Chapter L: E. L.--Monthly Magazine (3)

What tho’ no myrtle bower thy banks adorn,
Nor sportive Naiads wanton in thy waves;
No glittering sands of gold, or coral caves,
Bedeck the channel by thy waters worn:

Yet thou canst boast of honours passing these,
For when fair science left her eastern seat,
Ere Alfred raised her sons a fair retreat,
Where Isis’ laurels tremble in the breeze;
’Twas there, near where thy curling streamlet flows,
E’en in yon dell, the Muses found repose.”

This interesting period in the history of the venerable abbey, its supposed connection with Bradenstoke Priory, the admired scenery of the surrounding country, the events of past ages blended into the exertions of a fertile imagination, and the many traditions still floating in the minds of the inhabitants, would form materials deserving the attention of a writer disposed to wield his pen in that department of literature, which has been so successfully cultivated in the northern and other parts of our island.

If by the observation, “that his ancestors came from the Priory,” your correspondent means Bradenstoke Priory, he will allow me to direct his attention to the fact of the original register of that establishment being in the British Museum. I refer him to the “Beauties of England and Wales.”

As your correspondent probably resides in London, he may be induced to obtain access to this document, in which I conclude he would have no difficulty; and if you, Mr. Editor, could favour us in your publication with an engraving of this Priory, it would be acceptable.

I appreciate the manner in which your correspondent noticed my remarks, and wish him success in his literary efforts, whether relating to objects in this vicinity, or to other matters. One remark only I will add,--that I think he should avoid the naming of respectable individuals: the mention of names may cause unpleasant feelings in a neighbourhood like this, however unintentional on his part. I should have considered it better taste in an antiquarian to have named the person in possession of the golden image, in preference to the childish incident stated to have occurred when Bradenstoke Priory was occupied by a former respectable inhabitant, Mrs. Bridges.

Your correspondent will excuse the freedom of this observation; his ready pen could perhaps relate to you the detail of a tragical event, said by tradition to have occurred at Dauntsey, where the mansion of the late earl of Peterborough now stands, and “other tales of other times.”

A READER.[62]

_Lyneham, Wilts,_

_January 23, 1827._

* * * * *

OLD BIRMINGHAM CONJURERS.

BY MR. WILLIAM HUTTON.

No _head_ is a vacuum. Some, like a paltry cottage, are ill accommodated, dark, and circumscribed; others are capacious as Westminster-hall. Though none are immense, yet they are capable of immense furniture. The more room is taken up by knowledge, the less remains for credulity. The more a man is acquainted with things, the more willing to “give up the _ghost_.” Every town and village, within my knowledge, has been pestered with spirits, which appear in horrid forms to the imagination in the winter night--but the spirits which haunt Birmingham, are those of industry and luxury.

If we examine the whole parish, we cannot produce one _old_ “witch;” but we have numbers of young, who exercise a powerful influence over us. Should the ladies accuse the harsh epithet, they will please to consider, I allow them, what of all things they most wish for, _power_--therefore the balance is in my favour.

If we pass through the planetary worlds, we shall be able to muster two conjurers, who endeavoured to “shine with the stars.” The first, John Walton, who was so busy in casting the nativity of others, that he forgot his own. Conscious of an application to himself, for the discovery of stolen goods, he employed his people to steal them. And though, for many years confined to his bed by infirmity, he could conjure away the property of others, and, for a reward, conjure it back again.

The prevalence of this evil, induced the legislature, in 1725, to make the _reception_ of stolen goods capital. The first sacrifice to this law was the noted Jonathan Wild.

The officers of justice, in 1732, pulled Walton out of his bed, in an obscure cottage, one furlong from the town, now Brickiln-lane, carried him to prison, and from thence to the gallows--they had better have carried him to the work-house, and his followers to the anvil.

To him succeeded Francis Kimberley, the only reasoning animal, who resided at No. 60, in Dale-end, from his early youth to extreme age. A hermit in a crowd! The windows of his house were strangers to light. The shutters forgot to open; the chimney to smoke. His cellar, though amply furnished, never knew moisture.

He spent threescore years in filling six rooms with such trumpery as was just too good to be thrown away, and too bad to be kept. His life was as inoffensive as long. Instead of _stealing_ the goods which other people used, he _purchased_ what he could not use himself. He was not difficult in his choice of the property that entered his house; if there was _bulk_, he was satisfied.

His dark house, and his dark figure, corresponded with each other. The apartments, choked up with lumber, scarcely admitted his body, though of the skeleton order. Perhaps leanness is an appendage to the science, for I never knew a corpulent conjurer. His diet, regular, plain, and slender, showed at how little expense life might be sustained. His library consisted of several thousand volumes, not one of which, I believe, he ever read; having written, in characters unknown to all but himself, his name, the price, and the date, in the title-page, he laid them by for ever. The highest pitch of his erudition was the annual almanack.

He never wished to approach a woman, or be approached by one. Should the rest of men, for half a century, pay no more attention to the fair, some angelic hand might stick up a note like the arctic circle over one of our continents, “this world to be let.”

If he did not cultivate the acquaintance of the human species, the spiders, more numerous than his books, enjoyed an uninterrupted reign of quiet. The silence of the place was not broken; the broom, the book, the dust, or the web, was not disturbed. Mercury and his shirt performed their revolutions together; and Saturn changed _his_ with his coat. He died in 1756, as conjurers usually die, unlamented.[63]

[61] The word is not pronounced the same as _gipsy_, a fortune-teller;
the _g_, in this case, being sounded hard as in _gimlet_.

