banks of the Thames, contiguous to where Westminster Bridge now stands;
commencing at the present Privy Gardens, and ending near Scotland
Yard. It extended also from the River to St. James’s Park, along the
boundary of which, including the Cockpit and Spring Gardens, many of
its buildings were situated. Hubert de Burgh, Justiciary of England
in the reign of Henry III. who was its first owner, left it in 1242
to the Monastery of Black Friars, Holborn, who selling it to Walter
Gray, Archbishop of York, it subsequently became the property of
succeeding prelates, and was the York House more than once mentioned by
Shakespeare. Henry VIII. taking a fancy to it, Wolsey, as Archbishop
of York, found it prudent to dispose of the Palace to that arbitrary
monarch, from whose time it became the residence of the sovereigns of
England till 1695, when it was consumed by fire; and Queen Anne in
consequence removed to St. James’s. Henry VIII. threw a gallery across
the street to the new Park of St. James’s, which was formed about the
same time from the grounds of a dissolved monastery of this name, and
erected on that side of the way a Cockpit, a Tennis Court, &c. Many
of Cromwell’s letters about this time are dated from the Cockpit,
whilst his subsequent ones are usually dated Whitehall. The Banqueting
House, now commonly called Whitehall, which was built by James I. in
the room of an old building devoted by Elizabeth to a similar purpose,
alone escaped the fire; and still remains a monument of the purer
taste introduced by Inigo Jones. It was the only part of the intended
new structure built by him. The roof was painted by Rubens, 1629, who
received from Charles I. three thousand pounds and knighthood for his
labour.
❦
[Sidenote: Adieu.]
“The meanest thing to which we bid adieu,
Loses its meanness in the parting hour.
When long neglected worth seems born anew;
The heart that scorns earth’s pageantry and power,
May melt in tears, or break, to quit a flower.”
❦
[Sidenote: Indifference.]
It is easier to still the wave of passion than to break the dead Sea
of indifference, which, like the Lake Asphaltes, destroys the energies
of all that approach it, until, like the birds who are said to drop
lifeless on its dull surface, the heart sinks to rise no more.
❦
Nothing is more touching than unrequited love, and unreturned
friendship. I can go through all the sorrow and the sadness it must
excite--the heart thrown back, the hand rejected. There is then but one
shelter, one repose; it turns in upon itself, and stings that self to
death!--to death? yes, the heart to death--cinder powder! and the poor
frame walks about, a wonder and a speculation to its neighbour.
❦
[Sidenote: The Cross.]
The holy ensign of the Cross was often used in dress in order to
command a homage the wearer would not otherwise have received. In 1363,
the father of the Doge of Venice preferred always going bareheaded to
pulling off his cap to his son, until the Doge thought of placing a
golden cross in front of his cap. The father then re-assumed his cap,
and when he met his son pulled it off, saying, “It is not him I salute,
but the cross;” and from that time the cross became an ornament of the
ducal cap.
❦
[Sidenote: Solitude.]
Solitude is the nurse of all that is good within us. The world stains
what it touches, and the more we withdraw from it the better we are.
❦
[Sidenote: Voltaire’s Prayer.]
O Dieu! qu’on méconnait, O Dieu! que tout annonce,
Entends les derniers mots que ma bouche prononce:
Si je me suis trompé, c’est en cherchant ta loi;
Mon cœur peut s’égarer, mais il est plein de toi.
Je vois sans m’alarmer l’Eternité paraître,
Et je ne puis penser qu’un Dieu qui m’a fait naître;
Qu’un Dieu qui sur mes jours versa tant de bienfaits,
Quand mes jours sont éteints me tourmente à jamais.
❦
_Method of obtaining the figure of a Plant._
A piece of paper is to be rubbed over with powdered dragon’s blood, in
the manner practised by engravers, and then the small branch or leaf of
which the design is required, is to be laid upon it. By means of slight
friction it soon takes up a small quantity of the powder, and being
then laid upon moistened paper, an impression is taken in the manner
practised for lithography without a machine.
❦
[Sidenote: Misfortune a crime.]
Misfortune was his crime.--_Success_ would have silenced censure.
❦
[Sidenote: Grecian Tablets.]
