LANSINGBURGH, N.Y.,
_Saturday, May 4, 1839_.
MY DEAR M----, I can imagine you seated on that dear, delightful,
old-fashioned sofa, your head supported by its luxurious padding, and
with feet aloft on the aspiring back of that straight-limbed,
stiff-necked, quaint old chair, which, as our facetious W---- assured
me, was the identical seat in which old Burton composed his _Anatomy of
Melancholy_. I see you reluctantly raise your optics from the
ugh-clasped [_sic_] quarto which encumbers your lap, to receive the
package which the servant hands you, and can almost imagine that I see
those beloved features illumined for a moment with an expression of joy,
as you read the superscription of your gentle protégé. Lay down, I
beseech you, that odious black-lettered volume and let not its musty and
withered leaves sully the virgin purity and whiteness of the sheet which
is the vehicle of so much good sense, sterling thought, and chaste and
elegant sentiment.
You remember how you used to rate me for my hang-dog modesty, my
_mauvaise honte_, as my Lord Chesterfield would style it. Well! I have
determined that hereafter you shall not have occasion again to inflict
upon me those flattering appellations of ‘Fool!’ ‘Dolt!’ ‘Sheep!’ which
in your indignation you used to shower upon me, with a vigour and a
facility which excited my wonder, while it provoked my resentment.
And how do you imagine that I rid myself of this annoying hindrance?
Why, truly, by coming to the conclusion that in this pretty corpus of
mine was lodged every manly grace; that my limbs were modelled in the
symmetry of the Phidian Jupiter; my countenance radiant with the beams
of wit and intelligence, and my whole person the envy of the beaux, the
idol of the women, and the admiration of the tailor. And then my mind!
why, sir, I have discovered it to be endowed with the most rare and
extraordinary powers, stored with universal knowledge, and embellished
with every polite accomplishment.
Pollux! what a comfortable thing is a good opinion of one’s self when I
walk the Broadway of our village with a certain air, that puts me down
at once in the estimation of any intelligent stranger who may chance to
meet me, as a _distingué_ of the purest water, a blade of the true
temper, a blood of the first quality! Lord! how I despise the little
sneaking vermin who dodge along the street as though they were so many
footmen or errand-boys; who have never learned to carry the head erect
in conscious importance, but hang that noblest of the human members as
though it had been boxed by some virago of an Amazon; who shuffle along
the walk, with a quick, uneasy step, a hasty, clownish motion, which by
the magnitude of the contrast, set off to advantage my own slow and
magisterial gait, which I can at pleasure vary to an easy, abandoned
sort of carriage, or to the more engaging, alert, and lively walk, to
suit the varieties of time, occasion, and company.
And in society, too, how often have I commiserated the poor wretches who
stood aloof, in a corner, like a flock of scared sheep; while myself,
beautiful as Apollo, dressed in a style which would extort admiration
from a Brummell, and belted round with self-esteem as with a girdle,
sallied up to the ladies--complimenting one, exchanging a repartee with
another; tapping this one under the chin, and clasping this one round
the waist; and finally, winding up the operation by kissing round the
whole circle to the great edification of the fair, and to the unbounded
horror, amazement, and ill-suppressed chagrin of the aforesaid sheepish
multitude, who, with eyes wide open and mouths distended, afforded good
subjects on whom to exercise my polished wit, which like the glittering
edge of a Damascus sabre ‘dazzled all it shone upon.’
And then, when the folding-doors are thrown open, as the lacquey
announces supper to be ready, how often have I stepped forward and with
a profound obeisance to the ladies, bowing by the bow of Cupid, and
appealing to Venus for my sincerity, when I wished I had an hundred arms
at their service, escorted them right gallantly and merrily to the
banquet; while those poor, bashful creatures, like a drove of dumb
cattle, strayed into the apartment, stumbling, blushing, stammering, and
alone.
