"I went on studying the language, and, at the same time, the

manners of these strange people. My rapid progress in the

former astonished while it delighted Jasper. 'We'll no longer

call you Sap-engro, brother,' said he, 'but rather Lavengro,

which in the language of the gorgios meaneth Word-master.'

'Nay, brother,' said Tawno Chikno, with whom I had become very

intimate, 'you had better call him Cooro-mengro; I have put on

_the gloves_ with him, and find him a pure fist-master; I like

him for that, for I am a Cooro-mengro myself, and was born at

Brummagem.'"

There is a deal more of the same talk, tending to the laudation of

the author. Our taste may be perverted and unusual, but we really

cannot discover any merit whatever in the gipsy dialogues which occur

throughout these volumes. Mr Borrow ought to reflect that he has

already treated the public to a sufficiency of this jargon. What on

earth are we to make of "dukkeripens," "chabos," "poknees," "chiving

wafado dloova," "drabbing bawlor," "kekaubies," "drows," and "dinelos?"

Possibly these terms may be used in the most refined Rommany circles,

and enliven the conversation around the kettle in which the wired

hare or pilfered capon is simmering but such exotics can hardly be

considered as worth the pains of transplantation. When Mr Borrow, in

a moral reflection of his own, observes, "softly, friend; when thou

wouldst speak harshly of the dead, remember that thou hast not yet

fulfilled thy own dukkeripen!"--he is penning absolute nonsense, and

rendering himself supremely ridiculous. Then, as to the scraps of song

which are here and there interspersed, we cannot aver that they either

stir our bosoms like the call of a trumpet, or excite the tears of

pity. However, as we said already, our taste may be in fault; and it is

just possible that we may hear the following ditty warbled in many a

drawing-room:--

"The Rommany chi

And the Rommany chal,

Shall jaw basaulor

To drab the bawlor,

And dook the gry

Of the farming rye.

"The Rommany chi

And the Rommany chal,

Love Luripen,

And dukkeripen,

And hokkeripen,

And every pen

But Lachipen,

And Tatchipen."

Certainly we never had, on any previous occasion, the dukkeripen to

copy such jargon.

However pleasant it may be--and proverbs tell us that it is so--to

go a-gipsying, it is manifest that this mode of life, unless

professionally adopted, cannot keep the pot boiling. It is one thing

to be an amateur, and another to be a thorough-paced practitioner. Mr

Borrow, though tempted by his associates to adopt the latter course,

and ally himself in marriage with a young fortune-teller of the name

of Ursula, had the firmness and good sense to decline the proposal;

and, accordingly, we presently find him ostensibly engaged in the

study of law under the tutelage of an attorney. Young gentlemen so

situated, are, we fear, but too apt to overlook the advantages within

their reach, and to cultivate the Belles Lettres secretly when they

should be immersed in Blackstone. If they do nothing worse, we may

indulge the charitable hope that there is mercy for them in this world

and the next. Mr Borrow did like his neighbours; with this difference

that, instead of concealing the last new novel in his desk, he began

manfully to master the difficulties of the Welsh language, and became

an enthusiastic admirer of the poetry of Ab Gwilym. This, at all

events, was a step in the right direction. Next, by one of those

extraordinary accidents which, somehow or other, never occur except in

novels, he became possessed of a copy of the Danish ballad-book--we

presume the Kjoempeviser--and mastered the language by means of a

Danish bible. To this he added afterwards a knowledge of German, and

German literature; so that, when compelled to go forth and struggle,

single-handed with the world, his accomplishments were of a varied, if

not a very marketable kind.

We are here treated to a description of a prize-fight, which, if we

recollect has been already sketched by Mr Borrow in his "Gipsies in

Spain." It is rather too bombastic for our taste, though it is worked

up with considerable effect, both as regards action and accessories.

It is introduced, we presume, principally on account of an individual

who was present, and who took a prominent part in the proceedings

of the day--we mean the notorious Thurtell. That Mr Borrow should

have added Thurtell to the list of his acquaintances,--for it seems

the grim murderer of Weare was wont to bestow upon him a nod of

recognition,--after having known Haggart, is certainly remarkable, and

testifies, at all events, his superiority to vulgar prejudice. There is

a clever scene at the house of a magistrate, where Thurtell introduces

a prize-fighter to the notice of the _Custos Rotulorum_, a portion of

which we are tempted to quote:--

"'In what can I oblige you, sir?' said the magistrate.

'Well, sir, the soul of wit is brevity; we want a place for

an approaching combat between my friend here and a brave from

town. Passing by your broad acres this fine morning, we saw a

pightle, which we deemed would suit. Lend us that pightle, and

receive our thanks; 'twould be a favour, though not much to

grant: we neither ask for Stonehenge nor for Tempe.'

My friend looked somewhat perplexed; after a moment, however,

he said, with a firm but gentlemanly air, 'Sir, I am sorry that

I cannot comply with your request.'

'Not comply!' said the man, his brow becoming dark as midnight;

and with a hoarse and savage tone, 'Not comply! why not?'

'It is impossible, sir; utterly impossible.'

'Why so?'

'I am not compelled to give my reasons to you, sir, nor to any

man.'

'Let me beg of you to alter your decision,' said the man in a

tone of profound respect.

'Utterly impossible, sir; I am a magistrate.'

'Magistrate! then fare-ye-well, for a green-coated buffer and a

Harmanbeck!'"

Lavengro--our fine fellow--it is not a thing to boast of, that you

have, occasionally put on the gloves with Jack Thurtell!

Rejecting the profession of the law, our author, after the death of his

father, started for London, in the hopes of a literary engagement; his

sole credentials being a letter to a publisher from an eccentric German

teacher, and two bundles of manuscript--being translations respectively

from the Welsh and the Danish. Of course nobody would publish them;

and the bookseller to whom he had been recommended would do nothing

better for him than give him an order to compile a new series of the

Newgate Calendar, at worse than hodman's wages. This portion of the

story is very dull, and abounds in silly caricature. The struggles

of the aspirant to literary distinction fail to excite in us the

slightest degree of commiseration, because they are manifestly unreal;

and the episodes of London life, though intended to be startling, are

simply stupid. Thus, we have an Armenian merchant, whose acquaintance

Mr Borrow makes by apprehending a thief while making free with his

pocket-book--a merchant, only less sordid and fond of money than a Jew,

whom, nevertheless, the author persuades to employ the whole of his

realised fortune in making war upon the Persians! It is to be regretted

that Mr Borrow does not favour us with his dukkeripen. Then there is

the aforesaid thief, whom Mr Borrow again encounters at Greenwich fair,

in the possession of a thimble-rig table, and who makes confidential

proposals to him to act the subsidiary part of "bonnet." It was perhaps

as well that Tawno Chikno's idea of investing the author with the

honorary and fistic title of Cooro-mengro was not adopted, seeing that

Mr Borrow abstained from doubling-up the scoundrel at the first hint

of the kind. Then there is an applewoman who kept a stall on London

Bridge, at which stall the aforesaid Armenian was wont to eat apples,

and to which Mr Borrow occasionally repaired--for what purpose, does

the reader think? Why--simply to read the history of Moll Flanders, a

copy of which enticing work the old woman had in her possession!! This

excellent creature, when Mr Borrow first knew her, was a receiver of

stolen goods, and, in fact, hinted that, if Lavengro could pick up in

the course of his peregrinations any stray handkerchiefs, she would be

happy to give the highest available price for the same. There is some

awful trash about her conversion having taken place in consequence of

this copy of Moll being filched from her stall; but we have neither

stomach nor patience to dwell upon this maudlin episode. The extract

or essence of the whole, in so far as we can understand it, appears to

be this--that by the perusal of Moll Flanders, Mr Borrow acquires a

knowledge of the artistical skill of Defoe, and avails himself of that

knowledge by writing an entire work of fiction within a week! We have

never happened to fall in with this book, which is funnily entitled

"The Life and Adventures of Joseph Sell," and therefore we cannot

say whether or not it was limited to a single volume. In charity, we

shall assume the smallest bulk; and if it be indeed true that Mr Borrow

accomplished this task within the above time, feeding, moreover, all

the while on nothing stronger than bread and water, we are ready,

for the honour of our country, to back him for a heavy sum, not only

against Fenimore Cooper, but even against the redoubted and hitherto

unvanquished Dumas. We shall merely stipulate that the respective

authors shall be securely and properly locked up, so that all

communication from without may be effectually prevented. Cooper shall

have as many sherry-cobblers, and Dumas as many bottles of Pomard or

Chambertin, as they please. Lavengro shall be supplied with ale by the

pitcherful; and we have no fears of the result. Only--let him establish

his antecedents; and the challenge may be given, and the contest fixed,

in time for the approaching "Exhibition of the Industry of all Nations."

These women are the very devil at driving bargains! The bookseller, to

whom Lavengro sent the manuscript, might easily have been persuaded to

come down with a cool five-and-twenty for the adventure; but his wife

asked the author to tea, and between the relays of butter and toast,

buttered the original Sap-engro so effectually, that he accepted the

twenty, minus the five. And with this plentiful supply--from which the

payment of accounts past due had to be deducted--Lavengro valorously

determined to cut the trade of authorship, on the eve of his first

success, and follow out his dukkeripen among scenes and sounds which

were more congenial to his taste than the crowded streets and busy din

of London.

Somehow or other an author always falls upon his feet. If you,

dear reader, without any other recommendation than the figure and

countenance which nature has bestowed upon you--even though you have

never been solicited to join a gipsy encampment, or to participate in

the mysteries of thimble-rig--should start upon a pedestrian expedition

through these islands, rather shabbily attired, and carrying your

bundle on the end of your stick, the odds are that you do not meet

at every turn with a beneficent squire of considerable fortune, but

eccentric literary habits, to invite you to make his house your home so

long as you may please to honour it. This may be a reflection on modern

hospitality; however, try the experiment for yourself, and you will

find that we are right in our assumption. But, if you are an author,

the case is very different--at least it will be different when you

print. The _mens divinior_ will have come out in some way which passes

human understanding. You may have been standing flattening your nose

against an alehouse window, thinking perhaps intently on the means of

liquidating your reckoning, when a chariot shall arrest itself at the

door; a metaphysical gentleman steps out, for the apparent purpose of

regaling himself with a glass of bitters; and in the course of five

minutes' conversation, you so gain his heart, that you are whirled off

to the mansion-house or the lodge, and forced to submit, for the next

fortnight, to a regimen of turtle, venison, and claret. Such are the

horrid but unavoidable nuisances of superior mental cultivation. It is

no use struggling against the stream--you must perforce submit to it.

And accordingly, when you publish, you enter a proper protest against

the violence which has been done to your feelings, by removing you from

a damp truckle-bed to a couch of eider down; and by forcing down your

throat abhorred foreign luxuries, in place of that bread-and-cheese

which you patriotically preferred as your nutriment.

No long time elapses before our friend Lavengro encounters his

predestined squire. In the interim, however, he visits Stonehenge,

and encounters a returned convict, who of course is the son of the

applewoman. Shortly afterwards Amphytrion appears, just as Lavengro is

sitting down to a buttock of beef and accompaniments in a cheerful inn.

The character has been so often drawn, that it is rather difficult to

chalk out a new branch of eccentricity for the gentleman who is about

to convey the author to his house, in order that he may confide to

him the details of his personal history: we are bound, however, to

confess that Mr Borrow has managed this very cleverly. The new comer

is afflicted with the mania of "touching"--not for any pleasurable

sensation conveyed to the sensorium through the medium of the tips of

the fingers, but for luck, or as a charm against the influence of the

evil eye! For example, his mother being extremely ill, he finds himself

irresistibly impelled to climb a large elm-tree and touch the topmost

branch, as the means of averting the crisis. He does so, and sustains

a severe fall, to the detriment of his nether-man, but is rewarded

by finding that his filial piety has saved his mother, for the fever

departed the moment that he clutched the gifted twig! Genius has no

limits. After this it is not impossible that a gooseberry bush may be

found available machinery for adding to the interest of a tale.

