the next market-day to the neighboring town, and took along with him
his little daughter, my nurse, upon a pillion behind him. The box was
close on every side, with a little door for me to go in and out, and a
few gimlet-holes to let in air. The girl had been so careful as to put
the quilt of her baby's bed into it for me to lie down on. However, I
was terribly shaken and discomposed in this journey, tho it were but
of half an hour; for the horse went about forty feet at every step,
and trotted so high that the agitation was equal to the rising and
falling of a ship in a great storm, but much more frequent. Our
journey was somewhat farther than from London to St. Alban's. My
master alighted at an inn which he used to frequent; and after
consulting a while with the innkeeper, and making some necessary
preparations, he hired the "grultrud," or crier, to give notice
through the town of a strange creature to be seen at the sign of the
Green Eagle, not so big as a splacnuck (an animal in that country
very finely shaped, about six feet long), and in every part of the
body resembling a human creature--could speak several words, and
perform a hundred diverting tricks.
I was placed upon a table in the largest room of the inn, which might
be near three hundred feet square. My little nurse stood on a low
stool close to the table, to take care of me and direct what I should
do. My master, to avoid a crowd, would suffer only thirty people at a
time to see me. I walked about on the table as the girl commanded; she
asked me questions as far as she knew my understanding of the language
reached, and I answered them as loud as I could. I turned about
several times to the company, paid my humble respects, said "they were
welcome," and used some other speeches I had been taught. I took up a
thimble filled with liquor, which Glumdalclitch had given me for a
cup, and drank their health. I drew out my hanger, and flourished with
it after the manner of fencers in England. My nurse gave me a part of
a straw, which I exercised as a pike, having learned the art in my
youth. I was that day shown to twelve sets of company, and as often
forced to act over again the same fopperies, till I was half dead with
weariness and vexation; for those who had seen me made such wonderful
reports that the people were ready to break down the doors to come in.
My master, for his own interest, would not suffer any one to touch me
except my nurse; and to prevent danger, benches were set round the
table at such a distance as to put me out of everybody's teach.
However, an unlucky schoolboy aimed a hazel-nut directly at my head,
which very narrowly missed me; otherwise it came with so much violence
that it would have infallibly knocked out my brains, for it was almost
as large as a small pumpion: but I had the satisfaction to see the
young rogue well beaten and turned out of the room....
My master's design was to show me in all the towns by the way; and to
step out of the road, for fifty or a hundred miles, to any village or
person of quality's house where he might expect custom. We made easy
journeys, of not above seven or eight score miles a day; for
Glumdalclitch, on purpose to spare me, complained she was tired with
the trotting of the horse. She often took me out of my box, at my own
desire, to give me air and show me the country; but always held me
fast by a leading-string. We passed over five or six rivers, many
degrees broader and deeper than the Nile or the Ganges; and there was
hardly a rivulet so small as the Thames at London Bridge. We were ten
weeks in our journey, and I was shown in eighteen large towns, besides
many villages and private families.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 110: From the description of the Academy of Lagade in
"Gulliver's Travels."]
[Footnote 111: From No. 1 of "The Tatler."]
[Footnote 112: From "The Examiner."]
[Footnote 113: This essay is a satire on the writings of Robert
Boyle.]
[Footnote 114: From "Gulliver's Travels." At this point in the story
Gulliver, shipwrecked in the country of Brobdingnag, had by the farmer
who found him been given as a plaything to his little daughter
Glumdalclitch, who, altho only nine years old, was forty feet tall.]
JOSEPH ADDISON
Born in 1672, died in 1719; educated at Oxford, where he
wrote a Latin poem which brought him a pension of three
hundred pounds; traveled on the Continent in 1699-1703;
Under-secretary of State in 1706; Secretary to the Lord
Lieutenant of Ireland in 1709; Secretary for Ireland in
1715; Secretary of State in 1717; married the Countess of
Warwick in 1716; for his periodical _The Spectator_,
published daily from March 1st, 1711, to December 6th, 1712,
wrote 274 papers; including the Sir Roger de Coverley
papers; author of many other writings, among which "Cato: A
Tragedy" is notable.