[62] I am somewhat embarrassed by this difference between two valued
correspondents, and I hope neither will regard me in an ill light, if
I venture to interpose, and deprecate controversy beyond an extent
which can interest the readers of the _Table Book_. I do not say that
it has passed that limit, and hitherto all has been well; perhaps,
however, it would be advisable that “A Reader” should confide to me
his name, and that he and my “Old Correspondent,” whom I know, should
allow me to introduce them to each other. I think the result would be
mutually satisfactory.

W. H.

[63] Hist. of Birmingham.

* * * * *

PATIENCE.

_For the Table Book_

As the pent water of a mill-dam lies
Motionless, yielding, noiseless, and serene.
Patience waits meekly with companioned eyes;
Or like the speck-cloud, which alone is seen
Silver’d within blue space, ling’ring for air
On which to sail prophetic voyages;
Or as the fountain stone that doth not wear,
But suits itself to pressure, and with ease
Diverts the dropping crystal; or the wife
That sits beside her husband and her love
Subliming to another state and life,
Off’ring him consolation as a dove,--
Her sighs and tears, her heartache and her mind
Devout, untired, calm, precious, and resign’d.

*, *, P.

* * * * *

~British Portraits.~

CATALOGUE OF PAINTED BRITISH PORTRAITS, comprising most of the
Sovereigns of England, from Henry I. to George IV., and many
distinguished personages; principally the productions of Holbein,
Zucchero, C. Jansen, Vandyck, Hudson, Reynolds, Northcote, &c. _Now
selling at the prices affixed, by_ HORATIO RODD, _17, Air-street,
Piccadilly_. 1827.

This is an age of book and print catalogues; and lo! we have a picture dealer’s catalogue of portraits, painted in oil, from the price of two guineas to sixty. There is only one of so high value as the latter sum, and this is perhaps the most interesting in Mr. Rodd’s collection, and he has allowed the present engraving from it. The picture is in size thirty inches by twenty-five. The subjoined particulars are from the catalogue.

FROM THE ORIGINAL PICTURE BY HOGARTH, LATELY DISCOVERED.]

“To the present time, none of Hogarth’s biographers appear to have been aware of the ‘local habitation’ of the original painting from which the artist published his etching, the popularity of which, at the period to which it alludes, was so great, that a printseller offered for it its weight in gold: that offer the artist rejected; and he is said to have received from its sale, for many weeks, at the rate of twelve pounds each day. The impressions could not be taken off so fast as they were wanted, though the rolling-press was at work all night by the week together.

“Hogarth said himself, that lord Lovat’s portrait was taken at the White Hart-inn, at St. Alban’s, in the attitude of relating on his fingers the numbers of the rebel forces: ‘Such a general had so many men, &c.;’ and remarked that the muscles of Lovat’s neck appeared of unusual strength, more so than he had ever seen. Samuel Ireland, in his Graphic Illustrations of Hogarth, vol. i. p. 146, states that Hogarth was invited to St. Alban’s for the express purpose of being introduced to Lovat, who was then resting at the White Hart-inn, on his way to London from Scotland, by Dr. Webster, a physician residing at St. Alban’s, and well known to Boswell, Johnson, and other eminent literary characters of that period. Hogarth had never seen Lovat before, and was, through the doctor’s introduction, received with much cordiality, even to the kiss fraternal, which was then certainly not very pleasant, as his lordship, being under the barber’s hands, left in the salute much of the lather on the artist’s face. Lord Lovat rested two or three days at St. Alban’s, and was under the immediate care of Dr. Webster, who thought his patient’s illness was feigned with his usual cunning, or if at all real, arose principally from his apprehension of danger on reaching London. The short stay of Lovat at St. Alban’s allowed the artist but scanty opportunity of providing the materials for a complete picture; hence some carpenter was employed on the instant to glue together some deal board, and plane down one side, which is evident from the back being in the usual rough state in which the plank leaves the saw-pit. The painting, from the thinness of the priming-ground, bears evident proof of the haste with which the portrait was accomplished. The course lineament of features so strongly exhibited in his countenance, is admirably hit off; so well has Duncombe expressed it,

‘Lovat’s hard features Hogarth might command;’

for his pencil was peculiarly adapted to such representation. It is observable the button holes of the coat, &c., are reversed in the artist’s etching, which was professed to be ‘drawn from the life, &c.;’ and in the upper corner of the picture are satirical heraldic insignia, allusive to the artist’s idea of his future destiny.”

The “satirical heraldic insignia,” mentioned in the above description, and represented in the present engraving, do not appear in Hogarth’s well-known whole length etching of lord Lovat. The picture is a half-length; it was found in the house of a poor person at Verulam, in the neighbourhood of St. Alban’s, where Hogarth painted it eighty years ago, and it is a singular fact, that till its discovery a few weeks ago, such a picture was not known to have been executed. In all probability, Hogarth obliged his friend, Dr. Webster, with it, and after the doctor’s death it passed to some heedless individual, and remained in obscurity from that time to the present.[64] Further observation on it is needless; for persons who are interested concerning the individual whom Hogarth has portrayed, or who are anxious respecting the works of that distinguished artist, have an opportunity of seeing it at Mr. Rodd’s until it is sold.

As regards the other portraits in oil, collected by Mr. Rodd, and now offered by him for sale, after the manner of booksellers, “at the prices annexed,” they can be judged of with like facility. Like booksellers, who tempt the owners of empty shelves, with “long sets to fill up” at small prices, Mr. R. “acquaints the nobility and gentry, having spacious country mansions, that he has many portraits of considerable interest as specimens of art, but of whom the picture is intended to represent, matter of doubt: as such pictures would enliven many of their large rooms, and particularly the halls, they may be had at very low prices.”

Mr. Rodd’s ascertained pictures really form a highly interesting collection of “painted British Portraits,” from whence collectors may select what they please: his mode of announcing such productions, by way of catalogue, seems well adapted to bring buyers and sellers together, and is noticed here as an instance of spirited departure from the ancient trading rule, viz.