The story is told at the Squire's house during a thunder-storm; and

another character, a certain Rev. Mr Platitude, is introduced solely,

we presume, to lay a foundation for the subsequent appearance of

a Roman Jesuit, to whom the said Platitude is in bondage. Having

delivered himself of his touching history, the Squire, like Coleridge's

Ancient Mariner, feels himself considerably easier in his mind, and

Lavengro takes his leave. Led by his dukkeripen, he next falls in

with a disconsolate tinker, Jack Slingsby by name, whom he finds with

his wife and children sitting over an empty mug, "which, when filled,

might contain half-a-pint." Lavengro is perfectly orthodox on the

subject of malt liquor. He understands, appreciates, and even venerates

its virtues; so, like a kind Christian, he orders a double jorum,

and requests the woe-begone Jack to insinuate his whiskers therein.

Slingsby complies, nothing loath; for grief is notoriously dry: and

we are presently informed that he is sore at heart, in consequence

of having been beaten off his bent by a rival, ycleped the Flaming

Tinman, who travels the country, accompanied by his wife, Grey Moll,

and a young woman of more than amazonian proportions. This Ajax having

conceived an intense hatred of the pacific Slingsby, has first given

him an unmerciful hiding; and, secondly, compelled him to take his

Bible-oath that he will immediately vacate the country. Cause enough

of sorrow, to be sure, the district being rife in frying-pans, and the

kettles, generally speaking, of reasonable antiquity. Having delivered

himself of this tale, the soft-hearted Slingsby weeps once more, and

refuses to be comforted.

"'_Myself._--Take another draught--stout liquor.'

'_Tinker._--I can't, young man, my heart's too full, _and,

what's more, the pitcher is empty_.'"

Nature! thou art always the same. Under whatever garb--but we crave

pardon. We have already condemned apostrophes.

An idea occurs to Lavengro. What if he were to become the proprietor,

by purchasing Slingsby's stock in trade, and the goodwill of the

district, and start on his own account as a regenerator of fractured

pans? Of course he must be prepared to encounter the opposition of

the Flying Tinman; but that was only a contingent hazard; and should

it occur, why--our friend flattered himself that he had not looked

upon the "terrible Randall" for nothing. In days of old, his sire had

encountered Big Ben Brain the Bruiser "in single combat for one hour,

at the end of which time the champions shook hands and retired, each

having experienced quite enough of the other's prowess;" and the memory

of that glorious deed was glowing in the bosom of the son. Free of the

forge also was he, as one of Tubal Cain's apprentices; and if not quite

an adept in the mysteries of solder, likely enough to become so with

the help of a little practice. So Slingsby sold his cart, pony, and

apparatus, for the sum of five pounds ten shillings, and our author was

metamorphosed into a tinker. The account of his first night encampment

is rather picturesque, and we shall insert it here, as a good specimen

of Mr Borrow's powers of description.

"How long I continued in that state I am unable to say, but I

believe for a considerable time. I was suddenly awakened by the

ceasing of the jolting to which I had become accustomed, and

of which I was perfectly sensible in my sleep. I started up

and looked around me; the moon was still shining, and the face

of the heaven was studded with stars. I found myself amidst

a maze of bushes of various kinds, but principally hazel and

holly, through which was a path or driftway, with grass growing

on either side, upon which the pony was already diligently

browsing. I conjectured that this place had been one of the

haunts of his former master; and, on dismounting and looking

about, was strengthened in that opinion by finding a spot under

an ash-tree, which, from its burnt and blackened appearance,

seemed to have been frequently used as a fire-place. I will

take up my quarters here, thought I; it is an excellent spot

for me to commence my new profession in; I was quite right to

trust myself to the guidance of the pony. Unharnessing the

animal without delay, I permitted him to browse at free will

on the grass, convinced that he would not wander far from a

place to which he was so much attached; I then pitched the

little tent close beside the ash-tree to which I have alluded,

and conveyed two or three articles into it, and instantly felt

that I had commenced housekeeping for the first time in my

life. Housekeeping, however, without a fire is a very sorry

affair, something like the housekeeping of children in their

toy-houses. Of this I was the more sensible from feeling very

cold and shivering, owing to my late exposure to the rain,

and sleeping in the night air. Collecting, therefore, all the

dry sticks and furze I could find, I placed them upon the

fire-place, adding certain chips and a billet which I found

in the cart, it having apparently been the habit of Slingsby

to carry with him a small stock of fuel. Having then struck a

spark in a tinder-box, and lighted a match, I set fire to the

combustible heap, and was not slow in raising a cheerful blaze.

I then drew my cart near the fire, and, seating myself on one

of the shafts, hung over the warmth with feelings of intense

pleasure and satisfaction. Having continued in this posture

for a considerable time, I turned my eyes to the heaven in the

direction of a particular star; I, however, could not find the

star, nor indeed many of the starry train, the greater number

having fled, from which circumstance, and from the appearance

of the sky, I concluded that morning was nigh. About this time

I again began to feel drowsy; I therefore arose, and having

prepared for myself a kind of couch in the tent, I flung myself

upon it and went to sleep.

I will not say that I was awakened in the morning by the

carolling of birds, as I perhaps might if I were writing a

novel. I awoke because, to use vulgar language, I had slept my

sleep out--not because the birds were carolling around me in

numbers, as they probably had been for hours without my hearing

them. I got up and left my tent; the morning was yet more

bright than that of the preceding day. Impelled by curiosity, I

walked about, endeavouring to ascertain to what place chance,

or rather the pony, had brought me. Following the drift-way for

some time, amidst bushes and stunted trees, I came to a grove

of dark pines, through which it appeared to lead. I tracked it

a few hundred yards; but, seeing nothing but trees, and the way

being wet and sloughy, owing to the recent rain, I returned on

my steps, and, pursuing the path in another direction, came

to a sandy road leading over a common, doubtless the one I

had traversed the preceding night. My curiosity satisfied, I

returned to my little encampment, and on the way beheld a small

footpath on the left, winding through the bushes, which had

before escaped my observation. Having reached my tent and cart,

I breakfasted on some of the provisions which I had purchased

the day before, and then proceeded to take a regular account of

the stock formerly possessed by Slingsby the tinker, but now

become my own by right of lawful purchase.

Besides the pony, the cart, and the tent, I found I was

possessed of a mattress stuffed with straw, on which to lie,

and a blanket to cover me--the last quite clean, and nearly

new. Then there was a frying-pan and a kettle--the first for

cooking any food which required cooking, and the second for

heating any water which I might wish to heat. I likewise

found an earthen tea-pot and two or three cups. Of the first,

I should rather say I found the remains, it being broken in

three parts, no doubt since it came into my possession, which

would have precluded the possibility of my asking anybody to

tea for the present, should anybody visit me--even supposing I

had tea and sugar, which was not the case. I then overhauled

what might more strictly be called the stock in trade. This

consisted of various tools, an iron ladle, a chafing-pan and

small bellows, sundry pans and kettles--the latter being of

tin, with the exception of one which was of copper--all in a

state of considerable dilapidation, if I may use the term. Of

these first Slingsby had spoken in particular, advising me to

mend them as soon as possible, and to endeavour to sell them,

in order that I might have the satisfaction of receiving some

return upon the outlay which I had made. There was likewise

a small quantity of block-tin, sheet-tin, and solder. 'This

Slingsby,' said I, 'is certainly a very honest man; he has sold

me more than my money's worth; I believe, however, there is

something more in the cart.' Thereupon I rummaged the further

end of the cart, and, amidst a quantity of straw, I found a

small anvil, and bellows of that kind which are used in forges,

and two hammers, such as smiths use--one great and the other

small."

Here the author remains for a few days tinkering at his kettles, and

wholly uninterrupted, until he is surprised by the visit of a young

gipsy girl. The scene which follows is sufficiently absurd. The girl

wants to get a kettle from him, and patters Rommany, which choice

dialect Mr Borrow pretends not to understand. At last, however, he

presents her with the culinary implement, and astonishes her by

singing a part of that dainty ditty about dukkeripen, hokkeripen, and

lachipen, which we have inserted above. He had much better have kept

his accomplishments to himself; but we suppose the temptation was

irresistible. Indeed, judging from the various instances which are

chronicled in this book, it would appear that Lavengro made a regular

practice, in his intercourse with every one, to maintain the semblance

of considerable ignorance and simplicity, until some opportunity

occurred, when he could let off his bottled knowledge with astounding

effect. We question the wisdom of this method in any point of view,

and under any circumstance. In the present case he paid dear for the

untimely exhibition of his lore.

"The girl, who had given a slight start when I began, remained

for some time after I had concluded the song, standing

motionless as a statue, with the kettle in her hand. At

length she came towards me, and stared me full in the face.

'Grey, tall, and talks Rommany,' said she to herself. In her

countenance there was an expression which I had not seen

before--an expression which struck me as being composed of

fear, curiosity, and the deepest hate. It was momentary,

however, and was succeeded by one smiling, frank, and open.

'Ha, ha, brother,' said she, 'well, I like you all the

better for talking Rommany; it is a sweet language, isn't

it?--especially as you sing it. How did you pick it up? But you

picked it up on the roads, no doubt? Ha, it was funny in you

to pretend not to know it, and you so flush with it all the

time; it was not kind in you, however, to frighten the poor

person's child so by screaming out; but it was kind in you to

give the rikkeni kekaubi to the child of the poor person. She

will be grateful to you--she will bring you her little dog to

show you--her pretty juggal; the poor person's child will come

and see you again; you are not going away to-day, I hope, or

to-morrow, pretty brother, grey-haired brother--you are not

going away to-morrow, I hope?'

'Nor the next day,' said I; 'only to take a stroll to see if

I can sell a kettle. Good-bye, little sister, Rommany sister,

dingy sister.'

'Good-bye, tall brother,' said the girl as she departed,

singing--

"The Rommany chi," &c.

'There's something about that girl that I don't understand,'

said I to myself--'something mysterious. However, it is nothing

to me; she knows not who I am; and if she did, what then?'"

Lavengro, however, was doomed to become the victim of misplaced

confidence. The young lady in question was the grand-daughter of

Mrs Herne "of the hairy ones," who, as the reader will recollect,

abandoned the society of her kin rather than associate with the gorgio,

as, we presume, we ought to call Mr Borrow. This old woman, who was

resolved to have her revenge should any opportunity occur, was encamped

somewhere in the neighbourhood; and in the dusk of the evening Lavengro

beheld "a face wild and strange, half-covered with grey hair," glaring

at him through a gap in the bushes. It disappeared, and Lavengro went

to bed. A day or two afterwards he received a second visit from the

gipsy girl, who presented him with a species of bun, prepared, as she

said, by her "grandbebee," for the express consumption of the "harko

mescro" who had been so liberal of the "kekaubi." His evil dukkeripen

induced the author to eat, and, as the reader must have already

anticipated, the cake proves to have been poisoned.

Lavengro, in great agony, crawls into his tent, and has just sunk into

a kind of heavy swoon, when he is aroused by a violent thump upon the

canvass; and, opening his eyes, beholds Mrs Herne and the girl standing

without. They have come to gloat over his dying pangs.

It has been our fortune to peruse several of the romances of M. Eugene

Sue, and of his followers, as also divers of those interesting and

improving fictions which issue, in a serial form, from Holywell Street;

but we are not sure that we can recall to our memory any passage culled

from these various sources, which is more unnatural, distorted, and

purely disgusting, than the conversation between the two females.

We give a very small portion of it--for it extends to ten or twelve

pages--and what we do quote is, perhaps, the most natural of the

whole:--

"'Halloo, sir! are you sleeping? you have taken drows. The

gentleman makes no answer. God give me patience!'

'And what if he doesn't, bebee; isn't he poisoned like a hog?

Gentleman! indeed; why call him gentleman? if he ever was one

he's broke, and is now a tinker--a worker of blue metal!'

'That's his way, child; to-day a tinker, to-morrow something

else: and as for being drabbed, I don't know what to say about

it.'

'Not drabbed! what do you mean, bebee? But look there,

bebee--ha, ha--look at the gentleman's motions.'

'He is sick, child, sure enough. Ho, ho! sir, you have taken

drows; what, another throe! writhe, sir, writhe, the hog died

by the drow of gipsies; I saw him stretched at evening. That's

yourself, sir. There is no hope, sir, no help; you have taken

drow. Shall I tell your fortune, sir--your dukkerin? God bless

you, young gentleman, much trouble will you have to suffer,

and much water to cross; but never mind, pretty gentleman, you

shall be fortunate at the end, and those who hate shall take

off their hats to you.'

'Hey, bebee!' cried the girl, 'what is this? what do you mean?

you have blessed the gorgio!'

