may be dismissed at once as utterly irreconcilable with the context,

besides being villanous rhodomontade. The context lets us know very

plainly what the meaning of the first line must be. “A plot,” says

Edgar, “on the life of her husband, the best of men! and a marriage

with my brother, the greatest scoundrel unhanged! Oh, workings

of woman’s will, past all finding out--past all distinguishing!”

“Oh, unfathomable depth;” “Oh, unintelligible tortuosity;” “Oh,

undistinguishable limits;” that we believe to be the meaning of

“_Oh, undistinguished space_ of woman’s will.” The text requires no

amendment; and we would merely suggest _ways_ or _depth_ as a gloss,

and not as a substitute for “space.”

OTHELLO.--_Act I. Scene 1._--The old corrector sometimes passes over

lines which present intolerable difficulties. We wish, in particular,

that he had favoured us with his sentiments on that line which has

baffled all mankind, in which Iago describes Cassio as

“A fellow almost damned in a fair wife.”

Difficulty first, Cassio was _not married_! Difficulty second,

Supposing him to be married, why should he be either almost or

altogether damned in a fair wife? Difficulty third, Why, if damned

at all, should he be only _almost_, and not _completely_, damned in

her? These are points on which the old scholiast has not attempted

to throw any light. Cassio, it is well known, had a mistress. Is it

possible, then, that Shakespeare should use “wife” in the sense of

mistress or woman? That supposition might remove the difficulty. As

it is, all attempts to amend the line have hitherto been abortive. It

still stands the _opprobrium criticorum_.

After trying his hand very unsuccessfully on one or two passages, the

MS. corrector comes to the lines in which Desdemona is described by

Roderigo as

“Tying her duty, beauty, wit, and fortunes,

In an extravagant and _wheeling_ stranger

Of here and everywhere.”

Mr Collier says: “Here the commentators have notes upon

‘extravagant,’ but pass over ‘wheeling’ without explanation, although

_very unintelligible_ where it stands.” He then remarks that

“_wheedling_ (the MS. correction for ‘wheeling’) is an important

improvement of the text.” Few people, we imagine, will agree with

Mr Collier in thinking either that “wheeling” is unintelligible, or

that _wheedling_ is an improvement. “A wheeling stranger of here

and everywhere” is as plain, and, at the same time, as poetical a

periphrasis for _a vagabond_ as can be well conceived. We may be

_certain_ that the text as it stands is the language of Shakespeare.

Proceeding onwards, we meet with nothing which can be recommended

for the text, and little which attracts our attention, until we

come to the expression, “A super-subtle Venetian,” which is Iago’s

designation for Desdemona. The old corrector makes him call her “a

_super-supple_ Venetian”! But, if his own good taste could not keep

the old gentleman right, surely the context might have done so. Iago

says--“An erring barbarian (_i. e._ Othello) and a super-subtle

Venetian” (_i. e._ Desdemona). There is here a fine opposition

between barbarism and subtlety; but what opposition, what relation of

any kind, is there between barbarism and _suppleness_?

_Act II. Scene 3._--Othello, in a state of excitement, says--

“And passion having my best judgment _collied_,”

for which the MS. correction is _quelled_. Mr Collier says, “There

can hardly be a doubt that this is the proper restoration.” Whereupon

Mr Singer observes pathetically--and we quite agree with him--“I pity

the man who could for a moment think of displacing the effective and

now consecrated word _collied_. Its obvious meaning is _darkened_,

_obfuscated_; and a more appropriate and expressive word could not

have been used.”

_Act IV. Scene 1._--Othello, when the pretended proofs of Desdemona’s

guilt are accumulating upon him, and just before he falls into a

fit, exclaims, “Nature would not invest herself in such _shadowing_

passion without some instruction.” Johnson thus explains the place,

“It is not _words_ which shake me thus. This passion which spreads

its clouds over me, is the effect of some agency more than the

_operation of words_: it is one of these notices which men have of

unseen calamities.” How near does that come to Campbell’s fine line,

“And coming events cast their _shadows_ before.”