I
IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY[115]
When I am in a serious humor, I very often walk by myself in
Westminster Abbey; where the gloominess of the place, and the use to
which it is applied, with the solemnity of the building, and the
condition of the people who lie in it, are apt to fill the mind with a
kind of melancholy, or rather thoughtfulness, that is not
disagreeable. I yesterday passed a whole afternoon in the churchyard,
the cloisters, and the church, amusing myself with the tombstones and
inscriptions that I met with in those several regions of the dead.
Most of them recorded nothing else of the buried person, but that he
was born upon one day, and died upon another: the whole history of his
life being comprehended in those two circumstances, that are common
to all mankind. I could not but look upon these registers of
existence, whether of brass or marble, as a kind of satire upon the
departed persons, who had left no other memorial of them, but that
they were born and that they died. They put one in mind of several
persons mentioned in the battles of heroic poems, who have sounding
names given them, for no other reason but that they may be killed, and
are celebrated for nothing but being knocked on the head.
Glaucumque, Medontaque, Thersilochumque.
--VIRG.
The life of these men is finely described in Holy Writ by "the path of
an arrow," which is immediately closed up and lost.
Upon my going into the church, I entertained myself with the digging
of a grave; and saw, in every shovelful of it that was thrown up, the
fragment of a bone or skull intermixt with a kind of fresh moldering
earth that some time or other had a place in the composition of a
human body. Upon this I began to consider with myself, what
innumerable multitudes of people lay confused together under the
pavement of that ancient cathedral; how men and women, friends and
enemies, priests and soldiers, monks and prebendaries, were crumbled
amongst one another, and blended together in the same common mass; how
beauty, strength and youth, with old age, weakness, and deformity, lay
undistinguished in the same promiscuous heap of matter.
And having thus surveyed this great magazine of mortality, as it were
in the lump, I examined it more particularly by the accounts which I
found on several of the monuments which are raised in every quarter of
that ancient fabric. Some of them were covered with such extravagant
epitaphs, that, if it were possible for the dead person to be
acquainted with them, he would blush at the praises which his friends
have bestowed upon him. There are others so excessively modest, that
they deliver the character of the person departed in Greek or Hebrew,
and by that means are not understood once in a twelvemonth. In the
poetical quarter, I found there were poets who had no monuments, and
monuments which had no poets. I observed, indeed, that the present war
had filled the church with many of these uninhabited monuments, which
had been erected to the memory of persons whose bodies were perhaps
buried in the plains of Blenheim, or in the bosom of the ocean.
I could not but be very much delighted with several modern epitaphs,
which are written with great elegance of expression and justness of
thought, and therefore do honor to the living as well as to the dead.
As a foreigner is very apt to conceive an idea of the ignorance or
politeness of a nation from the turn of their public monuments and
inscriptions, they should be submitted to the perusal of men of
learning and genius before they are put in execution. Sir Cloudesley
Shovel's monument has very often given me great offense; instead of
the brave, rough English Admiral, which was the distinguishing
character of that plain, gallant man, he is represented on his tomb by
the figure of a beau, drest in a long periwig, and reposing himself
upon velvet cushions under a canopy of state. The inscription is
answerable to the monument; for instead of celebrating the many
remarkable actions he had performed in the service of his country, it
acquaints us only with the manner of his death, in which it was
impossible for him to reap any honor. The Dutch, whom we are apt to
despise for want of genius, show an infinitely greater taste of
antiquity and politeness in their buildings and works of this nature,
than what we meet with in those of our own country. The monuments of
their admirals, which have been erected at the public expense,
represent them like themselves; and are adorned with rostral crowns
and naval ornaments, with beautiful festoons of seaweed, shells, and
coral.