'Blessed him! no, sure; what did I say? Oh, I remember; I'm

mad. Well, I can't help it; I said what the dukkerin dook told

me. Woe's me! he'll get up yet.'

'Nonsense, bebee! look at his motions; he's drabbed, spite of

dukkerin.'

'Don't say so, child; he's sick, 'tis true: but don't laugh at

dukkerin; only folks do that that know no better; I, for one,

will never laugh at the dukkerin dook. Sick again; I wish he

was gone.'

'He'll soon be gone, bebee; let's leave him. He's as good as

gone; look there--he's dead!'

'No, he's not; he'll get up--I feel it. Can't we hasten him?'

'Hasten him? yes, to be sure; set the dog upon him. Here,

Juggal, look in there, my dog.'

The dog made its appearance at the door of the tent, and began

to bark and tear up the ground.

'At him, Juggal, at him; he wished to poison, to drab you.

Halloo!'

The dog barked violently, and seemed about to spring at my

face, but retreated.

'The dog won't fly at him, child; he flashed at the dog with

his eye, and scared him. He'll get up.'

'Nonsense, bebee! you make me angry. How should he get up?'

'The dook tells me so; and what's more, I had a dream.'"

But the gentle Leonora--which was the name of the girl--has a strong

tendency towards the practical. She would have been an invaluable

assistant at the inn of Terracina--which hostelry the dramatic writers

of the Surrey side used to select as the scene of their most appalling

tragedies; representing the landlord as an unhappy misanthrope, who

could never sleep unless he had poniarded his man; and the head-waiter

as a merry creature, who wore two brace of stilettoes in his girdle,

and lurked at the bottom of the pit, to receive the visitors when

the bed tumbled through the trap-door. Miss Leonora, we say, becomes

impatient at the exceeding dilatoriness of Lavengro in giving up the

ghost, and entreats her bebee, notwithstanding the dukkerin, to finish

him at once by poking her stick into his eye! The venerable descendant

of the hairy ones attempts to carry this humane advice into effect,

but, at the second lounge, the pole of the tent gives way, and she is

sent sprawling under the canvass.

At this juncture, the sound of wheels is heard, and the girl has work

enough to extricate her bebee, and hurry her off, before a car arrives.

It is pulled up by the fallen tent. Lavengro hears a sound of voices;

but the language is neither Rommany nor English: it is Welsh.

The Samaritan--who immediately doctors Lavengro with oil, and relieves

him from the effect of the poison--is a Methodist preacher, who, in

company with his wife, pays an annual visit to certain stations, where

his ministry is greatly prized. The portrayment of this family--Peter,

and his helpmate Winifred--would have been nearly perfect, had Mr

Borrow not chosen to represent the man as haunted by the most horrible

and overwhelming remorse for an imaginary sin of childhood. The idea

is evidently taken from a melancholy passage in the life of Cowper,

who, as every one knows, was, owing to constitutional hypochondria,

the victim of hideous delusions. To select such themes wantonly and

unnecessarily, argues the worst possible taste. They ought not, on any

account, to have been introduced in a work of this kind; and Mr Borrow

must not be surprised if very grave objections should be urged against

his book, arising from the manner in which he has chosen to treat of so

awful and inscrutable a dispensation. It will be no apology to say that

the thing actually occurred, and that the writer is merely relating

what passed under his own observation. No man is bound to set down and

publish everything which he hears or sees. On the contrary, he is bound

to use a just discretion, in order that he may not profanely enter

on forbidden ground, or cruelly parade confessions and doubts which,

surely, were never intended for the public ear.

But, as we have already indicated, we have no belief in the reality of

the preacher's story. Even had the main incidents of the episode been

true, it is not only improbable, but incredible, that a person, such

as the preacher is represented to be, would have confided his history

to Lavengro, who had certainly few recommendations as a spiritual

adviser. We are thoroughly convinced that our hypothesis is correct,

and that Mr Borrow--whose birth-place was Dereham, the town in which

Cowper was buried--has been led, through a diseased and vicious taste,

to reproduce a picture which no one can contemplate without a shudder.

But enough on this painful subject. There is, however, a point of minor

morals which we must notice. Is Mr Borrow aware that the conduct of his

hero in concealing his knowledge of the Welsh language from the people

who had just rescued him from death, so as to induce them to utter

their most private thoughts and feelings within his hearing, was, to

say the least of it, a very ungrateful return for all their kindness?

It would appear not. However, we are tolerably certain that no one who

peruses the book will differ from us in this opinion.

The preacher and his wife persuade Lavengro to travel with them as far

as the boundary of Wales, where he stops, refusing to set foot on the

land of Cadwallader. According to his usual custom, he petrifies them

at parting by exhibiting his intimate knowledge of the Welsh language

and literature. Just as they are taking leave, Petulengro makes his

appearance, emerging from Wales, and Lavengro turns with him. Now, what

does the reader think the respectable Jasper had been doing? Neither

more nor less than assisting at the interment of Mrs Herne, who had

herself anticipated the last tender offices of the executioner! The

fraternal pair jog on for a while amicably, Petulengro beguiling the

way by a sprightly narrative of blackguardism, until they reach a

convenient piece of turf, when he expresses a strong desire to have

a turn-up with the rather reluctant Lavengro. As the Rommany code of

honour is but little understood, we may as well give Petulengro's

reasons for defying his brother to the combat:--

"There is a point at present between us. There can be no doubt

that you are the cause of Mrs Herne's death--innocently, you

will say; but still the cause. Now, I shouldn't like it to be

known that I went up and down the country with a pal who was

the cause of my mother-in-law's death--that's to say, unless he

gave me satisfaction. Now, if I and my pal have a tussle, he

gives me satisfaction; and if he knocks my eyes out--which I

know you can't do--it makes no difference at all; he gives me

satisfaction: and he who says to the contrary knows nothing of

gipsy law, and is a dinelo into the bargain."

So, there being no other mode of adjustment, a stand-up fight took

place, in which it would appear that Lavengro received the largest

share of pepper. Petulengro at last declared himself satisfied, and the

affiliated couple set forward as if nothing had happened to disturb the

harmony of the afternoon. When they separate, Lavengro takes his way

in a secluded dingle, five miles distant from the nearest village, and

there encamps, makes horse-shoes, and has a fit of the horrors. Just

as he is recovering from this attack, who should appear in the dingle

but the Flying Tinman, with Grey Moll, and the amazon whom Slingsby had

mentioned--"an exceedingly tall woman, or rather girl, for she could

scarcely have been above eighteen." The Tinman himself was no beauty.

"I do not remember ever to have seen a more ruffianly-looking

fellow. He was about six feet high, with an immensely athletic

frame; his face was black and bluff, and sported an immense

pair of whiskers, but with here and there a grey hair; for

his age could not be much under fifty. He wore a faded blue

frock-coat, corduroys, and high-lows; on his black head was

a kind of red nightcap, round his bull-neck a Barcelona

handkerchief. I did not like the look of the man at all."

Two bulls are as likely to be amicable on one pasture as two tinkers

on the same beat. There is some surly chaffing. Lavengro tries to

conciliate the big girl by telling her that she is like Ingeborg,

Queen of Norway--which must have been an exceedingly intelligible

compliment--and then by pouring into her ear the following Orphean

strain:--

"As I was jawing to the gav yeck divvers,

I met on the drom miro Rommany chi."

The minstrel's reward was a thundering douse on the chops. Then stood

forth the Tinman in his ire, and a battle-royal commenced. Belle--for

such was the name of the big girl--was, however, an admirer of fair

play, and though she had been the first to strike him, volunteered her

services as Lavengro's second--Grey Moll doing the needful for her

spouse. After several sharp rounds, the Tinman misses a blow, smashes

himself against a tree, and goes down like a ninepin, insensible to the

call of time. There is honour among the tinkers, as there was law among

the cutters. The defeated warrior retires with his mort, leaving Belle,

whom he now abandons, to the protection of the victorious Lavengro.

And what follows? No sniggering, young gentleman, if you please.

You never were more entirely mistaken in your life. It is true that

Belle--or to give her her proper title--Miss Isopel Berners, was a

young lady of doubtful origin, who had been educated in the workhouse.

Why not? The only three noble names in the county were to be found

there. "Mine was one, the other two were Devereux and Bohun." And she

was independent as she was strong. Being apprenticed out at fourteen

years of age to a small farmer and his wife, she knocked down her

mistress for ill-using her, and, at sixteen, knocked down her master

for taking improper liberties. Shortly afterwards, having taken service

with a lady who travelled the country selling silks and linen, Belle

thrashed two sailors who wanted to rob the cart; so that, upon the

whole, she was by no means the Neæra with the tangles of whose hair

it was safe to play, unless with her entire consent. Therefore the

twain tarried in all amity and honour together in the dingle, making

themselves, upon the whole, remarkably comfortable. An occasional visit

to an alehouse, where politics and polemics were discussed, relieved

Lavengro from the vapours; and of an evening in the dingle, he occupied

himself by adding to the stock of accomplishments possessed by Miss

Isopel Berners. The reader will naturally be anxious to know the nature

of the lessons. Did he teach her ciphering, or French, or cross-stitch,

or cooking according to the method of Mrs Glass, or philosophy,

divinity, or calisthenics? Nothing of the kind. Lavengro gave her

"LESSONS IN ARMENIAN!"

Nor were they altogether without visitors. The priest appears upon the

stage, or rather comes to the dingle--a red-haired, squinting Jesuit,

who, very unnecessarily, expounds his method for converting England

to the faith of Rome, over several tumblers of Hollands-and-water,

sweetened with a lump of sugar. It is a curious fact, that he

preferred the water cold. Then, during a thunder-storm, a postilion

makes his appearance in consequence of a capsize of his postchaise,

and relates the history of his travels to Rome, where it appears that

he also had known the red-haired Jesuit. The said postilion, by the

way, is an accomplished rhetorician, for he divides his discourse into

the three parts of exordium, argument, and peroration. And so the book

ends; Lavengro and Miss Berners still remaining in the dingle, the

latter having evidently conceived a tender interest for her teacher in

Armenian lore.

Such are the contents of the book, which, most assuredly, will add

but little to Mr Borrow's reputation. That he has seen a great deal

of strange vagabond life, is certain; and it is equally plain that he

is gifted with adequate powers for depicting it. But he is no artist

as respects arrangement, and his anxiety to represent himself, or

Lavengro, as a character altogether without a parallel, has led him

into the most gross exaggerations and the most absurd positions. We

were willing to accept his former works as valuable contributions to

philology, and as containing sketches, vivid, if not true, of gipsy

life and manners. But this must have a limit somewhere. We are sick

of the Petulengros and their jargon, and Mr Borrow ought now to be

aware that he has thoroughly exhausted that quarry. He is mistaken if

he supposes that he has caught the secret of Defoe, who, like him,

introduced the reader to scenes and characters which were not usually

selected for portraiture and illustration. Defoe's excellence lies in

his extreme truthfulness, his homely manner, and his total freedom from

exaggeration; and until Mr Borrow is master of these qualities, he can

never hope to succeed in this line of composition. We strongly suspect

that, in the course of the composition of this book, which, unless our

memory strangely deceives us, was announced more than two years ago,

considerable changes have taken place in its plan and disposition. We

cannot read the preface in connection with the latter part of the third

volume, without thinking that much has been added and interpolated

to suit the occasion of the recent Papal aggression; and that we are

indebted to that circumstance for the introduction of the Jesuit, and

the rhetorical postilion's story, so strangely dragged in as an episode

to conclude the narrative. If we are right in this conjecture, a great

deal of the incongruity which is apparent throughout the work is

explained. But the faults still remain; and, while it is impossible to

deny that Lavengro contains some spirited passages and many indications

of talent, we cannot pronounce such a general verdict in its favour as

would be at all satisfactory either to the author or his admirers.

THE ARTS IN PORTUGAL.[24]

This portly volume, by the accomplished author of _Modern Art in

Germany_, is not so wise as it looks. Its bulk, like that of Minerva's

bird, of much feather and little weight, proves delusive when it comes

to be handled. This is not a history of the arts in Portugal, but an

accumulation of materials, whereof nine-tenths are either extraneous to

the subject or indirectly connected with it. A glance at the contents

may give an idea of the incongruity and unmethodical arrangement

of the book, in reference to its professed object. It consists of

twenty-nine letters. The second and third, occupying seventy-five

pages, are extracts from a MS., dated 1549, and chiefly relating to

Italian art, by Francisco de Hollanda, an architect and illuminator,

a Dutchman by race, but by birth a Portuguese, who resided for some

time at Rome. Highly interesting these extracts are; for the writer

was intimate with Michael Angelo, and gives a lively though somewhat

showy report of conversations with him on painting and sculpture, in

the presence of Victoria Colonna. But of the state of art in Portugal,

Francisco de Hollanda affords the scantiest information; he complains

much, indeed, that art was there disregarded. From his laboured and

tedious remonstrance on this neglect, addressed to the young King

Sebastian in 1571, Count Raczynski has been over-liberal in citation.

