little on one side, as much as to say, “Demme, I’m your sorts!” he was sucking the end of a little stick; he was a “gemman” from head to foot; but as to his face, there was no more expression in it than in the face of a Chinese lady on a tea-cup. On Cooper’s giving one of his gunpowder explosions of passion, I exclaimed, “Fine, very fine!” “Pardon me,” said my friend ’Sbidlikens, “this is damnable!—the gesture, my dear sir—only look at the gesture! how horrible! do you not observe that the actor slaps his forehead, whereas, the passion not having arrived at the proper height, he should only have slapped his—pocket-flap? this figure of rhetoric is a most important stage-trick, and the proper management of it is what peculiarly distinguishes the great actor from the mere plodding mechanical buffoon. Different degrees of passion require different slaps, which we critics have reduced to a perfect manual, improving upon the principle adopted by Frederic of Prussia, by deciding that an actor, like a soldier, is a mere machine; as thus—the actor, for a minor burst of passion, merely slaps his pocket-hole; good! for a major burst, he slaps his breast; very good! but for a burst maximus, he whacks away at his forehead, like a brave fellow; this is excellent; nothing can be finer than an exit, slapping the forehead from one end of the stage to the other.” “Except,” replied I, “one of those slaps on the breast, which I have sometimes admired in some of our fat heroes and heroines, which make their whole body shake and quiver like a pyramid of jelly.”

The Philadelphian had listened to this conversation with profound attention, and appeared delighted with ’Sbidlikens’ mechanical strictures; ’twas natural enough in a man who chose an actor as he would a grenadier. He took the opportunity of a pause to enter into a long conversation with my friend; and was receiving a prodigious fund of information concerning the true mode of emphasizing conjunctions, shifting scenes, snuffing candles, and making thunder and lightning, better than you can get every day from the sky, as practiced at the royal theatres; when, as ill luck would have it, they happened to run their heads full butt against a new reading. Now this was “a stumper,” as our old friend Paddle would say; for the Philadelphians are as inveterate new-reading hunters as the cockneys; and, for aught I know, as well skilled in finding them out. The Philadelphian thereupon met the cockney on his own ground, and at it they went, like two inveterate curs at a bone. ’Sbidlikens quoted Theobald, Hanmer, and a host of learned commentators, who have pinned themselves on the sleeve of Shakespeare’s immortality, and made the old bard, like General Washington, in General Washington’s life, a most diminutive figure in his own book; his opponent chose Johnson for his bottle-holder, and thundered him forward like an elephant to bear down the ranks of the enemy. I was not long in discovering that these two precious judges had got hold of that unlucky passage of Shakespeare which, like a straw, has tickled, and puzzled, and confounded many a somniferous buzzard of past and present time. It was the celebrated wish of Desdemona, that heaven had made her such a man as Othello. ’Sbidlikens insisted that “the gentle Desdemona” merely wished for such a man for a husband, which in all conscience was a modest wish enough, and very natural in a young lady who might possibly have had a predilection for flat noses; like a certain philosophical great man of our day. The Philadelphian contended, with all the vehemence of a member of Congress, moving the House to have “whereas,” or “also,” or “nevertheless” struck out of a bill, that the young lady wished heaven had made her a man instead of a woman, in order that she might have an opportunity of seeing the “anthropophagi, and the men whose heads do grow beneath their shoulders;” which was a very natural wish, considering the curiosity of the sex. On being referred to, I incontinently decided in favor of the honorable member who spoke last; inasmuch as I think it was a very foolish, and therefore very natural, wish for a young lady to make before a man she wished to marry. It was, moreover, an indication of the violent inclination she felt to wear the breeches, which was afterward, in all probability, gratified, if we may judge from the title of “our captain’s captain,” given her by Cassio—a phrase which, in my opinion, indicates that Othello was, at that time, most ignominiously henpecked. I believe my arguments staggered ’Sbidlikens himself, for he looked confoundedly queer, and said not another word on the subject.

A little while after, at it he went again on another tack, and began to find fault with Cooper’s manner of dying; “it was not natural,” he said; for it had lately been demonstrated by a learned doctor of physic, that when a man is mortally stabbed, he ought to take a flying leap of at least five feet, and drop down “dead as a salmon in a fishmonger’s basket.” Whenever a man, in the predicament above mentioned, departed from this fundamental rule, by falling flat down like a log, and rolling about for two or three minutes, making speeches all the time, the said learned doctor maintained that it was owing to the waywardness of the human mind, which delighted in flying in the face of nature, and dying in defiance of all her established rules. I replied, “for my part I held that every man had a right of dying in whatever position he pleased; and that the mode of doing it depended altogether on the peculiar character of the person going to die. A Persian could not die in peace unless he had his face turned to the east; a Mahometan would always choose to have his toward Mecca; a Frenchman might prefer this mode of throwing a somerset; but Mynheer Van Brumblebottom, the Roscius of Rotterdam, always chose to thunder down on his seat of honor whenever he received a mortal wound. Being a man of ponderous dimensions, this had a most electrifying effect, for the whole theatre ‘shook like Olympus at the nod of Jove.’” The Philadelphian was immediately inspired with a pun, and swore that Mynheer must be great in a dying scene, since he knew how to make the most of his latter end.