Twiddle your thumbs
Till a customer comes.

*

[64] There is an account of lord Lovat in the _Every-Day Book_.

* * * * *

DEATH’S DOINGS.

“I am now worth one hundred thousand pounds,” said old Gregory, as he ascended a hill, which commanded a full prospect of an estate he had just purchased; “I am now worth one hundred thousand pounds, and here,” said he, “I’ll plant an orchard: and on that spot I’ll have a pinery--

“Yon farm houses shall come down,” said old Gregory, “they interrupt my view.”

“Then, what will become of the farmers?” asked the steward, who attended him.

“That’s their business,” answered old Gregory.

“And that mill must not stand upon the stream,” said old Gregory.

“Then, how will the villagers grind their corn?” asked the steward.

“That’s not my business,” answered old Gregory.

So old Gregory returned home--ate a hearty supper--drank a bottle of port--smoked two pipes of tobacco--and fell into a profound slumber--and awoke no more; and the farmers reside on their lands--and the mill stands upon the stream--and the villagers rejoice that Death did “business” with old Gregory.

* * * * *

THE BARBER.

_For the Table Book._

Barbers are distinguished by peculiarities appertaining to no other class of men. They have a _caste_, and are a race of themselves. The members of this ancient and gentle profession--foul befall the libeller who shall designate it a _trade_--are mild, peaceable, cheerful, polite, and communicative. They mingle with no cabal, have no interest in factions, are “open to all parties, and influenced by none;” and they have a good, kind, or civil word for everybody. The cheerful morning salutation of one of these cleanly, respectable persons is a “handsell” for the pleasures of the day; serenity is in its tone, and comfort glances from its accompanying smile. Their small, cool, clean, and sparingly-furnished shops, with sanded floor and towelled walls, relieved by the white-painted, well-scoured shelves, scantily adorned with the various implements of their art, denote the snug system of economy which characterises the owners. Here, only, is the looking-glass not an emblem of vanity: it is placed to reflect, and not to flatter. You seat yourself in the lowly, antique chair, worn smooth by the backs of half a century of beard-owners, and instantly feel a full repose from fatigue of body and mind. You find yourself in attentive and gentle hands, and are persuaded that no man can be in collision with his shaver or hair-dresser. The very operation tends to set you on better terms with yourself: and your barber hath not in his constitution the slightest element of difference. The adjustment of a curl, the clipping of a lock, the trimming of a whisker, (that much-cherished and highly-valued adornment of the face,) are matters of paramount importance to both parties--threads of sympathy for the time, unbroken by the divesture of the thin, soft, ample mantle, that enveloped you in its snowy folds while under his care. Who can entertain ill-humour, much less vent his spleen, while wrapt in the symbolic vestment? The veriest churl is softened by the application of the warm emollient brush, and calmed into complacency by the light-handed hoverings of the comb and scissors. A smile, a compliment, a remark on the weather, a diffident, side-wind inquiry about politics, or the passing intelligence of the day, are tendered with that deference, which is the most grateful as well as the handsomest demonstration of politeness. Should you, on sitting down, half-blushingly request him to cut off “as large a lock as he can, merely,” you assure him, “that you may detect any future change in its colour,” how skilfully he extracts, from your rather thin head of hair, a graceful, flowing lock, which self-love alone prevents you from doubting to have been grown by yourself: how pleasantly you contemplate, in idea, its glossiness from beneath the intended glass of the propitiatory locket. A web of delightful associations is thus woven; and the care he takes to “make each particular hair to stand on end” to your wishes, so as to let you know he surmises your destination, completes the charm.--We never hear of people cutting their throats in a barber’s shop, though the place is redolent of razors. No; the ensanguined spots that occasionally besmirch the whiteness of the revolving towel is from careless, unskilful, and opiniated individuals, who mow their own beards, or refuse to restrain their risibility. I wonder how any can usurp the province of the barber, (once an almost exclusive one,) and apply unskilful, or unpractised hands so near to the grand canal of life. For my own part, I would not lose the daily elevation of my tender nose, by the velvet-tipped digits of my barber--no, not for an independence!

The genuine barber is usually (like his razors) well-tempered; a man unvisited by care; combining a somewhat hasty assiduity, with an easy and respectful manner. He exhibits the best part of the character of a Frenchman--an uniform exterior suavity, and _politesse_. He seems a faded nobleman, or _émigré_ of the old _régime_. And surely if the souls of men transmigrate, those of the old French _noblesse_ seek the congenial soil of the barber’s bosom! Is it a degradation of worthy and untroubled spirits, to imagine, that they animate the bodies of the harmless and unsophisticated?

In person the barber usually inclines to the portly; but is rarely obese. His is that agreeable plumpness betokening the man at ease with himself and the world--and the utter absence of that fretfulness ascribed to leanness. Nor do his comely proportions and fleshiness make leaden the heels, or lessen the elasticity of his step, or transmute his feathery lightness of hand to heaviness. He usually wears powder, for it looks respectable, and is professional withal. The last of the almost forgotten and quite despised race of pigtails, once proudly cherished by all ranks--now proscribed, banished, or, if at all seen, diminished in stateliness and bulk, “shorn of its fair proportions,”--lingers fondly with its former nurturer; the neat-combed, even-clipped hairs, encased in their tight swathe of black ribbon, topped by an airy bow, nestle in the well-clothed neck of the modern barber. Yet why do I call him _modern_? True, he lives in our, but he belongs to former times, of which he is the remembrancer and historian--the days of bags, queues, clubs, and periwigs, when a halo of powder, pomatum, and frizzed curls encircled the heads of our ancestors. That glory is departed; the brisk and agile tonsor, once the genius of the toilet, no longer directs, with the precision of a cannoneer, rapid discharges of scented atoms against bristling batteries of his own creation. “The _barber’s_ occupation’s gone,” with all the “pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious _wigs_!”