Among the reasons urged by the memorialist for royal encouragement of

the science of design and colouring, one is that the king might be

thereby instructed "how to choose hares, partridges, sporting-dogs,

camels, lions, tigers, and _other domestic_ animals." Both MSS. are in

the library of the Academy of Sciences at Lisbon. In the fifth letter,

an extract from _The Lisbon Nosegay_, O Ramalhete, introduces us to

an old history of the order of Dominic, and to its editor, Frei Luiz

de Sousa, a Portuguese classic, who is thus singularly recommended to

notice,--"You will perceive that the extracts which I have taken from

him do not mention a single fact that can throw light upon the history

of the arts in Portugal: not a name, and few interesting particulars."

[24] _Les Arts en Portugal._ By COUNT A. RACZYNSKI, Envoy from the

Court of Berlin to the Court Of Portugal.--Paris, 1846.

In default of the information wanted, we find, however, an anecdote

of Sousa, which might be no mean subject for the pencil. Manuel de

Sousa-Coutinho, a nobleman, proud of his talents and jealous of his

dignity, having set fire to his residence at Almada, to get rid of

importunate visitors from Lisbon during the plague, withdrew into

Spain. On his return he rebuilt his house, and married Magdalen, the

widow of Don John de Portugal, who had been reported among the slain

with Sebastian in Africa. Don Manuel had a daughter by this union, and

his domestic content was untroubled for some years, till a stranger

presented himself at Almada, and obtained an interview with the Lady

Magdalen. "I am a Portuguese," he said, "just returned from captivity

in Palestine. At the moment of my departure, one of my countrymen

charged me to seek you out, and to inform you that a person who had

not forgotten you was still in existence." The alarmed matron demanded

a minute description of that person, and the answer strengthened a

terrible suspicion. To remove all doubt, she led the stranger to a

room where the likeness of her first husband was suspended among many

other family portraits. The messenger at once recognised the portrait

of Don John of Portugal as that of the individual on whose errand he

had come. Manuel de Sousa was no sooner apprised of the fact, than he

resolved to take the cowl. He assumed the name of Luiz, and became a

friar in the Dominican convent at Bemfica. The lady also retired into

a religious house, and never saw him more.[25] The story would have

been as satisfactory if the captive husband had been ransomed by those

who had so unwittingly wronged him.

[25] Sr. J. B. Almeida Garrett, one of the most distinguished living

writers of Portugal, has produced an effective and popular drama on

this subject.--See vol. iii. of his collected works, in 7 vols. Lisbon,

1844.

In the next letter we find Monsieur Raczynski, catalogue in hand,

giving an account of his visit to a triennal exhibition of modern

paintings. On those or any other productions of art, even out of their

turn, we willingly listen to him; though his opinion only leads us to

the conclusion that revolutionary turmoils do not make painters. But we

protest against his budget of extravagancies from the _Lisbon Diary_,

and flowery tropes from _The Universal Review_, which is or was edited

by an ingenious poet, A. F. Castilho, who has the misfortune to be

blind, and has been so from his youth, and is nevertheless a critic

on art, who resents "the presumption of frivolous and impertinent

foreigners!" We might have been spared, too, the dull discourse

pronounced before their Majesties, by the late venerable Director of

the Academy. As a specimen of Senhor Loureiro's oration, in which

the glories of the _German_ easel are the main topic of panegyric,

take the following compliment to King Ferdinand Saxe Kohary:--"After

Louis XIV., who bowed to all the ladies he met on his ride, and after

Frederick II., no king nor prince in Europe returns the salute of

by-passers, except our much esteemed king, Don Ferdinand, as you all

must have often witnessed." This delicate flattery is insinuated _à

propos_ of a portrait by Frank, in the Berlin Cabinet, of "Frederick

the Great passing on horseback, and lifting his hand to his classical

hat, garnished with feathers, to salute the inhabitants of Potsdam,

who offer him their tribute of homage." Then follow ten letters,

full of capital blunders, for which M. Raczynski is no otherwise

responsible than that he has printed them; for these letters are

principally made up of communications from respectable but most

inaccurate correspondents, and of gatherings from more obscure and not

less questionable sources. That such a mass of absurdities, especially

those on Gran Vasco--the great name among Portuguese artists--should

have been retained is the more remarkable, because the Count, by his

laudable diligence, timely discovered that he had been misled on

many particulars, and finally tells us so himself. As to Gran Vasco,

in search of whose disputed identity his blind guides had led him

floundering through a weary morass--now after one will-o'-the wisp,

now after another--he at last finds himself on _terra firma_ at Vizeu,

whither he had repaired on the sensible advice of Viscount Juromenha,

and thus announces his success (Letter 16,)--"_Fica revogada toda a

legislação em contrario!_--that is to say, I retract all that I

have said or cited about Gran Vasco, and whatever is contrary to what

I am now going to tell you!" From Vizeu we are conducted, by shocking

bad roads, to Lamego and Regoa, and hence down the Douro to Oporto.

The 20th Letter is a postscript to the 11th, and we are again among

objects of art at Lisbon. Here the modesty of the king-consort is put

to the blush by one of those awkward compliments which personages of

the highest rank are born to suffer, and to which they become callous

in time. But the Prince is young, and courtiers should be merciful. We

have just heard the president of the Academy proclaiming him as the

only mannerly prince in Europe since the days of the Great Frederick

of Prussia. M. Raczynski throws the strong light of his admiration

on another and a greater excellence in the German husband of Donna

Maria da Gloria, though, inferentially, it is no compliment either to

Her Faithful Majesty or her subjects,--"The King is, to my knowledge,

endowed with more taste than any other person in this country; beyond

every other individual, he possesses true feeling for the arts. He is

the owner of a pleasing collection of paintings, besides a rich album

of drawings and water-colours, pretty pictures in German, French, and

English!" The 21st Letter is "the continuation of my letter the 14th,"

that is, a resumption of the subject of Portuguese architecture. The

22d Letter is a corollary to the 10th, "to serve as a sequel to my

10th letter;" and so, throughout the work the reader is fiddled to and

fro, down the middle and up again--now at Coimbra, now at Marseilles,

back again to Barcelona and Seville, and other places where he has

no business--and at last sits down to cool in a printing-office at

Paris. In short, if only what fairly relates to the arts in Portugal

had been admitted into this publication, with a due regard to method,

five score pages would have served the purpose of above five times that

number, and Monsieur Renouard's types would have been more profitably

employed--for the reader at least, if not for the printer. Even as it

is, however, the book is an improvement on Taborda and Cyrillo, the

latter of whom the Portuguese have hitherto been contented to take

for their Vasari. There is no reasonable doubt that attempts at the

revived art of painting were practised in Portugal as early as in

Spain, though so vastly in favour of the latter nation is the balance

of pictorial wealth. Rudiments of the art seem faintly discernible in

the very infancy of the Portuguese monarchy. There is a tradition of a

portrait of Count Henry, who died in 1112. In the Lisbon duplicate of

the _Livro-preto_--the Black-Book of Coimbra cathedral, a collection

of ancient documents--there is one dated 1168, setting forth sundry

payments to artificers in the church; and in that memorandum, mention

is made of an altar-picture, The Annunciation to the Virgin. Among

the royal archives at Lisbon is a book of charters, one page of which

is wholly occupied by a drawing of our Saviour, coloured in red and

blue. This MS. bears date 1277. That Portugal was early rich in

illuminated manuscripts, is proved by the existence of many very old

bibles, missals, breviaries, books of armorial blazonry, and other

gorgeous quaintnesses, on much and long enduring vellum. Garcia de

Resende, in his Chronicle of John II., at whose court he was brought

up, says that he employed much of his leisure in painting, to the great

satisfaction of his royal master, who often suggested subjects for his

pencil, and would frequently sit by him watching the progress of his

pleasant labours. The Castle of Belem, as it stands at this day, was

constructed, in the following reign, from a plan designed by Garcia for

John II., in whose time also, as we learn from that chronicler, and

from Ruy de Pina--both eye-witnesses--scene-painting was executed on a

large scale, for the court pantomimes and spectacles, before a stage

for the written drama was known in the kingdom. It was by John II.

that the Florentine Andrea Contucci, called Il Sansovino, was invited

to Portugal, where he remained nine years--chiefly employed, however,

in architecture and wood-sculpture--although his example as a painter

is supposed to have had some corrective influence on the rudeness of

pictorial notions in this country.

In the reigns of Emanuel and John III., 1495 to 1557, artists both

native and foreign were numerous in the land; and hagiologies were

ransacked for appropriate subjects of decoration for the churches and

monasteries, and other important edifices. Most of those painters are

forgotten. Few of their names have been preserved in connection with

their works; so that these, of which many are still extant, and might

bear honourable testimony to their skill, have incurred the singular

fate of being, almost universally attributed to one artist, who was

five years old at the decease of John III., and who ought to have lived

to more than twice the age of man, and have been a Proteus in varieties

of style, to make it possible that he should have completed one-half

the number of the works imputed to him. Every Gothic picture of any

pretension found in Portugal is called a Gran Vasco. Even that fine

painting, The Fountain of Mercy, in the sacristy of the Misericordia

at Oporto, has been pronounced a Gran Vasco. It was indeed painted

thirty years only before he was born; it has some historical features

that pretty nearly fix the date. King Emanuel gave that picture to

the brotherhood of the Misericordia at Oporto. It contains portraits

of himself, his third wife, several of his children by his second

wife, and other personages of his family and court. He died in 1521.

Vasco Fernandez, the true Gran Vasco, was baptised at Vizeu in 1552.

Senhor J. Berardo has the honour of this discovery. After many a weary

research among piles of records in the Vizeu Cathedral, he there

detected a document which destroys delusions that had become national,

leaves scores of old pictures fatherless, and yet detracts but little,

if at all, from the reputation of the great master. In the very church

where he was christened, several of the best compositions of Fernandez

remain as vouchers for the integrity of his genius. The antiquary of

Vizeu, Ribeiro Pereira, whose MS. is dated 1630, and who might have

personally known him, and must have well known the principal works

executed by him for their native town, specifies the large picture

of Calvary, in the Jesus Chapel of the cathedral, as by Gran Vasco.

The pictures in the sacristy are by the same hand; and, though the

cathedral is of very ancient foundation, this sacristy, in its present

form, was not finished till 1574, as we learn from the inscription

"Georgius Ataide Episcopus vicensus faciendum curavit MDLXXIIII;"

and by the position of the pictures, in regard to the light from the

windows, it is evident that they were prepared for the places they

occupy. M. Raczynski has not only seen and scrutinised those paintings,

but he has examined the baptismal entry above spoken of, and he has

likewise inspected a copy of the MS. of the Vizeu antiquary. Of the

register of baptism he says,--"M. Berardo has shown me the voucher,

which is almost in tatters. Nothing can be more authentic, more

incontestable. You have no idea of the vividness of tradition, among

all the inhabitants at Vizeu, respecting Gran Vasco. One would say

that all the world here has been personally acquainted with him, that

every man in the place has had some heritable share in him. For me,

the question is decided." On the extract, first communicated to him

by the Visconde de Juromenha, from the MS. of the Vizeu antiquary,

Vasco's contemporary and fellow-townsman, he observes, after comparing

it with the original in the Oporto Library,--"The extract is perfectly

accurate. M. Gandra, Librarian of Oporto, has given me a sight of the

MS., which is as genuine as the register of Vizeu. In the MS., the

painter is once styled 'The Great Vasco Fernandez;' and the second

time, 'Vasco Fernandez.'" It is curious that the celebrity of a quiet

artist should have been of such speedy growth as to obtain for his name

the popular prefix of "Great" during his lifetime. The Count's judgment

on the Vizeu paintings is as follows:--"The picture of 'Calvary' is

of high merit, but in bad condition. I should have supposed it older;

but, in fine, documents are a stronger authority than my impressions.