It is the inveterate cry of stage critics, that an actor does not perform the character naturally, if, by chance, he happens not to die exactly as they would have him. I think the exhibition of a play at Pekin would suit them exactly; and I wish, with all my heart, that they would go there and see one; nature is there imitated with the most scrupulous exactness in every trifling particular. Here an unhappy lady or gentleman, who happens, unluckily, to be poisoned or stabbed, is left on the stage to writhe and groan, and make faces at the audience, until the poet pleases they should die; while the honest folks of the _dramatis personæ_, bless their hearts! all crowd round and yield most potent assistance, by crying and lamenting most vociferously! The audience, tender souls, pull out their white pocket-handkerchiefs, wipe their eyes, blow their noses, and swear it is natural as life, while the poor actor is left to die without common Christian comfort. In China, on the contrary, the first thing they do is to run for the doctor and _tchoouc_, or notary. The audience are entertained throughout the fifth act with a learned consultation of physicians, and if the patient must die, he does it _secundum artem_, and always is allowed time to make his will. The celebrated Chow-Chow was the completest hand I ever saw at killing himself; he always carried under his robe a bladder of bull’s blood, which, when he gave the mortal stab, spirted out to the infinite delight of the audience. Not that the ladies of China are more fond of the sight of blood than those of our own country; on the contrary, they are remarkably sensitive in this particular; and we are told by the great Linkum Fidelius, that the beautiful Ninny Consequa, one of the ladies of the emperor’s seraglio, once fainted away on seeing a favorite slave’s nose bleed; since which time, refinement has been carried to such a pitch that a buskined hero is not allowed to run himself through the body in the face of the audience. The immortal Chow-Chow, in conformity to this absurd prejudice, whenever he plays the part of Othello, which is reckoned his masterpiece, always keeps a bold front, stabs himself slyly behind, and is dead before anybody suspects that he has given the mortal blow.

P. S.—Just as this was going to press, I was informed by Evergreen that Othello had not been performed here the Lord knows when; no matter, I am not the first that has criticised a play without seeing it, and this critique will answer for the last performance, if that was a dozen years ago.

NO. VII.—SATURDAY, APRIL 4, 1807.

LETTER FROM MUSTAPHA RUB-A-DUB KELI KHAN, TO ASEM HACCHEM, PRINCIPAL
SLAVE-DRIVER TO HIS HIGHNESS THE BASHAW OF TRIPOLI.

I promised in a former letter, good Asem, that I would furnish thee with a few hints respecting the nature of the government by which I am held in durance. Though my inquiries for that purpose have been industrious, yet I am not perfectly satisfied with their results; for thou mayst easily imagine that the vision of a captive is overshadowed by the mists of illusion and prejudice, and the horizon of his speculations must be limited indeed. I find that the people of this country are strangely at a loss to determine the nature and proper character of their government. Even their dervises are extremely in the dark as to this particular, and are continually indulging in the most preposterous disquisitions on the subject; some have insisted that it savors of an aristocracy; others maintain that it is a pure democracy; and a third set of theorists declare absolutely that it is nothing more or less than a mobocracy. The latter, I must confess, though still wide in error, have come nearest to the truth. You of course must understand the meaning of these different words, as they are derived from the ancient Greek language, and bespeak loudly the verbal poverty of these poor infidels, who cannot utter a learned phrase without laying the dead languages under contribution. A man, my dear Asem, who talks good sense in his native tongue, is held in tolerable estimation in this country; but a fool, who clothes his feeble ideas in a foreign or antique garb, is bowed down to as a literary prodigy. While I conversed with these people in plain English, I was but little attended to; but the moment I prosed away in Greek, every one looked up to me with veneration as an oracle.

Although the dervises differ widely in the particulars above mentioned, yet they all agree in terming their government one of the most pacific in the known world. I cannot help pitying their ignorance, and smiling, at times, to see into what ridiculous errors those nations will wander, who are unenlightened by the precepts of Mahomet, our divine prophet, and uninstructed by the five hundred and forty-nine books of wisdom of the immortal Ibrahim Hassan al Fusti. To call this nation pacific! Most preposterous! it reminds me of the title assumed by the sheik of that murderous tribe of wild Arabs, that desolate the valleys of Belsaden, who styles himself “Star of Courtesy—Beam of the Mercy-Seat.”

The simple truth of the matter is, that these people are totally ignorant of their own true character; for, according to the best of my observation, they are the most warlike, and I must say, the most savage nation that I have as yet discovered among all the barbarians. They are not only at war, in their own way, with almost every nation on earth, but they are at the same time engaged in the most complicated knot of civil wars that ever infested any poor unhappy country on which Allah has denounced his malediction!