Yet “shadowing” is to be deleted, and _shuddering_ substituted in its

room. No, no, thou shadow--but not of Shakespeare--we cannot afford

to be mulcted of so much fine poetry.

_Scene 2._--We might have called attention more frequently, as we

went along, to many instances which prove, what we have now not the

smallest doubt of, that these new readings were never at all intended

by the MS. corrector to be viewed as _restorations_ of Shakespeare’s

text; but simply as _avowed departures_ from his language, admitted

innovations, which might better suit the tastes, as he thought, of

a _progenies vitiosior_. That they were designed as restitutions of

the true Shakespearian dialect is a pure hypothesis on the part of

Mr Collier. It receives no countenance whatever from the handiwork

of his corrector, whom, therefore, we exculpate from the crime of

forgery, although his offences against good taste and common sense

remain equally reprehensible. Mr Collier, we conceive, is greatly to

blame for having mistaken so completely his _protégé’s_ intention. As

an instance of a new reading in which the text is merely modernised,

and certainly not restored, take the following, where Desdemona,

speaking of Othello, says,

“How have I been behaved, that he might stick

The small’st opinion on my greatest abuse?”

This is the reading of the quartos. The folios have,

“The small’st opinion on my _least misuse_.”

The latter of which words the corrector changes into _misdeed_,

as more intelligible to the ears of the groundlings subsequent to

Shakespeare.

_Act V. Scene 2._--Æmilia, after the murder of Desdemona, declares

that she will not hold her peace,

“No, I will speak as liberal as the _north_.”

The old quarto reads _air_. The MS. corrector reads _wind_. “Why, we

may ask,” says Mr Collier, “should the old corrector make the change,

inasmuch as no reasonable objection may be urged against the use of

‘north,’ which he deletes, not in favour of ‘air’ of the quarto 1622,

but in favour of _wind_? We may presume that he altered the word

because he had heard the line repeated in that manner on the stage.”

That is not at all unlikely. Actors sometimes take considerable

liberties with the text of their parts, and they probably did so

in the time of Shakespeare as well as now. A player might use _the

north_, or _the air_, or _the wind_, according as the one or other of

these words came most readily to his mouth. But that proves nothing

in regard to the authentic text of Shakespeare. For this we must look

to his _published_ works in their earliest impressions. We attach

little or no importance to the mere players’ alterations, even though

Mr Collier should be able to prove (what he is not) that many of his

corrector’s emendations were playhouse variations, for these were

much more likely to have had their origin in individual caprice than

in any more authoritative source.

* * * * *

ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.--_Act I. Scene 2._--Before changing the

following passage,

“The present pleasure,

By _revolution lowering_, does become

The opposite of itself,”

we should require better authority than that of the MS. corrector,

who reads,

“The present pleasure,

By _repetition souring_, does become

The opposite of itself.”

This, however, is one of his most specious emendations. But the

words, “by revolution lowering,” are sufficiently intelligible,--and

are indeed a very fine poetical expression for the instability of

human pleasure.

_Scene 3._--Antony says to Cleopatra, who seems to doubt his love,

“My precious queen, forbear,

And give true _evidence_ to his love which stands

An honourable trial”--

that is, bear true witness to my love. The MS. corrector changes

“evidence” into _credence_, as better suited to the popular

apprehension, though much less pleasing to the discriminating reader.

There cannot be a doubt as to which of the words is Shakespeare’s.

_Scene 5._--“An _arm-gaunt_ steed” has puzzled the commentators.

Of all the substitutes proposed, _termagant_ is perhaps the best.

_Arrogant_, suggested by Mr Boaden, and adopted by Mr Singer, is also

worthy of consideration. Either of these words harmonises with the

character of the animal “who neigh’d so high.” Sir T. Hanmer and the

old corrector read _arm-girt_.

_Act II. Scene 2._--In the description of Cleopatra in her barge, it

is said,

“The silken tackles

_Swell_ with the touches of those flower-soft hands

That yarely frame the office.”