Les Tablettes des Grecs étaient des tables de bois, minces et deliées,
et enduites de cire. On y écrivait avec un petit stylet de cuivre, de
fer, ou d’or, pointu d’un côté, et plat de l’autre: ce dernier bout
servait à effacer. Les Grecs portaient à la ceinture un étui nommé
_graphiarium_ où étaient renfermés le stylet et ses tablettes.
❦
[Sidenote: Christmas Day.]
The feast of our Saviour’s nativity was undoubtedly celebrated in the
early ages of Christianity. It is named _Christmas-day_ from the Latin
“Christi missa,” the mass of Christ, and thence the Roman Catholic
liturgy is called their Missal, or Mass book. About the year 500 this
day became generally observed in the Catholic church.
_Christmas Boxes._ The mass was called Christmas, the box,
Christmas-box, for the collecting money that the priests may say masses
to the Saints for those who presented them.
❦
[Sidenote: George IV.]
Mr. Croker asked the king why he was styled “George the _Fourth_.”
His Majesty replied, because his father was George III. Not at all,
observed Mr. Croker, it is because Your Majesty is king of England,
France, and Ireland, and _so forth_.
❦
[Sidenote: Ton of the French.]
This is the ton of the French nation--if they lose a battle an
_epigram_ consoles them; if they are loaded with a new impost, a ballad
indemnifies them. They are enlivened with a song, and the most simple
and native style is always seasoned with something sarcastic and biting.
❦
[Sidenote: Frederick the Great.]
Frederick was endowed with great self-possession and coolness:
these were in one instance displayed, when the guards, having been
promised an augmentation in their pay, which had not been attended
to; they rose in a mutinous spirit, and marched towards the palace
in order to obtain redress from the king himself. His Aide-de-Camp,
alarmed at their approach, came to inform his royal master of the
circumstance. Frederick, who was quietly writing at his desk, ordered
his hat and sword, and went to the palace yard to meet them; without
manifesting the least surprise he drew his sword, placing himself at
their head, at the same moment giving the word of command, “_Linksum
kehrt euch marsch_,”--To the left, wheel, march. Surprised by the
sudden appearance of their royal master, and electrified by the energy
with which this order was given, the men actually obeyed the word of
command, and returned quietly to their barracks.
❦
_The Widow of Barnevelt imploring the Mercy of Maurice, Prince of
Nassau, for her Son._
“I could not ask mercy for my husband--_he_ was innocent--but I implore
it for my son, who _is_ guilty.” This was the observation of the widow
of Barnevelt to Maurice of Nassau, when interceding for her son, who in
1624 had engaged in a conspiracy to revenge his father’s death.
❦
[Sidenote: Filial Love.]
Filial love; much more, the affection of a son to a mother, where love
loses its awe, and veneration is mixed with tenderness! Filial love!
the _morality of instinct_, the _sacrament of nature and duty_; or
rather miscalled a _duty_, for it flows from the heart without effort,
and is its delight, its indulgence, its enjoyment. It is guided, not
by the slow dictates of reason; it awaits not encouragement from
reflection or from thought; it asks no aid of memory; it is not innate,
but active consciousness of having been the object of a thousand tender
solicitudes, a thousand waking watchful cares, of meek anxiety and
patient sacrifices, unremarked and unrequited by the object. It is a
gratitude founded upon a conviction of obligations, not remembered
because conferred before the tender reason could acknowledge, or
the infant memory record them: a gratitude and affection which no
circumstances should subdue, and which few can strengthen. A gratitude
in which even injury from the object, though it may blunt regret,
should never breed resentment--an affection, which can be increased
only by the decay of those to whom we owe it; and which is then most
fervent when the tremulous voice of age, resistless in its feebleness,
inquires for the natural protection of its cold decline.”
“Aliens from nature! apostates from humanity! is there a crime more
fell, more foul, is there any thing worse than a wilful persecutor of
his mother? Guilty, by the general verdict of human kind!”
Lacretelle, the late member of the Academie Française, beautifully
says--
“Je désire pour ami, le fils qui n’a jamais résisté aux larmes de sa
mère.”
❦
[Sidenote: Politeness.]
Politeness, that cementer of friendship and soother of enmities, is no
where so much required and so frequently outraged as in family circles:
in near and dear connections it is continually abandoned, and the
result is, that all the illusions of life are destroyed, and with them,
much of its happiness.
❦
[Sidenote: Submission to Providence.]
Pain and pleasure, good and evil, come to us from unexpected sources.