Methinks I detect some unfledged reader, upon whose head of hair the sun of the eighteenth century never shone, glancing his “mind’s eye” to one of the more recent and fashionable professors of the art of “_ciseaurie_”--one of the chemical perfumers, or self-esteemed practitioners of the present day, in search of an exemplification of my description:--he is at fault. Though _he_ may deem Truefit or Macalpine models of skill, and therefore of description, I must tell him I recognise none such. I speak of the last generation, (between which and the present, Ross, and Taylor of Whitechapel, are the connecting links,) the last remnants of whom haunt the solitary, well-paved, silent corners, and less frequented streets of London--whose windows exhibit no waxen busts, bepainted and bedizened in fancy dresses and flaunting feathers, but one or two “old original” blocks or _dummies_, crowned with sober-looking, respectable, stiff-buckled, brown wigs, such as our late venerable monarch used to wear. There is an aboriginal wig-maker’s shop at the corner of an inn-yard in Bishopsgate-street; a “repository” of hair; the window of which is full of these primitive caxons, all of a sober brown, or simpler flaxen, with an occasional contrast of rusty black, forming, as it were, a finis to the by-gone fashion. Had our first forefather, Adam, been bald, he could not have worn a more simply artificial imitation of nature than one of these wigs--so frank, so sincere, and so _warm_ an apology for want of hair, scorning to deceive the observer, or to crown the veteran head with adolescent curls. The ancient wig, whether a simple scratch, a plain bob, or a splendid periwig, was one which a man might modestly hold on one hand, while with the other he wiped his bald pate; but with what grace could a modern wig-wearer dismount a specific deception, an elaborate imitation of natural curls to exhibit a hairless scalp? It would be either a censure on his vanity, or a sarcasm on his otherwise unknown deficiency. The old wig, on the contrary, was a plain acknowledgment of want of hair; avowing the comfort, or the inconvenience, (as it might happen,) with an independent indifference to mirth or pity; and forming a decent covering to the head that sought not to become either a decoration or deceit. Peace to the _manes_ of the primitive artificers of human hair--the true skull-thatchers--the architects of towering toupees--the engineers of flowing periwigs!

The wig-makers (as they still denominate themselves) in Lincoln’s-inn and the Temple, are quite of the “old school.” Their shady, cool, cleanly, classic recesses, where embryo chancellors have been measured for their initiatory forensic wigs; where the powdered glories of the bench have ofttimes received a _re_-revivification; where some “old Bencher” still resorts, in his undress, to have his nightly growth of beard shaven by the “particular razor;” these powder-scented nooks, these legal dressing-closets seem, like the “statutes at large,” to resist, tacitly but effectually, the progress of innovation. They are like the old law offices, which are scattered up and down in various corners of the intricate maze of “courts,” constituting the “Temple”--unchangeable by time; except when the hand of death removes some old tenant at will, who has been refreshed by the cool-borne breezes from the river, or soothed by the restless monotony of the plashing fountain, “sixty years since.”--But I grow serious.--The barber possesses that distinction of gentleness, a soft and white hand, of genial and equable temperature, neither falling to the “zero” of chilliness, nor rising to the “fever heat” of perspiration, but usually lingering at “blood heat.” I know not if any one ever shook hands with his barber: there needs no such outward demonstration of goodwill; no grip, like that we bestow upon an old friend returned after a long absence, by way of rivet, as it were, to that link in the chain of friendship. His air of courtesy keeps a good understanding floating between him and his customers, which, if ruffled by a hasty departure, or dismissal, is revived the next day by the sun-light of his morning smile!

The barber’s hand is unlike that of any other soft hand: it is not flabby, like that of a sensualist; nor arid, and thin, like a student’s; nor dead white, like that of a delicate female; but it is _naturally_ warm, of a glowing, transparent colour, and of a cushiony, elastic softness. Beneath its conciliatory touch, as it prepares the skin for the sweeping course of the razor, and its gentle pressure, as it inclines the head to either side, to aid the operation of the scissors, a man may sit for hours, and feel no weariness. Happy must he be who lived in the days of long, or full-dressed hair, and resigned himself for a full hour to the passive luxury of hair-dressing! A morning’s toilette--(for a gentleman, I mean; being a bachelor, I am uninitiated in the arcana of a lady’s dressing-room)--a morning’s toilette in those days was indeed an important part of the “business of life:” there were the curling-irons, the comb, the pomatum, the powder-puff, the powder-knife, the mask, and a dozen other requisites to complete the elaborate process that perfected that mysterious “frappant, or tintinabulant appendage” to the back part of the head. Oh! it must have been a luxury--a delight surpassing the famed baths and cosmetics of the east.

I have said that the barber is a gentle man; if not in so many words, I have at least pointed out that distinguishing trait in him. He is also a humane man: his occupation of torturing hairs leaves him neither leisure nor disposition to torture ought else. He looks as respectable as he is; and he is void of any appearance of deceit or cunning. There is less of personality or egotism about him than mankind in general: though he possesses an idiosyncrasy, it is that of his class, not of himself. As he sits, patiently renovating some dilapidated peruke, or perseveringly presides over the developement of grace in some intractable bush of hair, or stands at his own threshold, in the cleanly pride of white apron and hose, lustrous shoes, and exemplary jacket, with that studied yet seeming disarrangement of hair, as though subduing, as far as consistent with propriety, the visible appearance of technical skill--as he thus, untired, goes the never-varying round of his pleasant occupation, and active leisure, time seems to pass unheeded, and the wheel of chance, scattering fragments of circumstance from the rock of destiny, continues its relentless and unremittent revolution, unnoticed by him. He hears not the roar of the fearful engine, the groans and sighs of despair, or the wild laugh of exultation, produced by its mighty working. All is remote, strange, and intricate, and belongs not to him to know. He dwells in an area of peace--a magic circle whose area might be described by his obsolete sign-pole!