To let thee at once into a secret, which is unknown to these people themselves, their government is a pure unadulterated _logocracy_, or government of words. The whole nation does everything _viva voce_, or by word of mouth; and in this manner is one of the most military nations in existence. Every man who has what is here called the gift of the gab, that is, a plentiful stock of verbosity, becomes a soldier outright; and is forever in a militant state. The country is entirely defended _vi et linguâ_; that is to say, by force of tongues. The account which I lately wrote to our friend, the snorer, respecting the immense army of six hundred men, makes nothing against this observation; that formidable body being kept up, as I have already observed, only to amuse their fair countrywomen by their splendid appearance and nodding plumes; and are, by way of distinction, denominated the “defenders of the fair.”

In a logocracy thou well knowest there is little or no occasion for fire-arms, or any such destructive weapons. Every offensive or defensive measure is enforced by wordy battle, and paper war; he who has the longest tongue or readiest quill is sure to gain the victory—will carry horror, abuse, and ink-shed into the very trenches of the enemy; and, without mercy or remorse, put men, women, and children to the point of the—pen!

There is still preserved in this country some remains of that Gothic spirit of knight-errantry which so much annoyed the faithful in the middle ages of the Hegira. As, notwithstanding their martial disposition, they are a people much given to commerce and agriculture, and must, necessarily, at certain seasons be engaged in these employments, they have accommodated themselves by appointing knights, or constant warriors, incessant brawlers, similar to those who, in former ages, swore eternal enmity to the followers of our divine prophet. These knights, denominated editors or _slang-whangers_, are appointed in every town, village, or district, to carry on both foreign and internal warfare, and may be said to keep up a constant firing “in words.” O my friend, could you but witness the enormities sometimes committed by these tremendous slang-whangers, your very turban would rise with horror and astonishment. I have seen them extend their ravages even into the kitchens of their opponents, and annihilate the very cook with a blast; and I do assure thee, I beheld one of these warriors attack a most venerable bashaw, and at one stroke of his pen lay him open from the waistband of his breeches to his chin!

There has been a civil war carrying on with great violence for some time past, in consequence of a conspiracy, among the higher classes, to dethrone his highness, the present bashaw, and place another in his stead. I was mistaken when I formerly asserted to thee that this dissatisfaction arose from his wearing red breeches. It is true, the nation have long held that color in great detestation, in consequence of a dispute they had some twenty years since with the barbarians of the British islands. The color, however, is again rising into favor, as the ladies have transferred it to their heads from the bashaw’s —— body. The true reason, I am told, is, that the bashaw absolutely refuses to believe in the deluge, and in the story of Balaam’s ass; maintaining that this animal was never yet permitted to talk except in a genuine logocracy; where, it is true, his voice may often be heard, and is listened to with reverence, as “the voice of the sovereign people.” Nay, so far did he carry his obstinacy, that he absolutely invited a professed antediluvian from the Gallic empire, who illuminated the whole country with his principles—and his nose. This was enough to set the nation in a blaze—every slang-whanger resorted to his tongue or his pen; and for seven years have they carried on a most inhuman war, in which volumes of words have been expended, oceans of ink have been shed, nor has any mercy been shown to age, sex, or condition. Every day have these slang-whangers made furious attacks on each other, and upon their respective adherents; discharging their heavy artillery, consisting of large sheets, loaded with scoundrel! villain! liar! rascal! numskull! nincompoop! dunderhead! wiseacre! blockhead! jackass! and I do swear, by my beard, though I know thou wilt scarcely credit me, that in some of these skirmishes the grand bashaw himself has been wofully pelted! yea, most ignominiously pelted! and yet have these talking desperadoes escaped without the bastinado!

Every now and then a slang-whanger, who has a longer head, or rather a longer tongue than the rest, will elevate his piece and discharge a shot quite across the ocean, leveled at the head of the emperor of France, the king of England, or, wouldst thou believe it, O Asem, even at his sublime highness the bashaw of Tripoli! These long pieces are loaded with single ball, or language, as tyrant! usurper! robber! tiger! monster! and thou mayest well suppose they occasion great distress and dismay in the camps of the enemy, and are marvelously annoying to the crowned heads at which they are directed. The slang-whanger, though perhaps the mere champion of a village, having fired off his shot, struts about with great self-congratulation, chuckling at the prodigious bustle he must have occasioned, and seems to ask of every stranger, “Well, sir, what do they think of me in Europe?”[55] This is sufficient to show you the manner in which these bloody, or rather windy fellows fight; it is the only mode allowable, in a logocracy or government of words. I would also observe that their civil wars have a thousand ramifications.

NOTE, BY WILLIAM WIZARD, ESQ.

Footnote 55:

The sage Mustapha, when he wrote the above paragraph, had probably in
his eye the following anecdote, related either by Linkum Fidelius, or
Josephus Millerius, vulgarly called Joe Miller, of facetious memory.

The captain of a slave-vessel, on his first landing on the coast of
Guinea, observed under a palm-tree a negro chief, sitting most
majestically on a stump; while two women, with wooden spoons, were
administering his favorite pottage of boiled rice; which, as his
imperial majesty was a little greedy, would part of it escape the
place of destination and run down his chin. The watchful attendants
were particularly careful to intercept these scape-grace particles,
and return them to their proper port of entry. As the captain
approached, in order to admire this curious exhibition of royalty, the
great chief clapped his hands to his sides, and saluted his visitor
with the following pompous question—“Well, sir! what do they say of me
in England?”