But to return to our subject. I have left the repository of our
English kings for the contemplation of another day, when I shall find
my mind disposed for so serious an amusement. I know that
entertainments of this nature are apt to raise dark and dismal
thoughts in timorous minds and gloomy imaginations: but for my own
part, tho I am always serious, I do not know what it is to be
melancholy; and can therefore take a view of nature in her deep and
solemn scenes, with the same pleasure as in her most gay and
delightful ones. By this means, I can improve myself with those
objects which others consider with terror. When I look upon the tombs
of the great, every emotion of envy dies in me; when I read the
epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire goes out; when I
meet with the grief of parents upon a tombstone, my heart melts with
compassion; when I see the tomb of the parents themselves, I consider
the vanity of grieving for those whom we must quickly follow; when I
see kings lying by those who deposed them, when I consider rival wits
placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world with their
contests and disputes, I reflect with sorrow and astonishment on the
little competitions, factions, and debates of mankind. When I read the
several dates of the tombs, of some that died yesterday, and some six
hundred years ago, I consider that great day when we shall all of us
be contemporaries, and make our appearance together.
II
WILL HONEYCOMB AND HIS MARRIAGE[116]
My friend Will Honeycomb values himself very much upon what he calls
the knowledge of mankind, which has cost him many disasters in his
youth; for Will reckons every misfortune that he has met with among
the women, and every encounter among the men, as parts of his
education, and fancies he should never have been the man he is, had he
not broke windows, knocked down constables, disturbed honest people
with his midnight serenades, and beat up Phryne'e quarters, when he
was a young fellow. The engaging in adventures of this nature, Will
calls the studying of mankind, and terms this knowledge of the town,
the knowledge of the world. Will ingenuously confesses, that for half
his life his head ached every morning with reading of men over night;
and at present comforts himself under sundry infirmities with the
reflection that without them he could not have been acquainted with
the gallantries of the age. This Will looks upon as the learning of a
gentleman, and regards all other kinds of science as the
accomplishments of one whom he calls a scholar, a bookish man, or a
philosopher.
For these reasons Will shines in a mixed company, where he has the
discretion not to go out of his depth, and has often a certain way of
making his real ignorance appear a seeming one. Our club, however, has
frequently caught him tripping, at which times they never spare him.
For as Will often insults us with the knowledge of the town, we
sometimes take our revenge upon him by our knowledge of books.
He was last week producing two or three letters which he writ in his
youth to a coquette lady. The raillery of them was natural, and well
enough for a mere man of the town; but very unluckily, several of the
words were wrong spelt. Will laughed this off at first as well as he
could; but finding himself pushed on all sides, and especially by the
Templar, he told us with a little passion that he never liked pedantry
in spelling, and that he spelt like a gentleman and not like a
scholar: upon this Will had recourse to his old topic of showing the
narrow-spiritedness, the pride and ignorance, of pedants; which he
carried so far, that, upon my retiring to my lodgings, I could not
forbear throwing together such reflections as occurred to me upon
that subject.
A man who has been brought up among books, and is able to talk of
nothing else, is a very indifferent companion, and what we call a
pedant. But, methinks, we should enlarge the title, and give it to
every one that does not know how to think out of his profession and
particular way of life.
What is a greater pedant than a mere man of the town? Bar him the
play-houses, a catalog of the reigning beauties, and an account of a
few fashionable distempers that have befallen him, and you strike him
dumb. How many a pretty gentleman's knowledge lies all within the
verge of the court! He will tell you the names of the principal
favorites, repeat the shrewd sayings of a man of quality, whisper an
intrigue that is not yet blown upon by common fame; or, if the sphere
of his observation is a little larger than ordinary, will perhaps
enter into all the incidents, turns, and revolutions in a game of
ombre. When he has gone thus far, he has shown you the whole circle of
his accomplishments, his parts are drained, and he is disabled from
any further conversation. What are these but rank pedants? and yet
these are the men who value themselves most on their exemption from
the pedantry of colleges.
