the aid of whimsicalities as the milestones and finger-posts of memory,
is not only sanctioned (as we have said) by the recognition of one of
its inherent properties, but by the most unmistakable precedents in its
own natural operation. Surnames which do not owe their origin to the
professions of those who first assumed them, or to modifications of
Christian names, partake largely of the humorous in their conception,
as we have shewn in former articles on Names in this _Journal_. They
are, in fact, epigrammatic. Doubtless, among races in which the
susceptibility to humour is very subordinate to other sensibilities,
these epigram-names will embody less of that element; but even amongst
the gravest tribes of North American Indians, and the melancholy races
of Eastern Asia, secondary titles are in common use for ordinary and
familiar occasions, answering exactly to our own idea of nicknames.
Amongst ourselves the coinage of surnames has long ago been completed
and in full circulation, their original meanings having now no force
or application to the persons bearing them. Even nicknames have almost
disappeared from polite literature and society with the increasing
sensitiveness of the age. The art of 'smashing' in the matter of names,
however, still lingers in the nursery and the playground, as well
as in the inner circles of family life generally; and if we cast an
observing glance down the social scale, we shall find the practice more
and more widely obtaining, until, amongst the rural population and the
operatives of Lancashire and the Black Country, we find it absolutely
universal. In the latter locality, indeed, the inapplicability of
authorised surnames has led to their total disuse. We read some years
ago a Report from an official source, in which it was circumstantially
stated that many of the puddlers, nailers, and others had utterly
forgotten their original or baptismal name, being invariably addressed
and known by a _sobriquet_, which hit off some whimsical peculiarity
of person or character. We ourselves have a lively recollection of a
woman in the neighbourhood of Bilston to whom her own husband's real
name was so unfamiliar that she entirely failed to recognise it when we
questioned her regarding him.
Scottish literature, and that of England which in point of national
progress corresponds to it, owe much of their vigour and enjoyableness
to the quaintness of the counterfeit nomenclature with which they
abound; and at the same time indicate the prevalence of epigrammatic
humorous names in the age which produced them. One of our finest
ballads indeed--The Blithesome Bridal--is little other than a catalogue
of trenchant nicknames: 'Will wi' the meikle mou,' 'Bow-legged Robbie,'
'Thumbless Katie,' 'Plouckie-faced Wat i' the mill;' and so on.
If then the human mind has not only an exceptional facility for the
reproduction of whimsicalities, but a significant tendency to seek for
and employ these as aids to the memory of more serious but less salient
things, how shall we estimate _the mnemonic value of the sense of the
ludicrous_? We have no desire, even if space would permit, to treat the
inquiry exhaustively; but may point out one or two of the leading facts
on which so curious an investigation might be based, and one or two
reflections which the subject immediately suggests.
First, then, it is a well-established truth that the barbarous races
which have proved totally unsusceptible of civilisation are those
which are utterly or almost utterly devoid of the sense of humour:
exemplified in the aborigines of Australia and the Indians of the
West; while on the other hand the Negro, endowed with the most
whimsical of fancies, has, though steeped in barbarism, the latent
germ of intellectual and moral progress. Secondly, among the so-called
civilised branches of the human family, the Caucasian, with its rich
vein of humour, its hearty power of laughter, and its deftness in
extracting from every condition of things the elixir of fun, stands
in unapproachable superiority. Lastly, to those whose observation of
national character has been sufficiently minute and varied, it will be
equally clear that those European peoples which have the finest and
deepest appreciation of the quaint and ludicrous (entirely distinct
from wit), have also the greatest staying power intellectually and
morally, and the largest possibility of development.
It would seem a fair inference from these facts alone, had we not
already indicated it, that it is man's moral nature which benefits
most largely by the presence in the mental economy of a sense of the
ludicrous. The saying, 'Beware of him who cannot laugh,' is a pithy
but conclusive commentary. All that is fairest in human life; all
that is best and brightest in our earthly lot; the tender memories of
childhood; the generous ties of friendship; the various sympathies
which constitute the history of our inner selves, are rendered vivid
and operative for our highest culture by the action of the simple yet
unique mnemonic law which we have thus imperfectly examined.
SISTERS.
The day had gone as fades a dream;
The night had come and rain fell fast;
While o'er the black and sluggish stream
Cold blew the wailing blast.
In pensive mood I idly raised
The curtain from the rain-splashed glass,
And as into the street I gazed,
I saw two women pass.
One shivering with the bitter cold,
Her garments heavy with the rain,
Limped by with features wan and old,
Deep farrowed by sharp pain.
A child in form, a child in years;
But from her piteous pallid face,
The weariness of life with tears
Had washed all childlike grace.
And as she passed me faint and weak,
I heard her slowly say, as though
With throbbing heart about to break:
'"Move on!" Where shall I go?'
The other, who on furs reclined,
In brougham was driven to the play;
No thought within her vacant mind
Of those in rags that day:
With unmoved heart and idle stare,
Passed by the beggar in the street,
Who lifted up her hands in prayer
Some charity to meet.
Both vanished in the murky night:
The outcast on a step to die;
The lady to a scene of light,
Where Joy alone did sigh.
But angels saw amid her hair
What was by human eyes unseen;
The grass that grows on graves was there,
With leaves of ghastly green.
And though her diamonds flashed the light
Upon the flatterers gathered near,
The outcast's brow had gem more bright--
An angel's pitying tear.
* * * * *
Printed and Published by W. & R. CHAMBERS, 47 Paternoster Row, LONDON,
and 339 High Street, EDINBURGH.
* * * * *
_All Rights Reserved._