Nor does the character of the barber vary in other countries. He seems to flourish in unobtrusive prosperity all the world over. In the east, the clime most congenial to his avocations, the voluminous beard makes up for the deficiency of the ever-turbaned, close-shorn skull, and he exhibits the triumph of his skill in its most special department. Transport an English barber to Samarcand, or Ispahan, and, saving the language, he would feel quite at home. Here he reads the newspaper, and, unless any part is contradicted by his customers, he believes it all: it is his oracle. At Constantinople the chief eunuch would confide to him the secrets of the seraglio as if he were a genuine disciple of Mahomet; and with as right good will as ever old “gossip” vented a bit of scandal with unconstrained volubility of tongue. He would listen to, aye and put faith in, the relations of the coffee-house story-tellers who came to have their beards trimmed, and repaid him with one of their inventions for his trouble. What a dissection would a barber’s brain afford, could we but discern the mine of latent feuds and conspiracies laid up there in coil, by their spleenful and mischievous inventors. I would that I could unpack the hoarded venom, all hurtless in that “cool grot,” as destructive stores are deposited in an arsenal, where light and heat never come. His mind admits no spark of malice to fire the train of jealousy, or explode the ammunition of petty strife; and it were well for the world and society, if the intrigue and spite of its inhabitants could be poured, like the “cursed juice of Hebenon,” into his ever-open ear, and be buried for ever in the oblivious chambers of his brain. Vast as the caverned ear of Dionysius the tyrant, his contains in its labyrinthine recesses the collected scandal of neighbourhoods, the chatter of households, and even the crooked policy of courts; but all is decomposed and neutralized there. It is the very quantity of this freight of plot and detraction that renders him so harmless. It is as ballast to the sails of his judgment. He mixes in no conspiracy, domestic or public. The foulest treason would remain “pure in the last recesses of _his_ mind.” He knows not of, cares not for, feels no interest in all this material of wickedness, any more than the unconscious paper that bears on its lettered forehead the “sixth edition” of a bulletin.

Amiable, contented, respected race!--I exclaim with Figaro, “Oh, that I were a happy barber!”

GASTON.

* * * * *

~Books.~

THE KING OF INDIA’S LIBRARY.

Dabshelim, king of India, had so numerous a library, that a hundred brachmans were scarcely sufficient to keep it in order; and it required a thousand dromedaries to transport it from one place to another. As he was not able to read all these books, he proposed to the brachmans to make extracts from them of the best and most useful of their contents. These learned personages set themselves so heartily to work, that in less than twenty years they had compiled of all these extracts a little encyclopædia of twelve thousand volumes, which thirty camels could carry with ease. They had the honour to present it to the king. But, how great was their amazement, on his giving them for answer, that it was impossible for him to read thirty camel-loads of books. They therefore reduced their extracts to fifteen, afterwards to ten, then to four, then to two dromedaries, and at last there remained only so much as to load a mule of ordinary stature.

Unfortunately, Dabshelim, during this process of melting down his library, was grown old, and saw no probability of living to exhaust its quintessence to the last volume. “Illustrious sultan,” said his vizir, the sage Pilpay, “though I have but a very imperfect knowledge of your royal library, yet I will undertake to deliver you a very brief and satisfactory abstract of it. You shall read it through in one minute, and yet you will find matter in it for reflecting upon throughout the rest of your life.” Having said this, Pilpay took a palm leaf, and wrote upon it with a golden style the four following sentences:--

1. The greater part of the sciences comprise but one single word--_Perhaps_: and the whole history of mankind contains no more than three--they are _born_, _suffer_, _die_.

2. Love nothing but what is good, and do all that thou lovest to do; think nothing but what is true, and speak not all that thou thinkest.

3. O kings! tame your passions, govern yourselves; and it will be only child’s play to you to govern the world.

4. O kings! O people! it can never be often enough repeated to you, what the half-witted venture to doubt, that there is no happiness without virtue, and no virtue without the fear of God.

* * * * *

ENCOURAGEMENT TO AUTHORS.

Whether it is perfectly consistent in an author to solicit the indulgence of the public, though it may stand first in his wishes, admits a doubt; for, if his productions will not bear the light, it may be said, why does he publish? but, if they will, there is no need to ask a favour; the world receives one from him. Will not a piece everlastingly be tried by its merit? Shall we esteem it the higher, because it was written at the age of thirteen? because it was the effort of a week? delivered extempore? hatched while the author stood upon one leg? or cobbled, while he cobbled a shoe? or will it be a recommendation, that it issues forth in gilt binding? The judicious world will not be deceived by the tinselled purse, but will examine whether the contents are sterling.

* * * * *

POETICAL ADVICE.

_For the Table Book._

I have pleasure in being at liberty to publish a poetical letter to a young poet from one yet younger; who, before the years of manhood, has attained the height of knowing on what conditions the muse may be successfully wooed, and imparts the secret to his friend. Some lines towards the close, which refer to his co-aspirant’s effusions, are omitted.

To R. R.

To you, dear Rowland, lodg’d in town,
Where Pleasure’s smile soothes Winter’s frown,
I write while chilly breezes blow,
And the dense clouds descend in snow.
For Twenty-six is nearly dead,
And age has whiten’d o’er her head;
Her velvet robe is stripp’d away,
Her watery pulses hardly play;
Clogg’d with the withering leaves, the wind
Comes with his blighting blast behind,
And here and there, with prying eye,
And flagging wings a bird flits by;
(For every Robin _sparer_ grows,
And every Sparrow _robbing_ goes.)
The Year’s two eyes--the sun and moon--
Are fading, and will fade full soon;[65]
With shattered forces Autumn yields,
And Winter triumphs o’er the fields.