Moreover, the draperies and the architecture in the paintings of

Gran Vasco are of a style that well accords with the epoch to which

we are now certain they belong. Not only is the large, picture of

'Calvary' of great merit, but as much must be said of those that form

the _predella_," (that is, those on each side of the steps to the

altar,) "representing the sufferings of our Lord. The pictures in the

sacristy are--The Baptism of Christ, The Descent of the Holy Ghost upon

the Apostles, St Peter, The Martyrdom of St Sebastian, and thirteen

smaller pieces, half-length portraits of various saints. Nothing can

be more magnificent than the St Peter. Attitude, drapery, composition,

drawing, touch, colouring, architecture, accessories, landscape, the

small figures in the distance--all are fine, all faultless. I cannot

express to you what joy I felt when, on entering the sacristy, I at

once beheld, fronting the door, this superb painting of St Peter. The

effect on me was decisive; all doubt was over. Every work by Gran Vasco

has a solemn and elevated character, which I do not recognise to the

same extent in any of the Gothic pictures that I have seen in Portugal.

The style of Gran Vasco is not ascribable, as I had imagined it to

be, to Italian influence, but, very peremptorily, to that of Albert

Durer; and it is plain that this influence had continued to inspire

Portuguese artists, though working side by side with the imitators of

Gaspar Diaz and Campello," (two of the several Portuguese painters who

were sent by King Emanuel to study at Rome,) "who had imported into

their country the Italian style and tendencies of the classic era. I

will even affirm, that the influence of Flanders and Germany produced

better results than that of the classic painting of Italy." This notion

of the superior efficacy of Flemish and German over Italian influence

on Portuguese art, in the first half of the sixteenth century, is a

favourite one with our author; and not unreasonably so, for the palmy

days of Emanuel and his successor were also the days of Charles V., the

kinsman of those princes. Many Flemish and German subjects of the great

emperor found ready access to the court of Portugal, and a favourable

reception there; and their manner must have been pretty generally

adopted, and very closely imitated too, for in multiplied instances

it perplexed connoisseurs to distinguish the native from the northern

workmanship of that period.

Between Vasco Fernandez of Vizeu and any legitimate successor to his

supremacy as a Portuguese artist, the interregnum is far longer than

the _duration_ of the Spanish tyranny. After the death of Sebastian,

no Portuguese painter of any recognised eminence appears for nearly a

century and a half. During all that time, producers of pictures were

numerous; there was plenty of artists, but little or no art. At last,

about 1715, John V., the mighty builder, willing to hope that his

projected temples and palaces were destined to be worthily adorned by

native talent, if stimulated by the best models, sent several youths

to the schools of art in Italy; herein repeating the experiment of the

old kings of the race of Avis, but without much success. The only very

distinguished painter of this reign and the next, "O Insigne Pintor,"

Vieira Lusitano, owed his opportunities Of professional instruction at

Rome to the patronage of a nobleman rather than to that of the King

himself, though he was afterwards much employed both by John V. and his

successor Joseph.

The story of Francisco Vieira, popularly called the Lusitanian, and

self-styled "The Admirable," is one of the most curious on record.

It is an autobiography in verse, a lyrical poem in quatrains without

rhyme. His self-esteem is immense, as may be inferred from his

title-page, _Viera the Lusitanian, the famous Painter and faithful

Husband_. In the preface he loads himself with honour; through the

fourteen cantos, six hundred pages, of his poem (which is but a portion

of what he intended to give to the world, though it was published

three years before his death, and he died at the age of eighty-four,)

he puffs his own praises with all the simple untiring energy of a boy

blowing bubbles; yet it is as clear that he was no fool as that he

was a prodigious coxcomb. Measureless vanity does sometimes co-exist

with vigorous ability. There is no doubt whatever of the genuineness

of the production, for it was published in his lifetime, and he signed

his name to the dedication. Being the hero of his own story, he speaks

of himself all through in the third person; and it was perhaps his

intention, when he composed the work, to publish it anonymously, and

let the public suppose that it was written by some friend. But he no

doubt thought himself the _præclarus vates_ as well as the _pictor

insignis_, and could not finally make up his mind to lose the honours,

poetical and chivalrous, of his work, though it is in truth as wretched

a poem as it is a rare and most captivating biography. Robert Southey,

a name not to be mentioned without respect, yet a critic by no means

to be implicitly followed on questions of Portuguese literature, says

that this is the best book of Portugal. If he simply meant that it is

the most attractive biographical production, he was probably right,

(if we set aside old Mendez Pinto, the marvellous and the delightful,)

for we doubt whether a more striking personal narrative of genuine

love-adventure is extant in any language. But if Southey intended to

say that it was the best Portuguese poem, the eulogy is utterly absurd.

There is but little unborrowed poetry in it, and his countrymen, who

should be the best judges--justly proud as they are of him as an

artist--do not admit him to any rank even among their numerous minor

poets. There is, it is true, in one of the volumes of Southey's Life,

recently published, a favourable specimen of this poem--a translation

by Southey of a few lines, which are pleasing enough; but the version

is an improvement on the original. Vieira gave indications of his

talent for drawing by chalking figures on the floor before he could

walk alone; and he proved his genius for intrigue by winning the heart

of a damsel, not less juvenile than himself, but of far higher rank,

and by completely hood-winking her parents and his own, before he was

eight years old. But the constancy of this infant passion on both sides

is the marvel of his life. At ten years of age he gained a patron in

the Marquis of Abrantes, who, being appointed ambassador from John V.

to Pope Clement XI., took him to Rome, where he resided seven years,

always devoted to his art and to the Fidalgo's daughter. He was at

first a pupil of Lutti, and afterwards of Trevisani. He mentions the

latter with respect and affection. He obtained considerable distinction

as a student of painting, and was befriended by Cardinal Barberini. On

his return to Lisbon, whither his reputation had preceded him, he was

welcomed by none of his friends more cordially than by the parents of

Dona Agnes Helen De Lima e Mello, who was now a blooming and beautiful

young woman, for whom several offers of suitable marriage had been

already made, all of which she had evaded by the plea that it was her

intention to take the veil. On his first visit he was followed by a

porter with a box full of relics that he had brought from Rome--beads

blest by the Pope, bones of saints, a chip of the true cross, and many

other inestimable things of the kind, _all warranted--tudo com seus

diplomas authenticos!_ These he presented to the father and mother, who

were more than delighted with such gifts, and could not but attribute

a hopeful measure of sanctity to the young virtuoso who had collected

them. He was thenceforward a frequent guest at the Quinta da Luz, the

residence of the De Limas, and continued to be encouraged by the elders

of the family, till they found out--not by their own wit--that the

humble youth whom they had so graciously countenanced fully intended to

do them the favour of becoming their son-in-law. The presumption was

inconceivable, the humiliation of having been outwitted by two children

was intolerable. Vieira had secretly consulted the Judge of Marriages

(O Juiz dos Casamentos,) an official as formidable to hard-hearted

parents in Portugal as a Gretna Green parson to guardians of heiresses

in England. By his advice, the young gentleman had secured his

lady-love's signature to a formal declaration of her engagement to him;

and, on the strength of this document, the same obliging functionary

had easily obtained the Patriarch of Lisbon's certificate of approval,

which was necessary to perfect the legality of the contract. A page,

in attendance on the Patriarch when the matter was discussed, happened

to be acquainted with the family of De Lima, and hastened to reveal to

the astonished parents the transaction that he had witnessed. In strict

law, they had now no remedy--the parties were betrothed. But the lady's

father possessed a power greater than the law in the friendship of the

Minister, the formidable Pombal; and before any further communication

could pass between her and her lover, she was shut up in a nunnery,

the convent of St Anne. As she had avoided marriage by asserting her

intention to become a nun, it was now resolved that she should keep her

word. She resisted to the uttermost; and even after she was immured

in the convent, it was only by main force that the novice's dress was

put on her, though her aunt and two other grim duennas assisted in the

operation. Vieira appealed to the King; but it was too delicate an

affair to be interfered with, even by an absolute monarch. He retired

from the royal presence in anything but a loyal mood, and tasked

his wits from day to day, but all in vain, to devise some means of

communication with the prisoner. That convent, he says, baffled all his

approaches, as if it were an enchanted castle. He determined, however,

that if she could not see him she should hear him; so he seized his

guitar, repaired to the convent walls at midnight, and serenaded her

with passionate songs--walking round and round the gloomy den like

Blondel round the Fortress Tenebreuse, the cage of Lion Richard; or,

as the painter himself expressed it in one of his pictures, like

Orpheus at the gates of hell demanding his Eurydice. He was for the

third or fourth time turning a corner of the convent chapel when he was

pounced upon by the police, and forthwith lodged in prison, and would

inevitably have been transported, in a ship ready to depart for one

of the Indian settlements, had not one of his patrons, the Conde del

Assumar, afterwards Marquis de Alorna, interfered, and procured his

release. The noviciate of Agnes expired, and she was compelled to take

the veil. Her relations now thought that they had her safely settled

for life, and the lady abbess thought so too. Agnes, making a virtue of

necessity, pretended to be reconciled to her fate; and thenceforward

the restraints on the seemingly submissive nun were far less stringent

than those that had been imposed on the rebellious novice. A

correspondence between the married nun and her husband was now effected

through a third party, who had access to the convent. It was written in

a cipher invented by Vieira, as a sure precaution against mischance or

impertinent curiosity.

"Heaven first taught letters for some wretch's aid,

Some banished lover, or some captive maid."

But this sort of communication only inflamed their impatience for freer

intercourse. By the death of one of the sisterhood, a cell became

vacant which might be very convenient for a vestal whose heart was

unconsecrated. It was in a retired part of the building, and the window

was in an outer wall, separated from some of the city gardens by an

unfrequented thoroughfare. It was the custom to set a price upon the

new tenancy of any void cell, so that the nun who wished to possess

it must pay for the privilege. The price set upon this apartment was

three hundred milreas, about £70. Vieira procured the money, and passed

it to Agnes, who was thus enabled to become mistress of the room; and

the superior seems to have had no suspicion that the gold was not

supplied by some one of the young lady's wealthy relatives. The window

was high, but the spaces between the iron grates were not so narrow as

to forbid the passage of a faithful Mercury, in the shape of a basket

secured by a string. When it could be prudently let down, a palm branch

put out between the bars was a signal. Vieira, taught by his former

misadventure, no more approached the walls as an unarmed minstrel,

but silently, and furnished with munitions of war--_mas munido com

seus marciaes petrechos_--a good sword at his side, a pair of loaded

pistols in his belt, and a cloak of black taffeta over all. After a

hundred plans for her rescue had been mutually discussed and abandoned,

she thus addressed him,--"My beloved, I am withering here. You must

deliver me from this horrid prison, from these dismal rules which I

am forced to obey--though I protest that I am no nun, never was, and

never will be. _Freira nao sou, nem fui, nem ser quero._ I am assured

that nothing short of a decree by the Pope will avail us. I know that

certain immunities may be bought and obtained by deputy from the Holy

See; but I would trust no agent in such an affair as ours. I confide in

the proverb--'He who wants a thing goes for it; he who would miss it

sends for it.'--(_Quem quer vai, quem nao quer manda._)" He received

the young lady's orders without winking, _sem pestenejar_; and, leaving

two large pictures, commissions from the king, unfinished, he set off

on the forlorn hope to the Vatican, with a good chance of ending his

career in the Castle of St Angelo. He got to Rome, he says, as if by

magic. Cardinal Barberini was dead: this news was a shock to him, for

on his protection he had mainly relied. The resolute lover, however,

by dint of importunity, obtained from the Pope an order addressed

to the Patriarch of Lisbon, requiring him to cause the lady to be

interrogated, and to report the result. Months passed away, but no

answer came.

He obtained another order, an exact duplicate, also signed by the Pope,

and forwarded it with an explanatory letter to the Conde de Assumar.

The Count willingly carried the paper to the Patriarch, who was much

offended, and refused to receive it, saying, that such matters were not

to be disposed of in a hurry. He had received the Supreme Pontiff's

first letter, and had, in consequence, personally visited the convent,

and questioned Donna Agnes. Further investigations were on foot, and

the case could not yet be decided.