Mr Collier says, “we ought _undoubtedly_, with the old corrector, to

amend the text to

‘_Smell_ with the touches of the flower-soft hands.’”

Truly there _is_ no accounting for tastes!

_Scene 7._--“When Antony,” says Mr Collier, “during the debauch,

says to Cæsar, ‘Be a child o’ the time,’ Cæsar replies rather

unintelligibly,

‘_Possess it_, I’ll make answer; but I had rather fast

From all, four days, than drink so much in one.’

What does he mean by telling Antony ‘to possess it?’” His meaning

is quite obvious; he means, _Be master of it_. “Be a child of the

time,” says Antony. “Rather be its master, say I,” rejoins Cæsar--a

sentiment much more likely to come from the lips of the great

dictator than the paltry rejoinder which the old corrector puts into

his mouth--“_Profess it_”--that is, profess to be the child of the

time.

_Act III. Scene 4._--Antony, complaining of Cæsar’s unjust treatment,

says,

“When the best hint was given him, he _not took’t_,

Or did it from his teeth;”

that is, when the most favourable representations of my conduct were

made to him, he heeded them not, or merely put on the appearance of

attending to them. The corrector reads, “_but looked_;” yet, although

the folio 1623 has “he _not looked_,” we may be pretty sure that the

text, as given above, is the right reading, as it is assuredly the

only one which makes sense.

_Scene 6._--Cæsar expresses his dissatisfaction with the want of

ceremony with which Octavia has been received on her entrance into

Rome.

“But you are come

A market-maid to Rome, and have prevented

The ostentation of our love, which left, unshown,

Is often _left_ unlov’d.”

For “left” the corrector reads _held_, and Mr Singer proposes

_felt_. But if either of these emendations were adopted, we should

require to read, “is often felt _unloving_,” and this the measure

will not permit. We therefore stand by the old text, the meaning

of which we conceive to be--love which is left unshown is often

left _unreturned_. “Wrong led” is better suited to its place than

_wrongèd_, the MS. correction.

_Scene 11._--Enobarbus, ridiculing the idea that Cæsar will accept

Antony’s challenge to meet him in single combat, says,

“That he should dream,

Knowing all _measures_, the full Cæsar will

Answer his emptiness”--

that is, it is surprising that Antony, who has experienced every

measure of fortune, has drunk of her fullest as well as of her

emptiest cup, should dream that the _full_ Cæsar will answer _his

emptiness_. Here the words _full_ and _emptiness_ prove to a

demonstration that “measure” is the right word; yet the MS. corrector

alters it to _miseries_! Mr Collier remarks, in his supplementary

notes, “Still, it may be fit to hesitate before _miseries_ for

‘measures’ is introduced into the text.” We see no ground for a

moment’s hesitation. _Miseries_ is seen at a glance to be altogether

unendurable.

In the same scene, somewhat further on, we think that the word

_deputation_ ought to take the place of “disputation.” This was

Warburton’s amendment; and the MS. correction coincides with it.

_Act IV. Scene 4._--“Antony,” says Mr Collier, “enters calling for

his armour; ‘Mine armour, Eros;’ and when the man brings it, Antony

is made to say in the old copies, ‘Put _thine_ iron on;’ but surely

it ought to be as a manuscript note gives it, ‘Put _mine_ iron on.’”

Not at all; either word will do; but “thine” is more consonant with

ordinary usage. A gentleman asks his butler, not “have you cleaned

_my_ plate?” but “have you cleaned _your_ plate?” meaning, my plate

of which _you_ have the charge. Eros had the charge of Antony’s

armour. We agree with the corrector, that the words, “What is this

for?” should be given to Cleopatra, who is assisting to buckle on

Antony’s armour, and not to Antony, to whom they are assigned in the

_variorum_ edition 1785. “_Bear_ a storm” for “_hear_ a storm,” the

common reading, is a very unnecessary change.