So thus, alas! I’m gagg’d it seems,
From converse of the woods and streams,
(For all the countless rhyming rabble
Hold leaves can whisper-waters babble)
And, house-bound for whole weeks together
By stress of lungs, and stress of weather,
Feed on the more delightful strains
Of howling winds, and pelting rains;
Which shake the house, from rear to van,
Like valetudinarian;
Pouring innumerable streams
Of arrows, thro’ a thousand seams:
Arrows so fine, the nicest eye
Their thickest flight can ne’er descry,--
Yet fashion’d with such subtle art,
They strike their victim to the heart;
While imps, that fly upon the point,
Raise racking pains in every joint.

Nay, more--these winds are thought magicians.
And supereminent physicians:
For men who have been kill’d outright,
They cure again at dead of night.
That double witch, who erst did dwell
In Endor’s cave, raised Samuel;
But they each night raise countless hosts
Of wandering sprites, and sheeted ghosts;
Turn shaking locks to clanking chains,
And howl most supernatural strains:
While all our dunces lose their wits,
And pass the night in ague-fits.

While this _nocturnal series blows_
I hide my head beneath the clothes,
And sue the power whose dew distils
The only balm for human ills.
All day the sun’s prevailing beam
Absorbs this dew from Lethe’s stream:
All night the falling moisture sheds
Oblivion over mortal heads.
Then sinking into sleep I fall,
And leave them _piping_ at their _ball_.
When morning comes--no summer’s morn--
I wake and find the spectres gone;
But on the casement see emboss’d
A mimic world in crusted frost;
Ice-bergs, high shores, and wastes of snow,
Mountains above, and seas below;
Or, if Imagination bids,
Vast crystal domes, and pyramids.
Then starting from my couch I leap,
And shake away the dregs of sleep,
Just breathe upon the grand array,
And ice-bergs slide in seas away.

Now on the scout I sally forth,
The weather-cock due E. by N.
To meet some masquerading fog,
Which makes all nature dance incog.
And spreads blue devils, and blue looks,
Till exercised by tongues and books.

Books, do I say? full well I wist
A book’s a famous exorcist!
A book’s the tow that makes the tether
That binds the quick and dead together;
A speaking trumpet under ground,
That turns a silence to a sound;
A magic mirror form’d to show,
Worlds that were dust ten thousand years ago.
They’re aromatic cloths, that hold
The mind embalm’d in many a fold,
And look, arrang’d in dust-hung rooms,
Like mummies in Egyptian tombs;
--Enchanted echoes, that reply,
Not to the ear, but to the eye;
Or pow’rful drugs, that give the brain,
By strange contagion, joy or pain.

A book’s the phœnix of the earth,
Which bursts in splendour from its birth:
And like the moon without her wanes,
From every change new lustre gains;
Shining with undiminish’d light,
While ages wing their idle flight.

By such a glorious theme inspired
Still could I sing--but you are tired:
(Tho’ adamantine lungs would do,
Ears should be adamantine too,)
And thence we may deduce ’tis better
To answer (’faith ’tis time) your letter.

To answer first what first it says.
Why will you speak of partial praise?
I spoke with honesty and truth,
And now you seem to doubt them both.
The lynx’s eye may seem to him,
Who always has enjoy’d it, dim:
And brilliant thoughts to you may be
What common-place ones are to me.
You note them not--but cast them by,
As light is lavish’d by the sky;
Or streams from Indian mountains roll’d
Fling to the ocean grains of gold.
But still we know the gold is fine--
But still we know the light’s divine.

As to the Century and Pope,
The thought’s not so absurd, I hope.
I don’t despair to see a throne
Rear’d above his--and p’rhaps your own.
The course is clear, the goal’s in view,
’Tis free to all, why not to you?

But, ere you start, you should survey
The towering falcon strike her prey:
In gradual sweeps the sky she scales,
Nor all at once the bird assails,
But hems him in--cuts round the skies,
And gains upon him as he flies.
Wearied and faint he beats the air in vain,
Then shuts his flaggy wings, and pitches to the plain.
Now, falcon! now! One stoop--but one,
The quarry’s struck--the prize is won!

So he who hopes the palm to gain,
So often sought--and sought in vain,
Must year by year, as round by round,
In easy circles leave the ground:
’Tis time has taught him how to rise,
And naturalized him to the skies.
Full many a day Pope trod the vales,
Mid “silver streams and murmuring gales.”
Long fear’d the rising hills to tread,
Nor ever dared the mountain-head.

It needs not Milton to display,--
Who let a life-time slide away,
Before he swept the sounding string,
And soar’d on Pegasean wing,--
Nor Homer’s ancient form--to show
The Laurel takes an age to grow;
And he who gives his name to fate,
Must plant it early, reap it late;
Nor pluck the blossoms as they spring,
So beautiful, yet perishing.

* * * * *

More I would say--but, see, the paper
Is nearly out--and so’s my taper.
So while I’ve space, and while I’ve light,
I’ll shake your hand, and bid good-night.

F. P. H.

_Croydon, Dec. 17, 1826._

[65]

To shield this line from criticism--’Tis
Parody--not Plagiarism.

* * * * *

~Anecdotes.~

GENERAL WOLFE.

It is related of this distinguished officer, that his death-wound was not received by the common chance of war.

Wolfe perceived one of the sergeants of his regiment strike a man under arms, (an act against which he had given particular orders,) and knowing the man to be a good soldier, reprehended the aggressor with much warmth, and threatened to reduce him to the ranks. This so far incensed the sergeant, that he deserted to the enemy, where he meditated the means of destroying the general. Being placed in the enemy’s left wing, which was directly opposed to the right of the British line, where Wolfe commanded in person, he aimed at his old commander with his rifle, and effected his deadly purpose.