A friendly Portuguese Jesuit gave Vieira warning that he was in

danger, and that, if he persisted in his appeals to the Pope, he

would be quickly and summarily silenced. Baffled at all points, and

ashamed to go home, he continued in Italy for six years, during all

which time he maintained a correspondence with Agnes, by the aid of

a friend at Lisbon, a well-known brother artist, André Gonsalves. He

also laboured assiduously in his profession, and became famous as a

painter in the land of painters. His works were purchased as fast as

he could produce them, and many of them were engraved. Finally, he,

was elected member of the Academy of St Luke, and was honoured with

a diploma or certificate of especial merit. He now thought he might

return to Lisbon, and look after his impounded treasure--his _tesouro

imprisonado_. On the arrival of the ship in the Tagus, he remained on

board till he could be smuggled ashore at night. His enemies imagined

him to be still at Rome when he was once more plotting under the

convent walls, and thus announcing himself to the faithful object of

so much constant love--"Here I am again! All the doors of justice are

closed against us, and we have nothing but our own wits to help us;

yet I am more resolved on your deliverance than ever." He proposed

to supply her with files and aqua fortis to cut through the bars of

her cell, and a rope-ladder to let her down. But she rejected that

expedient. "Through the gate by which I entered, and through that

only, will I go out," she said. _Pois só pela portaria, por onde

entrei, sahir quero._ Repairs were going on in the house; many masons

were employed there daily. "Get me," said she, "a hodman's dress

and a half-mask, and I will walk out of the convent. Do not look so

mistrustful; I am not without courage; I know myself well. I rely, too,

on higher strength than my own for aid. God does not require violent

sacrifices: I am here against my will; my stay in these cloisters is

not self-devotion, but sacrilege." Seeing that she had made up her mind

to the adventure at all hazards, Vieira lost no time in furnishing her

with the required disguise. He prides himself particularly on his skill

in the fabrication of the half-mask, which he describes as a miracle of

art. It fitted her exactly, and the false nose was provided with hooks

to be inserted in the nostrils of the true nose, to prevent it from

betraying itself by any eccentric movement,

"Porém no nariz fingido

Lhe armou de arame hum remedio

Para poder segurar-se

Nas ventas do verdadeiro."

The hour was come for the perilous attempt. It was a summer evening,

light as noon, when the chapel bell rang for the Ave Maria. Donna Agnes

left her cell and gained a covered courtyard, where she passed some

of the sisters, who bade the supposed workman good evening. She was a

little too soon, for the labourers were not yet assembled to retire.

But, being so far committed, she could not retreat; she must proceed

alone to the porter's gate. It chanced that several ladies of the city

were standing by the lodge, in conversation with the superior. It was

therefore requisite, according to custom, that the person going out

should ask leave to pass with all respect, _licença para passar, com

respeito_. She did so, and the lady abbess herself answered, "Pass,"

making way for her. Donna Agnes, in her agitation, stumbled against

an angle of the wall, and heard one of the party she had just left

behind her, perhaps the abbess, exclaim--"Ah, can't you see, you

clumsy fellow?" She moved on into the street, where Vieira, also in

disguise, was anxiously waiting. He would not have known her had he not

recognised his own handiwork, the mask. He seemed not to notice, her

till she had turned down a lane at some distance: he then followed her,

and in a few minutes they were out of immediate danger. The commotion

in the nunnery, when her flight was known, may be imagined. The king,

when informed of an escape which was speedily the talk of the town,

applauded the act for its spirit and cleverness, though he had declined

to enforce the law on behalf of the aggrieved pair. They proceeded

with all despatch to verify the contract made between them before her

incarceration. After this formal attestation of the illegality of

her enforced vows, they were formally married, and their triumph was

complete. Here, according to rule, where connubial bliss begins, the

story should end, for it is very like a novel; but it is nevertheless

a true tale, _huma historia verdadeira_, and something darker remains

behind. They took a house in the Hortas da Cera, and were happy for

some months. But the rage of her family was unappeasable. While the

painter was pursuing his professional avocations with honour and

profit, they were secretly busy with machinations against his life. On

the morning of Whitsunday he had set out from home, to hear mass in

the nearest church. His wife, attended by a servant, followed him some

minutes later. At the top of an obscure alley, communicating with the

street just where it made a bend, stood a man whose face was muffled

up in his cloak. Vieira had passed but a little way beyond him, when

he was fired at and severely wounded by this person. The pistol had

been loaded with slugs, one of which pierced the artist's right cheek,

and another was lodged in his shoulder. Turning round, he caught a

glimpse of the face of the assassin, in whom he recognised his own

brother-in-law, the brother of Donna Agnes. Vieira, supposing himself

mortally hurt, called out for a confessor, staggered back to meet his

wife, and fell bleeding at her feet. Both were carried half dead into

their house. His wounds, though so serious that the last sacraments

were administered to him, were skilfully and prosperously treated by

Felucci, an Italian leech, and by the king's German surgeon, who was

ordered to attend to him. His wife was nearer death from terror and

anxiety, than he from his wounds; but no sooner was he declared out of

danger than she recovered, and was his best nurse. As soon as he could

be safely moved, he proceeded in a chair to the palace, and craved

audience of the king, before whom, after he had knelt and kissed hands,

he was permitted to produce the clothes in which he had been shot.

They were stained with blood that told its own story. The king and

the gentlemen present seemed much affected; and an order was given,

somewhat late it would seem, for the apprehension and punishment of the

assassin. Family interest, nevertheless, smothered up the inquiry, and

the criminal was not even imprisoned; but the mark of Cain was on him,

and the general odium that he had incurred soon compelled him to leave

the kingdom. It is a sort of satisfaction to know that he fell into

poverty, and was even at last reduced to the ignominious condition of

a pensioner on the bounty of the man whose life he had attempted. The

fact is not recorded in the poem, as it ought in poetical justice to

have been; but Cyrillo asserts that he had it from Vieira's own mouth,

in these words,--"He came at last to beg his bread from me, whom he had

outraged so cruelly."

Vieira, soon after his complaint to the king, being apprehensive of

further molestation from the family of his wife, placed her with some

of his own relations, and took sanctuary, for a while, in the convent

of the Paulistas; and there, in 1730 and 1731, he painted his famous

Hermits, as appropriate ornaments for the church of their patron, St

Paul the Eremite. In 1733, willing to live tranquil, says Cyrillo, he

resolved on a third visit to Rome, with the view of ending his days

there. Guarienti, the curator of the Dresden Gallery, who came to

Lisbon in 1733, and remained there till 1736, was personally acquainted

with Vieira, and asserts that his motive for expatriating himself was

disgust at an insult that had been put on him through the malice of his

rivals, by the removal of one of his works from the recently completed

pile of Mafra, and the substitution of a picture by an inferior artist.

He got no farther, however, than Madrid or Seville, (Cyrillo names the

latter city,) when he was recalled by his sovereign, who well knew

his value, and appeased him with honours and a fixed salary as Royal

Painter, exclusive of payment for works supplied by command.

Vieira Lusitano lived admired and honoured, to a venerable age,

eighty-four; and his constant heroine, the Lady Agnes, also reached a

good old age, and shared prosperity which could hardly have been real,

or of any value, without her. She died at Mafra in 1775, and from the

day of her death he never again touched a pencil. To the last, says

Cyrillo, he idolised her memory; and, no doubt, the strength of his

affection for her was the governing motive of his publication of their

strange history, five years after her decease, and but three before

his own. Both his own portrait and hers were often introduced into

his paintings. Many of his works perished in the earthquake, with

the temples and mansions they adorned. He particularises, as thus

destroyed, "his grand picture of the Martyrs--the inestimable portrait

of the first Patriarch of Lisbon, Don Thomas Almeida," (who figures as

an important influence, for and against him, in the narration of his

love adventure;) "the portraits of the Royal Children, and that sublime

idea," (the words are his own,) "the Meeting of the Blessed Mother with

her Son, after her assumption--the Death of Moses--Pluto and the Court

of Hell listening to the suit of Orpheus." He says he designed the

last-named performance as an allegorical plea for the restoration of

his wife, to whom the convent was a hell. In another composition, which

he calls "a stupendous work," and which was also demolished--Perseus

exhibiting the Gorgon's head to Phineus--he represented his own effigy

as that of the Greek hero, and the image of his cloistered wife, as a

winged Victory, hovering over him, and about to drop a laurel wreath on

his helm, &c.

But in spite of the earthquake in his own day, and the later _razzias_

of the French in their Pyrennean Algiers,--in spite, too, of civil

convulsions, spoliation of convents and convent churches, and all

the various causes of dispersion or wanton destruction of works of

art in this fair but unhappy land--there is a sufficient number left

of those by Vieira Lusitano to show, on better authority than his

poetical self-celebration, that he was in truth a fine artist, though

not quite a Gran Vasco. The dignity of his St Augustine, and the

elegance of his Madonna of the Rosary, both in the Academy of Art at

Lisbon, might be evidence enough to prove that the Italians made no

great mistake when they conferred a first-class medal on him in his

boyhood, nor when they elected him member of the Academy of St Luke

after his return, an unprotected emigrant, to Rome. St Augustine is

trampling on heresy, while an angel in the foreground burns a pile of

heretical writings. This is generally admired as the most powerful of

those works by F. Vieira that are in possession of his countrymen.

Count Raczynski prefers the other--a Virgin and Child,--in which the

infant Jesus stands on a pedestal, surrounded with figures excellently

grouped. It must be a fastidious taste that can look coldly upon

either. A St Antony in the Church of St Francisco de Paula bears

Vieira's signature, and the date 1763. It shows that his hand had

lost nothing of its cunning at the age of sixty-four. The Church of

St Roque and that of the Paulistas, and some other Lisbon churches,

contain important specimens of his skill. They are all more or less

remarkable, not only for correctness of drawing, and for breadth of

well-harmonised colouring, but for a peculiar grace of touch--a feeling

of the versifier and the lover--that seems never to have forsaken him

to the last. Even in the countenances of his hermits, the sanctity

of expression is heightened, not enfeebled, by a sentiment of human

tenderness and regret, as if the day-dreams of their youth in the world

were not utterly forgotten. M. Raczynski, though usually chary of

commendation in these latitudes--for his predilections are manifestly,

and perhaps naturally enough, far north,--has always a good word for

this artist, and now and then even grants him a down-feather from the

nest of the Black Eagle itself. "As to Vieira Lusitano," says the

Count, "he is truly a distinguished artist; and at the time in which he

lived we were very poor in Prussia: we were very far from possessing

a painter of his value. Wherever I meet with his works, I feel myself

attracted by the nature that he infuses into art."

The alphabetical table (which, by-the-by, sadly wants the revision of

an index-maker,) gives references to Vieira Lusitano, and Francisco

Vieira, as if the two designations did not belong to one and the same

person.

There _is_ a second Francisco Vieira, also a historical painter;

but, to distinguish him from his predecessor, he is called Vieira

Portuense--Vieira of Oporto, the place where he was born, 1765. In

1789 he went to Rome. After about two years' study there, he repaired

to Parma, where he was elected one of the directors of the Academy,

and gave lessons in drawing to a daughter of the Duke. In 1794 he

returned to Rome, where he staid three years more, and then proceeded

to Dresden. Few of his works are found in his native city. Mr Allen

possesses two or three. There is one at the house of the British

Association--Eleanor of Castille extracting the poison from the arm of

our Edward the First. The outline of the two figures is not ungraceful,

but the effect is tame. The queen looks more asleep than the king;

her lips do not touch the wound, yet are so close to it as to seem to

express that action. In this, as in most of this artist's productions,

the colouring is fluent but weak. Yet some of his church-pictures at

Lisbon, and one also of the few at Oporto--St Margaret on her deathbed

confessing to a Monk--are stamped with a holy fervour of intention, a

deep and unaffected sentiment of piety, that is strength in itself,

and not always to be found in religious paintings of higher name.

Of his lighter performances, a Cupid and Venus in a landscape, very

elegant, and not unworthy of Albani, was engraved at Lisbon by his

friend Bartolozzi. His life, it is said, was embittered by the malice

of Sequeira his rival. They went to Rome about the same time. Taborda,

Fusquini, and Cyrillo, their contemporaries, also studied at Rome. We

agree with M. Raczynski in his estimate of Sequeira, whose St Bruno

and other ambitious displays are so highly extolled by his countrymen.