It is not there, where we have gathered up our brightest hopes, that
the dawn of happiness breaks. It is not there, where we have glanced
our eye with affright, that we find the deadliest gloom. _What should
this teach us?_ To bow to the great and only Source of light and life
humbly, and with confiding resignation.
❦
[Sidenote: A Gentleman.]
To constitute a perfect gentleman, the best attributes of the heart
and head must be combined. He who would indeed deserve that proud
epithet, must be devout, courteous, and accomplished, gentle, generous,
and brave; pure in word and deed, disinterested, philanthropic, and,
above all, incessant and intrepid in charitably succouring the weak,
the lowly, and the poor. It was once affirmed with a pious fervour
almost bordering on profanation, that our _Saviour_ was the first true
gentleman that ever lived.
❦
[Sidenote: Love silent.]
Silence in love, bewrays more woe
Than words, though ne’er so witty,
A beggar that is dumb, you know,
Deserveth double pity.
❦
[Sidenote: Note concerning the Wandering Jew.]
The story of the Wandering Jew is of considerable antiquity. It is told
by Matthew Paris, who heard it from an Archbishop of Armenia, who _knew
the man_. His original name was Calaphilus, Pontius Pilate’s Porter,
who when they were dragging Jesus out of the door of the Judgment Hall,
struck him on the back, saying, “Go faster, Jesus, go faster--why dost
thou linger?” upon which Jesus looked upon him with a frown, and said,
“I am indeed going, but thou shalt tarry till I come.” Soon after he
was converted, and took the name of Joseph. He lives for ever, but
at the end of every _hundred_ years falls into a fit or trance, from
which, when he recovers, he returns to the same age as he was when our
Saviour suffered, being then about thirty years. He always preserves
the utmost gravity of deportment. He was never seen to smile. He
perfectly remembers the death and resurrection of Christ.
❦
[Sidenote: Statues.]
The origin of the introduction of statues instead of columns, in
architecture, is thus related. “Carya, a city of Peloponnesus, sided
with the Persians against the Grecian States. When the country was
freed from the invaders, the arms of the Greeks were turned against
the Caryans. Upon the capture of the city, the males were put to the
sword, and the women led away captives. The architects of the age, in
order to perpetuate the ignominy of this people, introduced statues of
their women instead of columns in the porticos of their buildings; the
ornaments and drapery were faithfully copied from the attire of the
women, the mode of which they were never permitted to change.
❦
_Charles, Prince of Wales_,[4]
_By Lope de Vega._
Carlos Estuardo soy,
Que, siendo amor mi guia,
Al cielo de’España voy
Per ver mi estrella Maria.
Charles Stuart I am,
Whom love has guided afar;
To the heaven of Spain I came
To see Maria my star.
[4] Sung in Spain during the romantic expedition of Charles to that
country, whilst his marriage with the Infanta was in agitation.
❦
Afflictions are sent us by Providence to teach us to recollect our
ways.
❦
_Philadelphia, City of William Penn._
This is a _planned_ town: built according to the rectangular plan of
its illustrious founder, the great and good William Penn. He who had
received from his Sovereign an absolute title to the lands on the
wilful subterfuge of Christian and heathen rights to the soil--but who,
acting upon the principle of “uniform justice,” never would invade a
foot of territory which he had not before purchased from the Indians.
Penn considered immemorial occupancy superior to all other tenure,
that this right of the Red-man was founded in nature, that this tenure
was the free gift of Heaven, which no king, no pope, no man had a
right to question, or any equitable pretence to destroy; and therefore
his principles required him to commence with justice to the natural
occupant of the soil. With the founder of Pensylvania, the measures he
adopted, and his demeanour towards the aborigines were wise, and so
happy that it became a maxim among them “never to lift the tomahawk
against the race of William Penn.” The country of William Penn was
called “the Poor Man’s Paradise;” poverty was unknown in all its
borders.
With reference to the name given to the colony, it is stated by Penn
on the 5th Jan. 1681: “This day, after many waitings, watchings,
solicitings, and disputes in Counsel, my country was confirmed to me
under the Great Seal of England, with large powers and privileges, by
the name of Pensylvania, a name the king would give it in honour of
my father. I chose _New Wales_, being a hilly country; and when the
Secretary, being a Welshman, refused to call it New Wales, I proposed
Sylvania, and they added _Penn_ to it, though I much opposed it, and
went to the king to have it struck out. He said it was past, and would
take it upon him. I feared it should look like a vanity in me, and not
as a respect of the king to my father, as it really was.”