* * * * *

DR. KING--_His_ PUN.

The late Dr. King, of Oxford, by actively interfering in some measures which materially affected the university at large, became very popular with some individuals, and as obnoxious with others. The mode of expressing disapprobation at either of the universities in the senate-house, or schools, is by scraping with the feet: but deviating from the usual custom, a party was made at Oxford to hiss the doctor at the conclusion of a Latin oration he had to make in public. This was accordingly done: the doctor, however, did not suffer himself to be disconcerted, but turning round to the vice-chancellor, said, very gravely, in an audible voice, “Laudatur ab _His_.”

* * * * *

~February.~

Conviviality and good cheer may convert the most dreary time of the year into a season of pleasure; and association of ideas, that great source of our keenest pleasures, may attach delightful images to the howling wind of a bleak winter’s night, and the hoarse screeching and mystic hooting of the ominous owl.[66]

WINTER.

When icicles hang by the wall,
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,
And Tom bears logs into the hall,
And milk comes frozen home in pail;
When blood is nipt, and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
Tu-who;
Tu-whit tu-who, a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

When all aloud the wind doth blow,
And coughing drowns the parson’s saw,
And birds sit brooding in the snow,
And Marian’s nose looks red and raw:
Then roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,
And nightly sings the staring owl,
Tu-who;
Tu-whit tu-who, a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

_Shakspeare._

To “keel” the pot is an ancient spelling for “cool,” which is the past participle of the verb: see Tooke’s “Diversions of Purley,” where this passage is so explained.

[66] Dr. Forster’s Perennial Calendar.

Vol. I.--9.

TO THE MEMORY OF THE SWISS GUARDS WHO WERE MASSACRED AT THE TUILLERIES, ON THE TENTH OF AUGUST, 1792.]

The engraving above is executed from a clay figure, modelled by a Swiss artist from the original. It was obligingly sent to the editor, for the present purpose, by the gentleman to whom it belongs. The model was presented to him by a friend, who, in answer to his inquiries on the subject, wrote him a letter, of which the following is an extract:--

“The _Terra Incognita_ you mention comes from Lucerne, in Switzerland, and is the model of a colossal work, cut in the solid rock, close to that city, on the grounds of general Pfyffer. It is from a design furnished by Thorwaldsen, which is shown close by. The ‘L’envoi,’ as don Armado calls it, is as follows:--‘The Helvetian lion, even in death, protects the lilies of France.’ The monument was executed by the Swiss, in memory of their countrymen, who were massacred, on the 10th of August, at the Tuilleries, in defending Louis XVI. from the _sans culottes_. The names of those who perished are engraved beneath the lion.”

The particulars of the dreadful slaughter, wherein these helpless victims fell, while defending the palace and the person of the unfortunate monarch, are recorded in different works within the reach of every person who desires to be acquainted with the frightful details. About sixty who were not killed at the moment, were taken prisoners, and conducted to the town-hall of the commons of Paris, for summary trial: but the ferocious females who mingled in the mobs of those terrifying times, rushed in bodies to the place, with cries of vengeance, and the unhappy men were delivered up to their fury, and every individual was murdered on the spot.

~Garrick Plays.~

No. VI.

[From the “Chaste Maid in Cheapside,” a Comedy, by Thomas Middleton,
1620.]

_Citizen to a Knight complimenting his Daughter._

Pish, stop your words, good Knight, ’twill make her blush else,
Which are wound too high for the Daughters of the Freedom;
Honour, and Faithful Servant! they are compliments
For the worthy Ladies of White Hall or Greenwich;
Ev’n plain, sufficient, subsidy words serve us, Sir.

* * * * *

_Master Allwit (a Wittol) describes his contentment._

I am like a man
Finding a table furnish’d to his hand,
(As mine is still for me), prays for the Founder,
Bless the Right worshipful, the good Founder’s life:
I thank him, he[67] has maintain’d my house these ten years;
Not only keeps my Wife, but he keeps me.
He gets me all my children, and pays the nurse
Weekly or monthly, puts me to nothing,
Rent, nor Church dues, not so much as the Scavenger;
The happiest state that ever man was born to.
I walk out in a morning, come to breakfast,
Find excellent cheer, a good fire in winter;
Look in my coal-house, about Midsummer eve,
That’s full, five or six chaldron new laid up;
Look in my back yard, I shall find a steeple
Made up with Kentish faggots, which o’erlooks
The water-house and the windmills. I say nothing,
But smile, and pin the door. When she lies in,
(As now she’s even upon the point of grunting),
A Lady lies not in like her; there’s her imbossings,
Embroiderings, spanglings, and I know not what,
As if she lay with all the gaudy shops
In Gresham’s Burse about her; then her restoratives,
Able to set up a young ’Pothecary,
And richly store the Foreman of a Drug shop;
Her sugars by whole loaves, her wines by rundlets,
I see these things, but like a happy man
I pay for none at all, yet fools think it mine;
I have the name, and in his gold I shine:
And where some merchants would in soul kiss hell,
To buy a paradise for their wives, and dye
Their conscience in the blood of prodigal heirs,
To deck their Night-piece; yet, all this being done,
Eaten with jealousy to the inmost bone;
These torments stand I freed of. I am as clear
From jealousy of a wife, as from the charge.
O two miraculous blessings! ’tis the Knight,
Has ta’en that labour quite out of my hands.
I may sit still, and play; he’s jealous for me,
Watches her steps, sets spies. I live at ease.
He has both the cost and torment; when the string
Of his heart frets, I feed fat, laugh, or sing.