He is a clever and disagreeable performer on canvass, except in some

few of his minor pictures, such as the Translation of St Francis. In

his large and finished works he strains at intenseness of effect, and

vulgarises his art. But his numerous sketches have quite a contrary

character. They appear to have cost him no trouble; and the best of

them, if always true to proportion, would be almost as valuable as

those of the elder Vieira, the Lusitanian, of which many, in red

crayon, are preserved in the library at Evora. As to Taborda, Fusquini,

and Cyrillo, and some other recent artists, we would say, to the

inquirer, "Go to the palace of Ajuda, and by their works you shall know

them! They are as precious there as flies in amber."

M. Raczynski's desultory notices touch on architecture, sculpture,

terra-cotta figures, glazed tiles, and many other things besides

painting--that portion of his inquiries to which we have of necessity

confined our remarks. Of the actual condition of this art in the city

of Ulysses, the Academy, instituted in 1780, presents, we fear, no very

hopeful indications, though it has many young students as well as many

old members. "Numerous are the persons," Count Raczynski observes,

"who are enthusiastic in their praise of the Arts in Portugal. But

with the honourable exceptions of the Duke of Palmella and the Count

de Farrobo, not one will expend a sous, not one will take any trouble

for their advancement. It is true, however, that in the actual position

of affairs, it would be no easy matter to know how to set about such

a service to the nation. _The country is in a state of revolution._

These few words explain all; and we have only to accuse modern

constitution-mongers, and the confusion of ideas and the disorderly

spirit that are the consequence of their machinations, here and in

Spain, for more than twenty years."

The worthy diplomatist from Prussia, when he wrote the last quoted

sentence, seems to have had no notion of the force of pestilent

doctrines that were at work on the other side of the Pyrenees, nor how

soon the revolutionary mania was to shake the Transmontane thrones, and

all but annihilate even his own master's.

SOUTHEY.[26]

So good, so estimable, so eminent a man as Southey--one whose moral

character was perhaps as near to perfection as it is given to humanity

to attain, and whose literary works, if not of the very highest order

of genius, fall short only when compared with those few which are of

the very highest--such a man as Southey, it was not likely we should

allow to pass from amongst the living without some tribute bestowed

upon his memory, or some attempt made, to appreciate the value of his

long and illustrious labours. We have been somewhat tardy, it maybe

thought, in fulfilling this duty. But we do not regret the delay. Our

topic is not one of an ephemeral nature, and the delay may perhaps have

instructed us in those points of view in which it is most needful that

our subject should be placed.

[26] _The Life and Correspondence of the late Robert Southey._ Edited

by his Son, the Reverend CHARLES CUTHBERT SOUTHEY.

There is nothing, for instance, so well known of Southey--if we may be

allowed to anticipate a little, and to plunge, like the epic poets, _in

medias res_--nothing so notorious as the change which his political

and social opinions underwent; the sentiments of his youth upon

government, and the organisation of society, being almost diametrically

opposed to those of his maturer years. The contrast is great between

the young republican, the ardent communist, the bold experimenter

in _Pantisocracy_, the author of the _Book of the Church_, and the

celebrated champion of Conservative principles in the _Quarterly

Review_. But often as the contrast has been held up to notice, the time

has only just arrived when it can be surveyed in the right spirit.

_The whole life_ of the man is now before us; and, contradictory as

the parts may have appeared as the long picture was slowly unrolled to

the eyes of contemporaries, it now becomes possible for us to see the

real coherence that existed between the several parts, and to trace

throughout their very inconsistencies a unity, and an honourable unity,

of character. The enthusiasm of the youth enables us to understand

whatever was peculiar in the maturer man. The earlier mind of Southey

throws light, we think, upon the later. It was the same mind, it was

the same man, young and old.

We learn from the biography before us, that the imagination of Southey

had been early and too exclusively developed; and whether from this

circumstance, or from natural temperament, a close, systematic,

scientific mode of reasoning was the mental quality or mental exercise

in which, throughout life, he least distinguished himself. His

affections were ardent and generous, his moral sentiments invariably

pure and noble, his piety unalterable; his judgment, wherever abstract

and general principles were to be dealt with, was, to the last, often

hasty, incomplete, vague, uncertain. But if his reasoning was never

that "dry light" of which Bacon speaks, it never, in his case, was

mingled with other passions or feelings than those which did honour

to his nature. Above all, there was throughout his career the utmost

sincerity in the expression of his opinion; no taint of hypocrisy, no

reserve, no timidity--a want sometimes of caution, never that prudence

which is the disguise of cowardice,--you had at all times the genuine

unaffected utterance of the man. He was not even the least apprehensive

of ridicule. He would have borne martyrdom before a host of jesters,

which some have thought to be not the lightest species of martyrdom. If

astrology had found favour in his sight, he would have expressed his

belief in it before the whole conclave of the Royal Society. Whatever

seemed truth to him, had its clear, manly, unhesitating avowal. Of an

ardent disposition, impatient of slow thinking or of long and intricate

reasoning, eager, confident, somewhat too self-relying, his was not

the mind peculiarly fitted for expounding abstract principles;--we

note no extraordinary deficiency in this respect, but we can easily

conceive of minds better trained and disciplined for the discovery of

great elementary truths;--but few men in our age and generation have

manifested a warmer or more generous attachment to whatever assumed

to them the shape of truth. For this he was ready to do battle to the

utmost. No crusader could be more valiant, or go forth with fuller

faith, or be more resolved at all hazards to drive out the infidel,

and take possession of the Holy City. His geography was once at fault,

or the territory and scene curiously shifted, and his Jerusalem was at

one time due west, and at another due east; but it was the same devoted

uncompromising knight that was seen marching towards it.

Those only who have never thought at all, or who have quite forgotten

their past efforts at thinking, will throw blame upon another because

the opinions of his his youth were different from those of his manhood.

Such difference is almost the necessary attendant upon progress and

mental development. The ardour and the candour of Southey's nature

made the difference in his case singularly conspicuous. He lived,

too, at that epoch when the French Revolution made and unmade so many

enthusiasts. This may be thought a sufficient vindication of his

memory. But there remains to add one very honourable distinction. Many

of those whom the French Revolution had made enthusiasts in the cause

of human progress, became cold and dead and utterly indifferent to

that cause--selfishly callous, or quite sceptical as to the _possible_

improvements which might be effected in society. Now, Southey changed

his opinion on many subjects, but he never deserted the cause of

human improvement. He would have promoted very different measures at

different periods, but he had the same cause always at heart. He never

sank into a cold and selfish indifference; nor was it a mere passive

conservatism that he ever advocated. His son has here very justly

pointed out that, as a writer in the _Quarterly Review_, in which

character he was thought to have consummated his apostasy, it was

_the renegade Southey_ who drew attention to the state of the poor,

who called on the Government for a scheme of national education, who

pointed out the folly of neglecting our great colonial possessions,

and the necessity of adopting some large and judicious plan of

emigration. Of the topics which occupy reflective and philanthropic

men at this moment, pauperism, national education, and emigration are

three of the most conspicuous; and in each of these Southey may claim

to have led the way, in drawing towards them that public attention

which they so eminently deserve. He is always alive to whatever seems

to him a feasible scheme for the improvement of society. If he goes

abroad, and visits the _Beguinages_ in Belgium, he thinks whether a

like institution might not be introduced into Protestant England, for

the benefit of a class of women, whether single or widowed, who with

difficulty find any active employment--who are not paupers, but whose

poverty condemns them to a cheerless, solitary existence. If Robert

Owen of Lanark comes across his path, no fear of having his own early

dream of Pantisocracy revived before him, of being reproached for an

old abandoned faith, (the constant terror of men who feel themselves

apostates,) prevents him from expressing the natural interest which

such a man, and the projects he _then_ had in view, naturally excited

within him. His _Colloquies_ may not earn him a reputation amongst

political economists; but no one will deny the philanthropic spirit

which they breathe. In his _Life of Wesley_, and all his religious or

theological publications, however devoted he may show himself to the

Church of England, he never fails to inquire how this great institution

may be made still more serviceable to the nation at large, and this,

too, by embracing within its pale those very sectaries towards whom he

was accused of having so bigoted and unfriendly a feeling.

Those of his opponents who, in the later part of his career, were

accustomed to represent Southey as the unscrupulous, drilled, formal

advocate of a party in Church and State, ready for his pension and his

pay, for court honours and the praise of bishops, to espouse its cause

to the utmost, never made a greater mistake in their lives. Innumerable

proofs are here before us in his letters, if we did not find them

in his works, that he retained to the last a certain bold, erratic,

independent manner of thinking, quite his own.

Always was he Robert Southey, and no representative of a party. At

one time of his life he contemplated the profession of the law, and

studied for the bar. What sort of lawyer he might have made, if he had

been able to give up his mind to the study, or what the practice of

Westminster Hall might have made of him, there is no saying; but there

was never any literary men, earning subsistence by his pen, who had

less of the spirit of the retained advocate. A self-willed, untamed,

quite individual manner of looking at things, is always breaking out.

If he had taken that seat in Parliament which, without any consultation

of his wishes, was so strangely bestowed upon him, he would, we are

persuaded, have greatly disappointed any party that might have relied

upon his steady and unswerving co-operation. He would often have

deserted them for the cross benches, and as often perplexed them by his

uncompromising zeal. No whipper-in would have been quite sure of him,

or kept him steady in the ranks. In that position where he was most

subject to restraint--as a writer in the _Quarterly_--it is amusing to

see how restive he is, how he rears and plunges at first starting, how

he chafes at that harness which each one in such a team must be content

to wear, though every steed were a veritable Pegasus, and Apollo

himself in the editorial car. He thinks "a sprinkling of my free and

fearless way of thinking would win friends" for the _Review_. "It is my

nature and my principle," he says, "to speak and write as earnestly,

as plainly, and as straight to the mark as I think and feel. If the

editor understands his own interest, he will not restrict me." We must

confess, judging by the ebullitions he sometimes gives vent to in these

letters, that the most indulgent editor must have been occasionally

called upon to "restrict" a certain impetuosity of manner, which, it

may be observed, would have embarrassed Mr Gifford almost as much as it

would have done Mr Jeffrey.

But from this somewhat rash incursion into the very centre of our

subject, it would be wise--since we are not, in fact, epic poets--to

effect a timely retreat; let us recommence, after the more legitimate

manner of prosaic reviewers, with some account of the work immediately

before us.

_The Life and Correspondence of Dr Southey_, which is here presented

to the public, answers fairly to the description which the author, or

editor, himself gives of it in his preface. A number of letters are

arranged according to their dates, and are connected together with just

such intimations of a biographical nature as enable them to tell their

own story. The life of Southey, meaning thereby a skilful narrative and

analysis of incident and character, remains, of course, to be written;

and a very interesting work it will prove, if it falls into fortunate

hands. Meanwhile, this collection of letters, many of them delightful

compositions, and perfect models of epistolary style, gives us such an

insight into, and appreciation of the man Southey, as was previously

impossible to any one who did not know him personally and intimately.

The editor has performed his part in a very creditable and judicious

manner. It would have been very difficult for the son to conduct a

rigid and impartial scrutiny into the literary merits of the father,

and he has not attempted it; but it would have been the easiest thing

in the world for that son, or for any other editor, to have spoilt

such a work as this by intrusive panegyric, by constant controversy

with old and hostile criticisms, by perpetual contest for place and

pre-eminence for his biographical idol. The mere vanity of authorship,

or an officious spirit, might have given a repulsive air to what is now

a most agreeable book. There are cases, and this is one of them, where,

considering the temptations that beset an editor, the absence of cause

for censure becomes no slight ground of commendation.

The letters of Southey are preceded by the fragment of an

autobiography. Would it were more than a fragment! The author, we are

told, had looked forward to this task as one of a very agreeable

nature; and, so far as he proceeded with it, appears to have found

it such; for he revels in the reminiscences of childhood and his

school-days, and describes the old house in Bristol in which he lived

when a boy, with a loving minuteness that is in danger of outrunning

the interest which any one but himself could feel in such a locality.

But even before his school-days are quite over, he drops the pen. To

one who had so much necessary employment for that pen, a supererogatory

labour of this description ought to be very attractive, and apparently

he found in his task, as he advanced, increasing difficulties and

decreasing pleasure.