_Scene 8._--_Gests_ (gesta, exploits) for “guests” is highly to be

commended in the lines where Antony says,

“We have beat him to his camp. Run one before

And let the queen know of our _gests_.”

This emendation by the old corrector ought to take its place in the

text: and he should get the credit of it, although, as a proposed

reading, it may be, as Mr Singer says, already well known.

_Scene 9._--_Fore sleep_ instead of “for sleep,” is also entitled to

very favourable consideration.

_Scene 12._--_Composed_ for “disposed,” is the text _modernised_, not

restored.

_Scene 13._--Cleopatra declares that she will never be led in triumph

by Cæsar, as an object of scorn to the proud patrician dames.

“Your wife, Octavia, with her modest eyes,

And _still conclusion_, shall acquire no honour

Demuring upon me.”

How good is that expression “still conclusion”! That lady of yours,

looking demurely upon me with her modest eyes, and _drawing her quiet

inferences_, shall acquire no honour from the contrast between my

fate with her own. And yet we are called upon by the MS. corrector

to give up these pregnant words for the vapid substitution of “still

_condition_!” This, we say, is no fair exchange, but downright

robbery.

When Cleopatra and her women are endeavouring to raise the dying

Antony into the monument, the Egyptian queen exclaims,

“_Here’s sport indeed!_ How heavy weighs my lord.”

Johnson’s note on this place is remarkable, as an instance of want

of judgment in a man whose sagacity was very rarely at fault. He

says, “I suppose the meaning of these strange words is, _here’s_

trifling; _you_ do not work _in earnest_.” No interpretation could

well go wider of the mark than this. Steevens says that she speaks

with an “affected levity.” It would be truer to say that she speaks

from that bitterness of heart which frequently finds a vent for

itself in irony. The MS. corrector reads, “Here’s _port_ indeed,”

which Mr Collier explains by saying, “Here Shakespeare appears to

have employed _port_ as a substantive to indicate weight.” But “it

would astonish me, and many more,” says Mr Singer, “if Mr Collier

should succeed in finding _port_ used for a load or weight in the

whole range of English literature.” We might add, that even although

authority could be found for it, the proposed reading would still be

utterly indefensible--

“Here’s _port_ (i. e. _weight_) indeed! how _heavy weighs_ my lord!”

This is as bad as “_old_ Goody Blake was _old_ and poor.” Mr Singer

proposes, “Here’s _support_ indeed,” which we can by no means approve

of, as it seems to have no sense.

_Act V. Scene 2._--Although the text of the following lines is not

very satisfactory, we greatly prefer it to the old corrector’s

amendment. Cleopatra, contemplating suicide, says,

“It is great

To do that thing that ends all other deeds,

Which shackles accidents, and bolts up change;

Which sleeps, and never palates more the _dung_,

The beggar’s nurse and Cæsar’s.”

“Dung” here is probably used contemptuously, and must be taken in

a wide sense for food in general. As bread is raised from manure,

man, who lives by bread, may be said to feed on manure. The sense

probably is--It is great to do the thing (suicide) which causes us

to sleep, and never more to taste the produce of the earth, which

nourishes alike Cæsar and the beggar. The MS. correction is _dug_,

which was long ago suggested, and which certainly does not mend

matters. This new reading affords no extrication of the construction,

“which sleeps,” which we have ventured to explain as “which _lays us_

asleep, and _causes us_ never more to palate or taste,” &c.

_Scene 2._--

“A grief that shoots

My very heart at root,”

is perhaps judiciously altered into “a grief that smites.” The old

copies read “suites.” This emendation was also proposed by the late

Mr Barron Field.