Verily, by my elegant accomplishments and superior parts, by my graceful
address, and above all by my easy self-possession, I have unwittingly
provoked to an irreconcilable degree the resentment of half a score of
these village beaux; whom, although I had rather have their esteem, I
value too little to dread their malice.
By my halidome, sir, this same village of Lansingburgh contains within
its pretty limits as fair a set of blushing damsels as one would wish to
look upon on a dreamy summer day! When I traverse the broad pavements of
my own metropolis, my eyes are arrested by beautiful forms flitting
hither and thither; and I pause to admire the elegance of their attire,
the taste displayed in their embellishments; the rich mesh of the
material; and sometimes, it may be, the loveliness of the features,
which no art can heighten and no negligence conceal.
But here, sir, here, where woman seems to have erected her throne, and
established her empire; here, where all feel and acknowledge her sway,
she blooms in unborrowed charms; and the eye, undazzled by the profusion
of extraneous ornament, settles at once upon the loveliest faces which
our clayey natures can assume. The poet has sung:--
‘When first the Rhodian’s mimic art array’d
The queen of Beauty in her Cyprian shade,
The happy master mingled on his piece
Each look that charm’d him in the fair of Greece.
To faultless nature true, he stole a grace
From every finer form and sweeter face;
And, as he sojourn’d on the Ægean isles,
Woo’d all their love and treasured all their smiles;
Then glow’d the tints, pure, precious, and refined,
And mortal charms seemed heavenly when combined.’
Now, had this same Apelles flourished in our own enlightened day, and
more particularly, had he taken up his domicile in this goodly village,
I could with ease have presented him with many a Hebe, in whom were
united all the requisite graces which make up the beau-ideal of female
loveliness. Nor, my dear M----, does there reign in all this bright
display that same monotony of feature, form, complexion, which elsewhere
is beheld; no, here are all varieties, all the orders of Beauty’s
architecture; the Doric, the Ionic, the Corinthian, all are here.
I have in ‘my mind’s eye, Horatio,’ three (the number of the Graces, you
remember) who may stand, each at the head of their respective orders.
The one, were she arrayed in sylvan garb, and did she in her hand carry
her bow, might with equal justice and propriety stand, the picture of
Diana herself. Her figure is bold, her stature erect and tall, her
presence queenly and commanding, and her complexion is clear and fair as
the face of heaven on a May day, through which sparkles an eye of that
indefinable hue, which is beyond comparison the most striking that can
garnish the human countenance. The vermilion in her cheeks perpetually
wears that ruddy, healthful tint, which one is accustomed to behold
illumine, but for a moment, alas! the face of a city belle when she
takes her annual ramble in the country, to revel for a period in the
retreats of rustic life.
If to these qualities you superadd that majesty of carriage and dignity
of mien, which we would fancy the royal mistress of Antony to have
possessed; together with that heroic and Grecian cast of countenance
which the imagination unconsciously ascribes to the Jewess, Rebecca,
when resisting the vile arts of the Templar--you have in my poor opinion
the portraiture of ⸻.
When I venture to describe the second of this beautiful trinity, I feel
my powers of delineation inadequate to the task; but nevertheless I will
try my hand at the matter, although, like an unskilful limner, I am
fearful I shall but scandalise the charms I endeavour to copy.
Come to my aid, ye guardian spirits of the Fair! Guide my awkward hand,
and preserve from mutilation the features ye hover over and protect!
Pour down whole floods of sparkling champagne, my dear M----, until your
brain grows giddy with emotion; con over the latter portion of the first
canto of _Childe Harold_, and ransack your intellectual repository for
the liveliest visions of the Fairy Land, and you will be in a measure
prepared to relish the epicurean banquet I shall spread.
The stature of this beautiful mortal (if she be indeed of earth) is of
that perfect height, which, while it is freed from the charge of being
low, cannot with propriety be denominated tall. Her figure is slender
almost to fragility, but strikingly modelled in spiritual elegance, and
is the only form I ever saw, which could bear the trial of a rigid
criticism.