I might here mention the military pedant, who always talks in a camp,
and is storming towns, making lodgments, and fighting battles from one
end of the year to the other. Everything he speaks smells of
gunpowder: if you take away his artillery from him, he has not a word
to say for himself. I might likewise mention the law pedant, that is
perpetually putting eases, repeating the transactions of Westminster
Hall, wrangling with you upon the most indifferent circumstances of
life, and not to be convinced of the distance of a place, or of the
most trivial point in conversation, but by dint of argument. The state
pedant is wrapt up in news, and lost in politics. If you mention
either of the kings of Spain or Poland, he talks very notably; but if
you go out of the Gazette, you drop him. In short, a mere courtier, a
mere soldier, a mere scholar, a mere anything, is an insipid pedantic
character, and equally ridiculous.
Of all the species of pedants which I have mentioned, the book pedant
is much the most supportable: he has at least an exercised
understanding, and a head which is full tho confused, so that a man
who converses with him may often receive from him hints of things that
are worth knowing, and what he may possibly turn to his own advantage,
tho they are of little use to the owner. The worst kind of pedants
among learned men are such as are naturally endowed with a very small
share of common sense, and have read a great number of books without
taste or distinction....
My friend Will Honeycomb, who was so unmercifully witty upon the
women, in a couple of letters which I lately communicated to the
public, has given the ladies ample satisfaction by marrying a farmer's
daughter; a piece of news which came to our club by the last post. The
Templar is very positive that he has married a dairymaid; but Will, in
his letter to me on this occasion, sets the best face upon the matter
that he can, and gives a more tolerable account of his spouse. I must
confess I suspected something more than ordinary, when upon opening
the letter I found that Will was fallen off from his former gaiety,
having changed Dear Spec, which was his usual salute at the beginning
of the letter, into "_My worthy friend_," and subscribed himself at
the latter end of it, at full length, William Honeycomb. In short, the
gay, the loud, the vain Will Honeycomb, who had made love to every
great fortune that has appeared in town for above thirty years
together, and boasted of favors from ladies whom he had never seen, is
at length wedded to a plain country girl.
His letter gives us the picture of a converted rake. The sober
character of the husband is dashed with the man of the town, and
enlivened with those little cant phrases which have made my friend
Will often thought very pretty company. But let us hear what he says
for himself.
MY WORTHY FRIEND.
I question not but you, and the rest of my acquaintance,
wonder that I, who have lived in the smoke and gallantries
of the town for thirty years together, should all on a
sudden grow fond of a country life. Had not my dog of a
steward run away as he did, without making up his accounts,
I had still been immersed in sin and sea-coal. But since my
late forced visit to my estate, I am so pleased with it,
that I am resolved to live and die upon it. I am every day
abroad among my acres, and can scarce forbear filling my
letter with breezes, shades, flowers, meadows, and purling
streams. The simplicity of manners which I have heard you so
often speak of, and which appears here in perfection, charms
me wonderfully. As an instance of it, I must acquaint you,
and by your means the whole club, that I have lately married
one of my tenants' daughters. She is born of honest parents,
and tho she has no portion she has a great deal of virtue.
The natural sweetness and innocence of her behavior, the
freshness of her complexion, the unaffected turn of her
shape and person, shot me through and through every time I
saw her, and did more execution upon me in grogram than the
greatest beauty in town or court had ever done in brocade.
In short, she is such a one as promises me a good heir to my
estate; and if by her means I can not leave to my children
what are falsely called the gifts of birth, high titles and
alliances, I hope to convey to them the more real and
valuable gifts of birth, strong bodies and healthy
constitutions. As for your fine women, I need not tell thee
that I know them. I have had my share in their graces, but
no more of that. It shall be my business hereafter to live
the life of an honest man, and to act as becomes the master
of a family. I question not but I shall draw upon me the
raillery of the town, and be treated to the tune of "_The
Marriage-hater match'd_"; but I am prepared for it. I have
been as witty upon others in my time. To tell thee truly, I
saw such a tribe of fashionable young fluttering coxcombs
shot up, that I did not think my post of an _homme de
ruelle_ any longer tenable. I felt a certain stiffness in my
limbs, which entirely destroyed that jauntiness of air I
was once master of. Besides, for I may now confess my age to
thee, I have been eight and forty above these twelve years.