* * * * *

CYMBELINE.--_Act I. Scene 5._--“We here encounter,” says Mr Collier,

“the first MS. emendation of _much value_.” Iachimo has remarked,

that the marriage of Posthumus with the king’s daughter, from whom,

however, he has been divorced, tends to raise Posthumus in the public

estimation. “And then his banishment,” says the Frenchman. “Ay,” adds

Iachimo, “and the approbation of those that weep this lamentable

divorce _under her colours_ are wonderfully to extend him;” that

is, his banishment, and the approbation of those _of his wife’s

party_ (this is the meaning of “under her colours”), who weep this

lamentable divorce, help to enhance still further the opinion of his

merits. The old corrector thus disfigures the passage: “Ay, and the

_approbations_ of those that weep this lamentable divorce, _and her

dolours_, are _wont_ wonderfully to extend him.” The old corrector’s

mental vision does not seem to be capable of taking in more than a

quarter of an inch of the text at once. He saw that the verb “are”

required a plural nominative, hence he reads “approbations.” But he

might have avoided this barbarism had he extended his optical range,

so as to comprehend the word “banishment” in the preceding speech.

The two words, “banishment” and “approbation,” are surely entitled to

be followed by the verb “are.”

Of a piece with this is the next. Posthumus is defying Iachimo to

make good his boast that he will overcome the chastity of Imogen.

He says, “If you make your voyage upon her, and give me directly to

understand you have prevailed, I am no further your enemy.” This is

converted into, “if you _make good your vauntage_ upon her,” &c. And

this is a _restitution_ of the language of Shakespeare!

_Scene 7._--When Iachimo is introduced to Imogen he exclaims,

“What, are men mad? Hath nature given them eyes

To see this vaulted arch, and the rich _crop_

Of sea and land, which can distinguish ’twixt

The fiery orbs above and the twinn’d stones

Upon the _numbered_ beach; and can we not

Partition make with spectacles so precious

’Twixt fair and foul?”

In this passage _cope_ has been proposed for “crop,” and _unnumbered_

for “numbered,” by several of the commentators, and among them

by Mr Collier’s anonymous corrector. We are of opinion that in

neither of the places ought the text to be altered. _Cope_ is a

mere repetition of the “vaulted arch,” and must, therefore, be set

aside as tautological. “Numbered” is more difficult. Let us consider

the bearing of the whole speech. It has a sinister reference to

Posthumus, the husband of Imogen, the lady in whose presence the

speech is uttered. “How can Posthumus,” says Iachimo, “with such a

wife as this--this Imogen--take up with the vile slut who now holds

him in her clutches? Are men mad--with senses so fine that they can

distinguish, or separate from each other, the fiery orbs above; and

also so acute that they can distinguish between the ‘twinned’ (or

closely resembling) stones which _can be counted_ upon the beach;

‘with spectacles’--that is, with eyes--so precious, are they yet

unable (as Posthumus seems to be) to make partition ’twixt a fair

wife and a foul mistress?” The words, “which can distinguish ’twixt

the fiery orbs above and the twinned stones,” do not mean that

we have senses so fine that we can distinguish between stars and

stones, but senses so fine that we can count, or distinguish from one

another, the stars themselves; and can also perceive a difference

in the pebbles on the beach, though these be as like to one another

as so many peas. This interpretation brings out clearly the sense

of the expression, “_numbered_ beach;” it means the beach on which

the pebbles can be numbered; indeed, are numerically separated by

us from each other, in spite of their homogeneousness, so delicate

is our organ of vision by which they are apprehended; “yet,”

concludes Iachimo, as the moral of his reflections, “with organs

thus discriminating, my friend Posthumus has, nevertheless, gone

most lamentably astray.” This explanation renders the substitution

of _unnumbered_ not only unnecessary, but contradictory. We cannot

be too cautious how we tamper with the received text of Shakespeare.

Even though a passage may continue unintelligible to us for years,

the chances are a hundred to one that the original lection contains a

more pregnant meaning than any that we can propose in its place.

Mr Collier is of opinion that the MS. corrector’s _bo-peeping_ is

preferable to “by-peeping” or “lie peeping.” We cannot at all agree

with him. “By-peeping” is Shakespeare’s phrase, “lie peeping” is

Johnson’s amendment. Either will do; and an editor ought not to go

out of his way to make himself ridiculous.[15] A few lines further

on, the substitution of _pay_ for “play” is quite unnecessary, as Mr

Collier himself admits in one of his supplementary notes. Neither is

_contemn_ any improvement upon “condemn.”