The reminiscences of childhood, of boyhood, and even of the first

entrance into youth, have to almost all men an indescribable charm. Up

to this time, we look back upon ourselves with a curious feeling, as

if it were not altogether ourselves we were contemplating, but rather

some _other being_ who preceded us, and whose thoughts and feelings

are the sole remembrance of them we have inherited. We look back upon

the frailties of that other self with an unlimited indulgence; we

smile at his errors, at his passions, at his griefs; we even sport

with his absurdities, and can afford to throw a playful ridicule over

all the follies he committed. This child that we are playing with is

ourself, but still it is only a child; and we have the fuller right

to play with it because it is ourself. No sense of responsibility

intervenes to disturb this singular amusement, where the adult is seen

toying with and holding in his arms the image of his own infancy. But

when this early pre-existent state has passed in review, and the real

man is summoned forth upon the scene, we begin to feel that this is

indeed ourselves; and we become too implicated and too much involved

in the part he performs, to enjoy any longer the position of an

imaginary spectator. We are sensitive to the errors, and responsible

for the faults, of this other self; we cannot treat him with cavalier

indifference; we must be his advocate or his censor. The retrospect

assumes a quite different character. Formerly we called up a departed

self from some half-fabulous region of the past, and questioned it

as to its ways of thinking and acting; we now stand ourselves in

the witness-box, and give our testimony; and the best of us must

occasionally assume the sullen aspect of an unwilling witness. Formerly

we sported with the past absurdity, ridiculed and laughed at it; but

now the remembered folly, the sentimental effusion of the youth, the

absurd oratorical display, the ridiculous exhibition, of whatever kind

it may have been, affords us no amusement. It matters not what the

distance of time, the cheek tingles with the reminiscence. What is

still more to the purpose, the griefs and afflictions which we have now

to summon up are the same in character as those we continue to feel,

and their recollection is but a renewal of suffering. The affliction of

the child rarely revives an affliction in the man--very often calls up

a smile at the idea that so much distress had been felt at so trivial a

cause. This is one reason why childhood appears, in our review of human

life, so much happier than any other portion of it. We find a mirth in

its remembered tears which assuredly we never discovered when they were

flowing. But the remembrance of the sorrows of a later period is but

sorrow itself, and we only taste again the bitterness of grief.

To Southey, whose disposition rendered him peculiarly susceptible to

those domestic losses which death occasions, this last appears to have

been one chief reason for the distaste he felt for his task as he

proceeded in it. Certainly it soon lost its zest. During the early and

playful portions of the biography, he holds on his way with alacrity

and delight; he ransacks his memory, and brings out with great glee

whatever odd and strange things he finds there; but the Westminster

boy has not run his career before the theme has changed its aspect. At

all events, it has no longer sufficient interest _to make_ a time and

leisure for itself amongst the crowded occupations of the author.

In the record of his childhood which Southey has given us, we have

no reason, as we have intimated, to complain of the want of detail.

Indeed, some circumstances are related which at first we thought

might as well have been passed over in silence. It appeared to us

that everything which a person can possibly recollect of his own

childhood, cannot be interesting to others, although every such effort

of recollection may be extremely amusing to the reminiscent himself;

and we were prepared to read a lecture to all future autobiographers,

and to remind them that they must distinguish between the pleasure

of memory, of rescuing the half-forgotten incident from threatened

oblivion--a pleasure which must be exclusively their own--and the

value which the rescued fact itself may possess in the estimation of

the world at large. But while we were preparing this lecture, a little

incident occurred which gave us a lesson ourselves, and induced us to

withhold this part of our criticism. Such details as we have alluded

to, not only give pleasure to the reminiscent, but occasion exactly

the same pleasure to those in whom they call up similar recollections;

and we had overlooked the extreme difficulty the critic, or any one

reader, must have in determining which of such details is absolutely

without this species of interest for other readers. What seems to

him as really "too absurd" to be worth mentioning, may awaken vivid

emotions in another in whom it calls up a similar remembrance from

the all-but-forgotten past: _he_ shares in the very pleasure of the

original reminiscent. Whilst we were perusing this autobiography, and

our pencil was straying down the margin of a passage we intended to

quote as an example of a quite superfluous effort of recollection, a

friend called in upon us. We read to him this identical passage. To our

astonishment, it had thrown him into a perfect ecstasy of delight. It

had recalled an image of his schoolboy days which had never once been

revived since he left school, and which he was certain would never

again have occurred to him but for the paragraph we had read. Here is

the passage:--

"One very odd amusement, which I never saw or heard of

elsewhere, was greatly in vogue at this school. It was

performed with snail shells, by placing them against each

other, point to point, and pressing till the one was broken in,

or sometimes both. This was called conquering; and the shell

that remained unhurt, acquired esteem and value in proportion

to the number over which it had triumphed, an accurate account

being kept. A great conqueror was prodigiously prized and

coveted--so much so indeed, that two of this description

would seldom have been brought to contest the palm, if both

possessors had not been goaded to it by reproaches and taunts.

The victor had the number of its opponent's triumphs added to

its own; thus, when one conqueror of fifty conquered another

which had been as often victorious, it became conqueror of an

hundred and one. Yet, even in this, reputation was sometimes

obtained upon false pretences. I found a boy one day who had

fallen in with a great number of young snails, so recently

hatched that the shells were still transparent, and he was

besmearing his fingers by crushing these poor creatures one

after another against his conqueror, counting away with the

greatest satisfaction at his work. He was a good-natured boy,

so that I, who had been bred up to have a sense of humanity,

ventured to express some compassion for the snails, and to

suggest that he might as well count them and lay them aside

unhurt. He hesitated, and seemed inclined to assent, till it

struck him as a point of honour, or of conscience, and then

he resolutely said, No! that would not do, for he could not

then fairly say he had conquered them. There is a surprising

difference of strength in these shells, and that not depending

on the size or species; I mean whether yellow, brown, or

striped. It might partly be estimated by the appearance of the

point or top, (I do not know what better term to use;) the

strong ones were usually clear and glossy there, and white if

the shell were of the large, coarse, mottled brown kind. The

top was then said to be petrified; and a good conqueror of

this description would triumph for weeks or months. I remember

that one of the greatest heroes bore evident marks of having

once been conquered. It had been thrown away on some lucky

situation, where the poor tenant had leisure to repair his

habitation, or rather where the restorative power of nature

repaired it for him, and the wall was thus made stronger than

it had been before the breach, by an arch of new masonry below.

But in general I should think the resisting power of the shell

depended upon the geometrical nicety of form."--(Vol. i. p. 55.)

This odd amusement, it seems, was not monopolised by young Southey's

school. "Oh, I remember it well!" cried my enraptured auditor. "Yes,

conqueror was the word. But Southey is wrong! It was the _empty_ shell

only that we used. How distinctly I remember it!--and it must be thirty

years ago--and never once till this moment have I thought of it since.

How strange a thing is memory! You hold the shell, you see, between

your forefinger and thumb, the forefinger being bent to receive it.

Your adversary did the like with his shell. Then you applied the boss

of your little shield to the boss of his--quite fairly, you understand,

boss to boss, otherwise the strongest part of one shell would come

in contact with the weaker part of the other. Silently, but with all

your might, you pressed them together. The one which broke through

its antagonist's was, of course, the conqueror. But Southey is wrong!

It was only the empty shell we used. Consider, if the animal was

there--what a horrible mess!"

We ventured to suggest to our friend, as soon as his impetuosity

permitted us, that Southey was describing _his_ school, and no other

school whatever; and as to the horrible mess which boys might delight

in, it would be difficult to say, in such a matter, what would pass the

bounds of credibility.

After this unintentional experiment, we gave up all idea of determining

what might or might not be interesting amongst details of such a

description. If this story of the snail-shells found its ardent

admirer or sympathiser, what other could possibly be pronounced to

be superfluous? or down the margin of what other passage could our

critical and expurgatorial pencil have safely strayed? To as little

purpose, we apprehend, should we undertake to examine such stories on

the grave historic ground of their perfect credibility. When "Uncle

William," who is half an idiot, plays a trick upon the servant Thomas,

and substitutes a dead mouse for his quid of tobacco, the thought

did occur to us, that although a mouse is a very small animal, it

would surely make an enormous quid--altogether a most extraordinary

substitute for a quid--and that the servant Thomas must have been the

greatest idiot of the two to have been deceived by it. But such carping

criticism, we repeat, would be altogether out of place; and this

fragment of autobiography is really too amusing to excite any other

feeling than that of regret at its sudden termination.

We learn from it that Southey was born on the 12th August 1774. His

father was a linendraper at Bristol, and by no means prosperous in his

calling. He passed his childhood, however, for the most part under the

roof of a maiden aunt, Miss Tyler, who resided at Bath. To this house

at Bath we must, therefore, betake ourselves, if we would learn the

circumstances which assisted in forming the mind of the future poet

and historian. To be born the son of a linendraper we hold to be no

evil; but to have been bred up in the shop at Bristol would have been

to Southey a real calamity. From this he was spared. The linendraper's

shop may figure on his shield, if the malicious herald is disposed to

place it there; it had nothing to do with his head, or his heart, or

his manners; he was bred a gentleman. Moreover, he had exactly that

sort of breeding which is calculated to foster the imagination, and

develop whatever there was of poetry within him. Miss Tyler had two

passions--one for order and cleanliness, the other for the theatre. She

had, too, a free admission; and young Southey, at an age when other

little boys are fain to content themselves with turning over the leaves

of the great picture-book, was seated, night after night, in the front

row of the boxes, a delighted spectator of the performances of one of

the best companies in England. His first library--and this he possessed

as soon as he could read--was a whole set, more than twenty in number,

"of Mr Newbury's fairy tales, or other wonderful stories; delectable

histories in sixpenny books for children, splendidly bound in flowered

and gilt Dutch paper, of former days." This library, and free admission

to the theatre, and, for the rest, much idleness, few companions, and

a world of dreams,--such is the opening scene of Southey's mental

history.

"I had seen more plays before I was seven years old," he says, "than I

have seen since I was twenty." Miss Tyler, it seems, was living at one

time with some ladies whose property was vested in the theatre. From

their house--

"A covered passage led to the play-house, and they very rarely

missed a night's performance. I was too old to be put to bed

before the performance began, and it was better that I should

be taken than left with the servants; therefore I was always

of the party; and it is impossible to describe the thorough

delight which I received from this habitual indulgence. No

after-enjoyment could equal or approach it; I was sensible

of no defects either in the dramas or in the representation;

better acting, indeed, could nowhere have been found: Mrs

Siddons was the heroine; Dimond and Murray would have done

credit to any stage; and among the comic actors were Edwin and

Blanchard--and Blisset, who, though never known to a London

audience, was, of all comic actors whom I have seen, the most

perfect. But I was happily insensible to that difference

between good and bad acting, which in riper years takes off so

much from the pleasure of dramatic representation; everything

answered the height of my expectations and desires. And I saw

it in perfect comfort, in a small theatre, from the front row

of a box, not too far from the centre. The Bath theatre was

said to be the most comfortable in England; and no expense was

spared in the scenery and decorations."--(Vol. i. p. 71.)

Frequenting the theatre soon introduced him to far other literature

than Mr Newbury's publications. Shakespere was in his hands, he

says, as soon as he could read. He went through Beaumont and Fletcher

before he was eight years old. What hosts of plays beside he may have

devoured, it was probably beyond his power to recall. And he early

began to imitate what he read. In one passage he leaves us to gather

that his first attempts at _poetry_ were so early, that they went

beyond the time of memory.

Miss Tyler had all along intended to give her _protegé_ a systematic

education, and for this purpose she had purchased a translation of

Rousseau's _Emilius_. The systematic education, however, was never

commenced. In 1782 he was placed--for what reason we are not told--as

a day-boarder in a school at Bristol. He then necessarily resided with

his father. Two years after, Miss Tyler herself removed to Bristol,

and again received her nephew. But in this interval of two years, the

holidays were always spent with his aunt, wherever she might be. It was

in these holidays that his real education was carried on.

At home he was on very short allowance of books. His father read

nothing but the _Bristol Journal_. A small glass cupboard in the

back parlour, fastened up against the wall, was sufficient to hold

the wine-glasses and all the library. But in the holidays he gets

back again to Bath, and to Bull's circulating library. He meets, at

his aunt's, people who talk about authors--even sees an author or

two--learns that they are greater personages even than the players. In

one of these holidays a lady gives him a copy of Hoole's translation of

the _Jerusalem Delivered_. This led him into a new course of poetical

reading; it converted the budding dramatist into an epic poet. The

_Tasso_ introduced him to the translation of the _Orlando Furioso_, and

this to Spenser's _Fairy Queen_. How he read, how he revelled in these

books!