Since my retirement into the country will make a vacancy in
the club, I could wish you would fill up my place with my
friend Tom Dapperwit. He has an infinite deal of fire, and
knows the town. For my own part, as I have said before, I
shall endeavor to live hereafter suitable to a man in my
station, as a prudent head of a family, a good husband, a
careful father (when it shall so happen), and as
Your most sincere friend and humble servant,
WILLIAM HONEYCOMB.
III
PRIDE OF BIRTH[117]
Horace, Juvenal, Boileau, and indeed the greatest writers in almost
every age, have exposed with all the strength of wit and good sense,
the vanity of a man's valuing himself upon his ancestors, and
endeavored to show that true nobility consists in virtue, not in
birth. With submission, however, to so many great authorities, I think
they have pushed this matter a little too far. We ought in gratitude
to honor the posterity of those who have raised either the interest or
reputation of their country, and by whose labors we ourselves are more
happy, wise, or virtuous than we should have been without them.
Besides, naturally speaking, a man bids fairer for greatness of soul,
who is the descendant of worthy ancestors, and has good blood in his
veins, than one who is come of an ignoble and obscure parentage. For
these reasons, I think a man of merit, who is derived from an
illustrious line, is very justly to be regarded more than a man of
equal merit who has no claim to hereditary honors. Nay, I think those
who are indifferent in themselves, and have nothing else to
distinguish them but the virtues of their forefathers, are to be
looked upon with a degree of veneration even upon that account, and to
be more respected than the common run of men who are of low and vulgar
extraction.
After having thus ascribed due honors to birth and parentage, I must,
however, take notice of those who arrogate to themselves more honors
than are due to them upon this account. The first are such who are not
enough sensible that vice and ignorance taint the blood, and that an
unworthy behavior degrades and disennobles a man in the eyes of the
world, as much as birth and family aggrandize and exalt him.
The second are those who believe a _new_ man of an elevated merit is
not more to be honored than an insignificant and worthless man who is
descended from a long line of patriots and heroes; or, in other words,
behold with contempt a person who is such a man as the first founder
of their family was, upon whose reputation they value themselves.
But I shall chiefly apply myself to those whose quality sits uppermost
in all their discourses and behavior. An empty man of a great family
is a creature that is scarce conversible. You read his ancestry in
his smile, in his air, in his eyebrow. He has, indeed, nothing but his
nobility to give employment to his thoughts. Rank and precedency are
the important points which he is always discussing within himself. A
gentleman of this turn began a speech in one of King Charles's
parliaments: "Sir, I had the honor to be born at a time"--upon which a
rough, honest gentleman took him up short, "I would fain know what
that gentleman means: is there any one in this house that has _not_
had the honor to be born as well as himself?" The good sense which
reigns in our nation has pretty well destroyed this starched behavior
among men who have seen the world, and know that every gentleman will
be treated upon a foot of equality. But there are many who have had
their education among women, dependents or flatterers, that lose all
the respect which would otherwise be paid them by being too assiduous
in procuring it.
My Lord Froth has been so educated in punctilio, that he governs
himself by a ceremonial in all the ordinary occurrences of life. He
measures out his bow to the degree of the person he converses with. I
have seen him in every inclination of the body, from a familiar nod to
the low stoop in the salutation-sign. I remember five of us, who were
acquainted with one another, met together one morning at his lodgings,
when a wag of the company was saying, it would be worth while to
observe how he would distinguish us at his first entrance.
Accordingly, he no sooner came into the room, but, casting his eye
about, "My lord such a one (says he) your most humble servant.--Sir
Richard, your humble servant.--Your servant, Mr. Ironside.--Mr.
Ducker, how do you do?--Hah! Frank, are you there?"
There is nothing more easy than to discover a man whose head is full
of his family. Weak minds that have imbibed a strong tincture of the
nursery, younger brothers that have been brought up to nothing,
superannuated retainers to a great house, have generally their
thoughts taken up with little else.