❦
[Sidenote: Calumny.]
As I have myself felt the arrows of calumny, I should be inexcusable
if I readily believed what is said of others. What I have suffered
ought to regulate my conduct with regard to those who may be in like
manner traduced. When I have the evidence of my senses that what is
said of such a one be true, I must then examine my heart, to see if I
cannot discover an excuse for errors that may have been the result of
weakness; and in no case ought I to pronounce a decided judgment.
❦
[Sidenote: Constancy.]
Remember--never to divest the person of your wife of the diversity with
which your imagination clothed it while she was your mistress, and be
sedulous yourself in the preservation of every attraction as well of
the person, as of the heart.
Recollect--that it is vacuity which requires the charm of novelty: keep
the soul replete with genuine bliss, and the desire of change will
never make head against the power of pure and mutual love. The cooling
of the heart towards the object once adored, proceeds in general from
the weakness of unoccupied hours, and the inaction of sensibility.
Kind attentions mutually kept up, will always endear even indifferent
persons to each other; and will not the very name of husband, and wife,
lead to those attentions, to those endearments? The flame of love
once raised, will burn long if fanned by both the votaries; but will
inevitably expire if left only to the care of one.
❦
_The Baths of Schlangenbad._
Schlangenbad, a short distance from Mayence: the effect of the
Schlangenbad waters on the skin is really wonderful; it seems like
exaggeration or fancy on the part of those who have described them
already, to say that one quarter of an hour’s luxurious lying under
their clear soft surface, should be able to produce such an impression.
Yet so it is, in sober earnest. I think it was two days at least before
the effect of even one bath went off; and when, forgetting what manner
of man or woman we had become in it, we afterwards happened to pass
our hands over our foreheads, either for want of thought, or in search
of some stray thought that had made its escape, the agreeable contact
waked us suddenly to the sense of the soothing, softening influence of
the waters.
❦
[Sidenote: Traditions.]
In the thirteenth century the two chief meals were dinner and supper,
the first at nine in the morning, the supper at five in the afternoon.
The greatest luxury and magnificence were displayed at those repasts,
and the side tables were highly ornamented, and covered with various
fermented liquors, as mead, ale, beer, and, above all, rich wines
of English growth. At the celebration in London of the marriage of
Richard, Earl of Cornwall, and Cincia, daughter of Redmond, Earl of
Provence (A. D. 1243), there were above thirty thousand dishes served
at the marriage dinner.
An unlimited hospitality reigned in the castles of great barons: their
gates were ever open to strangers of condition, as well as their
own vassals, friends, and followers. It is evident that the immense
halls to be seen in the remains of ancient structures, were built to
accommodate vast numbers of guests of all ranks; and the little window
above, opening from a recess of the state apartment, was evidently
intended in order that the guests should be seen assembling, before
the lord of the mansion and persons of dignity went down to the common
repast. In the middle of each table stood a large salt-cellar, and it
was a mark of distinction whether a person sat above or below the salt.
Particular care was taken to place the guests according to their rank.
❦
[Sidenote: Serenades.]
It has been wittily said of the Sicilians, that no person could pass
for a man of gallantry who had not got a _cold_, and was sure never to
succeed with his mistress unless he made love in a _hoarse voice_. This
arose from the custom of serenading the object of preference during the
hours of the night, by the execution of vocal and instrumental music
under their balconies. The Sicilians are a nation of poets; and the
lover who cannot celebrate his mistress’s charms in verse, would be
thought unworthy of her attention.
❦
[Sidenote: Ancient Poetry.]
Didst thou but know the inly touch of love,
Thou would’st as soon go kindle fire with snow
As seek to quench the fire of love with words:
The more thou damm’st it up, the more it burns.
The current that with gentle murmur glides,
Thou know’st, being stopp’d, impatiently doth rage;
But when his fair course is not hindered,
He makes sweet music with the enamel’d stones;
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage:
And so by many winding nooks he strays
With willing sport, to the wild ocean.
Then let me go, and hinder not my course;
I’ll be as patient as a gentle stream,
And make a pastime of each weary step,
Till the last step have brought me to my love:
And there I’ll rest, as after much turmoil
A blessed soul doth in Elysium.