Every man who is gifted with the least particle of imagination, must in
some of his reveries have conjured up from the realms of fancy, a being
bright and beautiful beyond everything he had ever before apprehended,
whose main and distinguishing attribute invariably proves to be a form
the indescribable loveliness of which seems to
--‘Sail in liquid light,
And float on seas of bliss.’
The realisation of these seraphic visions is seldom permitted us; but I
can truly say that when my eyes for the first time fell upon this lovely
creature, I thought myself transported to the land of dreams, where lay
embodied the most brilliant conceptions of the wildest fancy. Indeed,
could the Promethean spark throw life and animation into the Venus de’
Medici, it would but present the counterpart of ⸻.
Her complexion has the delicate tinge of the brunette, with a little of
the roseate hue of the Circassian; and one would swear that none but the
sunny skies of Spain had shone upon the infancy of the being, who looks
so like her own ‘dark-glancing daughters.’
The outline of her head, together with the profile of her countenance,
are sketched in classic purity, and while the one indicates refined and
elegant sentiment, the other is not more chaste and regular than the
mind which beams from every feature of the face. Her hair is black as
the wing of the raven, and is parted _à la Madonna_ over a forehead
where sits, girt round with her sister graces, the very genius of poetic
beauty, hope, and love.
And then her eyes! They open their dark, rich orbs upon you like the
full noon of heaven, and blaze into your very soul the fires of day!
Like the offerings laid upon the sacrificial altars of the Hebrews, when
in an instant the divine spark falling from the propitiated God kindled
them in flames; so, a single glance from that Oriental eye as quickly
fires your soul, and leaves your bosom in a perfect conflagration! Odds
Cupids and Darts! with one broad sweep of vision in a crowded ballroom,
that splendid creature would lay around her like the two-handed sword of
Minotti, hearts on hearts, piled round in semicircles! But it is well
for the more rugged sex that this glorious being can vary her proud
dominion, and give to the expression of her eye a melting tenderness
which dissolves the most frigid heart, and heals the wounds she gave
before.
If the devout and exemplary Mussulman, who dying fast in the faith of
his Prophet, anticipates reclining on beds of roses, gloriously drunk
through all the ages of eternity, is to be waited on by Houris such as
these: waft me, ye gentle gales, beyond this lower world and,
‘Lap me in soft Lydian airs!’
But I am falling into I know not what extravagances, so I will briefly
give you a portrait of the last of these three divinities, and will then
terminate my tiresome lucubrations.
This last is a Lilliputian beauty; diminutive in stature, fair-haired,
and with a foot for which Cinderella’s slipper would be too large; a
countenance sweet and interesting, and in her manners eminently refined
and engaging. The cast of her physiognomy is singularly mild and
amiable, and her whole person is replete with every feminine grace. Her
eyes
‘Effuse the mildness of their azure beam;’
and to her, above all her sex, are applicable the lines of our gentle
Coleridge:--
‘Maid of my Love, sweet ⸻
In Beauty’s light you glide along:
Your eye is like the star of eve,
And sweet your Voice as Seraph’s song.
Yet not your heavenly Beauty gives
This heart with passion soft to glow:
Within your soul a Voice there lives!
It bids you hear the tale of Woe.
When sinking low the Sufferer wan
Beholds no hand outstretched to save,
Fair as the bosom of the Swan
That rises graceful o’er the wave,
I’ve seen your breast with pity heave,
And therefore love I you, sweet ⸻.’
Here, my dear M----, closes this catalogue of the Graces, this chapter
of Beauties, and I should implore your pardon for trespassing so long on
your attention. If you, yourself, in whose breast may possibly be
extinguished the amatory flame, should not feel an interest in these
three ‘counterfeit presentments,’ do not fail to show them to ⸻, and
solicit her opinion as to their respective merits.
Tender my best acknowledgments to the Major for his prompt attention to
my request, and, for yourself, accept the assurance of my undiminished
regard; and hoping that the smiles of heaven may continue to illuminate
your way,--I remain, ever yours,
L. A. V.