* * * * *

I’ll go bid Gossips[68] presently myself,
That’s all the work I’ll do; nor need I stir,
But that it is my pleasure to walk forth
And air myself a little; I am tyed
To nothing in this business; what I do
Is merely recreation, not constraint.

* * * * *

_Rescue from Bailiffs by the Watermen._

----I had been taken by eight Serjeants,
But for the honest Watermen, I am bound to ’em.
They are the most requiteful’st people living;
For, as they get their means by Gentlemen,
They’re still the forward’st to help Gentlemen.
You heard how one ’scaped out of the Blackfriars[69]
But a while since from two or three varlets,
Came into the house with all their rapiers drawn,
As if they’d dance the sword-dance on the stage,
With candles in their hands, like Chandlers’ Ghosts!
Whilst the poor Gentleman, so pursued and banded,
Was by an honest pair of oars safe landed.

* * * * *

[From “London Chanticleers,” a rude Sketch of a Play, printed 1659,
but evidently much older.]

_Song in praise of Ale._

1.

Submit, Bunch of Grapes,
To the strong Barley ear;
The weak Wine no longer
The laurel shall wear.

2.

Sack, and all drinks else,
Desist from the strife;
Ale’s the only Aqua Vitæ,
And liquor of life.

3.

Then come, my boon fellows,
Let’s drink it around;
It keeps us from grave,
Though it lays us on ground.

4.

Ale’s a Physician,
No Mountebank Bragger;
Can cure the chill Ague,
Though it be with the Stagger.

5.

Ale’s a strong Wrestler,
Flings all it hath met;
And makes the ground slippery,
Though it be not wet.

6.

Ale is both Ceres,
And good Neptune too;
Ale’s froth was the sea,
From which Venus grew.

7.

Ale is immortal;
And be there no stops
In bonny lads’ quaffing,
Can live without hops.[70]

8.

Then come, my boon fellows,
Let’s drink it around;
It keeps us from grave,
Though it lays us on ground.

C. L.

[67] A rich old Knight, who keeps Allwit’s Wife.

[68] To his Wife’s Lying-in.

[69] Alsatia, I presume.

[70] The original distinction of Beer from the old Drink of our
Forefathers, which was made without that ingredient.

* * * * *

~The Drama.~

CHARLOTTE CHARKE.

The novel called “Mr. Dumont,” by this unfortunate woman, was published in the year 1755 in one volume, twelves, by H. Slater, of Drury-lane, who may be presumed to have been the bookseller that accompanied Mr. Whyte to her miserable dwelling, for the purpose of hearing her read the manuscript. Since the account at col. 125, I met with an advertisement of November, 1742, from whence it appears that she and her daughter, “_Miss_ Charke,” performed at one of those places of public amusement at that period, when, to evade the law, under pretence of a musical entertainment, a play and the usual afterpiece were frequently represented by way of divertisement, although they constituted the sole attraction. The notice referred to is altogether a curiosity: it runs thus:--

“_For the Benefit of a Person who has a mind to get Money_: AT THE NEW THEATRE in James-street near the Haymarket, on Monday next, will be performed a CONCERT of vocal and instrumental Musick, divided into TWO PARTS. Boxes 3_s._ Pit 2_s._ Gallery 1_s._ Between the two parts of the Concert will be performed a _Tragedy_, call’d THE FATAL CURIOSITY, written by the late Mr. Lillo, author of George Barnwell. The part of Mrs. Wilmot by _Mrs._ CHARKE (who originally performed it at the Haymarket;) _The rest of the parts by a Set of People who will perform as well as they can, if not as well as they wou’d, and the best can do no more_. With variety of Entertainments, viz. Act I. A Preamble on the Kettle drums, by Mr. Job Baker, particularly, _Larry Grovy_, accompanied with French Horns. Act II. A new Peasant Dance by Mons. Chemont and Madem Peran, just arriv’d piping hot from the Opera at Paris. To which will be added a Ballad-Opera, call’d THE DEVIL TO PAY; The part of Nell by _Miss_ CHARKE _who performed Princess Elizabeth at Southwark_. Servants will be allow’d to keep places on the stage--Particular care will be taken to perform with the utmost decency, and to prevent mistakes, the Bills for the day will be blue and black, &c.”

*

* * * * *

THE BLOODY HAND.

_For the Table Book._

One December evening, the year before last, returning to T--, in the northern extremity of W--, in a drisling rain, as I approached the second milestone, I observed two men, an elder and a younger, walking side by side in the horse-road. The elder, whose appearance indicated that of a labourer in very comfortable circumstances, was in the path directly in front of my horse, and seemed to have some intention of stopping me; on my advancing, however, he quietly withdrew from the middle of the road to the side of it, but kept his eyes firmly fixed on me, which caused also, on my part, a particular attention to him. He then accosted me, “Sir, I beg your pardon.”--“For what, my man?”--“For speaking to you, sir.”--“What have you said, then?”--“I want to know the way to S--.”--“Pass on beyond those trees, and you will see the spire before you.”--“How far is it off, sir?”--“Less than two miles.”--“Do you know it, sir?”--“I was there twenty minutes ago.”--“Do you know the gentleman there, sir, that wants a man to go under ground for him?”--“For what purpose?” (imagining, from the direction in which I met the man, that he came from the mining districts of S--, I expected that his object was to explore the neighbourhood for coals.) His answer immediately turned the whole train of my ideas. “To go under ground for him, to take off the _bloody hand_ from his carriage.”--“And what is that to be done for?”--“For a thousand pounds, sir. Have you not heard any thing of it, sir?”--“Not a word.”--“Well, sir, I was told that the gentleman lives here, at S--, at the hall, and that he offers a thousand pounds to any man that will take off the _bloody hand_ from his carriage.”--“I can assure you this is the first word I have heard on the subject.”--“Well, sir, I have been told so;” and then, taking off his hat, he wished me a good morning.