❦
[Sidenote: The Hottentots.]
Among the Hottentots, if a widow marries again, she is obliged to
cut off the joint of a finger for every husband she marries after
the first: this she presents to her new husband on her wedding day,
beginning at one of the little fingers first.
❦
[Sidenote: Sir Charles Sedley.]
The painter’s art is done, the features hit,
Of Sedley’s face. No art can show his wit.
He appeared in public about the year 1667, and is to be considered as
one of the first among the men of genius who adorned that age. Charles
II. used to tell him, that nature had given him a patent to be Apollo’s
viceroy. However, he knew as well how to conceal his own excellencies
with modesty, as the rest of the world knew how to value them. It was
at the acting of his play called _Bellamira_, that the roof of the
play-house fell down. But it was singular, that very few were hurt
except himself. His merry friend, Sir Fleetwood Shepherd, told him,
“there was so much fire in his play, that it blew up the poet, house,
and all.” He replied, “No! The play was so heavy, it broke down the
house, and buried the poet in his own rubbish.”
❦
_To a Gentleman, on his complaining of having lost his Gold Watch._
Grieve not, my friend, or peevish say
Your luck is worse than common,
For “GOLD takes wings, and flies away,”
And “TIME will stay for no man.”
❦
_Lines by Lord Erskine, on being asked whether he preferred great
Sensibility or Indifference._
The heart can ne’er a transport know,
That never felt a pain;
That point thus settled long ago,
The present question’s vain.
Who’d wish to travel life’s dull round,
Unmov’d by pain or pleasure?
’Tis reason’s task to set the bound,
And keep them all in measure.
The Stoic who with false pretence
Each soft emotion stifles,
Thinks want of feeling shows his sense,
Yet frets and fumes at trifles.
And he, who vainly boasts the heart
Touch’d by each tale of woe,
Forbears to act the friendly part
That tender heart to show.
Th’ unfeeling heart can never know,
By cold indifference guarded,
The joy, the transport, that will flow
From love and truth rewarded.
True sensibility we find
Shares in another’s grief;
And pity yields the generous mind
From sympathy relief.
The point discussed, we find this rule,
A rule both true and sad;
Who feels too little is--a fool;
Who feels too much--runs mad.
❦
“_L’amicale persévérance_,” was the term by which the _Countess de
Lichtenau_ designated her connection with Frederick William II. King of
Prussia. In speaking of the attachment of our Henry VIII. to the Lady
Elizabeth, wife of Sir Thomas Boleyn, and mother to Anne, afterwards
his Queen, Lloyd says, she was _his solace, not his sin_.
❦
_Epigram on reading an article in the Newspapers, stating that the
Garrison of Dantzic had eaten their last Horse._
By the newsmen we’re told, and believe it of course,
That the people of Dantzic had eat their last horse;
In resources, how much should we Dantzic surpass
Could we only hold out, till we eat our last _ass_.
❦
_To the May Fly._
Thou art a frail and lively thing
Engender’d by the sun;
A moment only on the wing,
And thy career is done.
Thou sportest in the evening beam
An hour--an age to thee--
In gaiety above the stream
Which soon thy grave must be.
Although thy life is like to thee,
An atom--art thou not
Far happier than thou e’er could’st be,
If long life were thy lot?
For then deep pangs might wound thy breast,
And make thee wish for death;
But as it is thou’rt soon at rest,
Thou creature of a breath!
And man’s life passeth thus away,
A thing of joy and sorrow;
The earth he treads upon to-day
Shall cover him to-morrow.
“As the sun declines the misnamed ‘May-fly’ is to be seen emerging from
the surface of shallow streams, and lying there for a time till its
wings are dried for flight. Escaping after a protracted struggle of
half a minute from its watery birth place, it flutters restlessly up
and down over the same spot during its whole era of a summer evening,
and at last dies as the last streaks of day are leaving the western
horizon. Yet, who shall say, that in that space of time it has not
undergone all the vicissitudes of a long and eventful life? That it has
not felt all the freshness of youth, all the vigour of maturity, all
the weakness and satiety of old age, and all the pangs of death itself?
In short, who shall satisfy us that any essential difference exists
between _its_ four hours, and _our_ fourscore years?”
❦
[Sidenote: From my Mother.]