_Act II. Scene 2._--“Swift, swift,” says Iachimo--

“Swift, swift, you dragons of the night! that dawning

May _bare_ the raven’s eye.”

The MS. correction is, “may _dare_ the raven’s eye”--_i. e._, says

Mr Collier, may _dazzle_ the eye of the raven. Surely the old

commentator must here have been driven to his wits’ end. We have

little doubt that “the _raven’s_ eye” here means the _night’s_ eye.

“May bare the raven’s eye”--that is, may open the eye of darkness,

and thus usher in the day. Has not Milton got “smoothing the _raven_

down of _darkness_ till it smiled?” This interpretation must be

placed to the credit of Mr Singer (_Shakespeare Vindicated_, &c., p.

304), although it had occurred previously to ourselves.

_Scene 5._--Instead of the line,

“Like a full-acorn’d boar--a _German_ one,”

which is the common reading, the corrector proposes “a _foaming_

one.” Mr Singer suggests “a _brimeing_ (_i. e._, a rutting) one,” and

this we greatly prefer. _Iarmen_ is the original text--a word without

any meaning.

_Act III. Scene 4._--The competing versions of the following lines,

in which the MS. corrector’s is pitted against the original text,

have given rise to much controversy and speculation. Mr Halliwell

has written an ingenious, and, we believe, an exhaustive pamphlet on

this single point. He advocates the old reading. We cannot say that

we consider his arguments altogether convincing, or that he has been

able to adduce any very _pat_ parallelism, placing the point beyond

all doubt; but we believe that he has made the most of his case, and

that if he has not produced any such evidence, it is because there is

none to produce. We agree with Mr Halliwell’s conclusion, in so far

as it rejects the MS. correction; but we advocate the retention of

the original reading, simply because it is the text, and because we

know _for certain_ that the old corrector had no authority for his

emendation except his own brains, generally addled, and not enjoying,

in even this instance, a short interval of comparative lucidity.

The passage is this: Imogen, supposing that her husband Posthumus has

been led astray by some Italian courtesan, exclaims indignantly and

sarcastically--

“Some jay of Italy,

Whose _mother was her painting_, hath betray’d him;

Poor I am stale, a garment out of fashion.”

We take it that “mother” here means _Italy_, and that “painting”

means _model_; so that the gloss on the passage should run thus:

Some jay of Italy, to whom Italy (_i. e._ Italian manners) was the

model according to which she shaped her morals and her conduct,

hath betrayed him. That this, or something like it, is the meaning,

is confirmed by what follows--“Poor I am stale, a garment _out of

fashion_;” that is, the new fashions, the new-fangled ways, are to

be found only in Italy, and doubtless that daughter of Italy--that

jay or imitative creature by whom Posthumus is now enslaved--is a

considerable proficient in those fashionable and novel methods of

conquest. This, we conceive, is nearer the meaning than the ordinary

interpretation given by Dr Johnson, which represents this “jay”

as “the creature not of nature but of painting.” At any rate, if

we adopt Johnson’s meaning, we must change _was_ into _is_, and

read--“whose mother _is_ her painting.”

Again, perhaps the meaning is this: Some jay of Italy,--whose mother,

_i. e._ whose birthplace (the renowned, the fashionable Italy) was

her painting--_i. e._ was the adornment, the attraction, which

allured my husband to her arms,--hath betrayed him. This, on second

thoughts, we consider the best interpretation. But we allow the

other to stand, as a specimen of _groping_ towards the truth.

The MS. corrector’s version is--“who _smothers her with painting_;”

but if this had stood in the printer’s manuscript, it is exceedingly

unlikely that he would have blundered it into the text as we now have

it. Moreover, there is a prosaic vulgarity about the expression which

smacks much more of the old corrector, and of his notions of what

would suit a popular assembly, than of the genius of Shakespeare. We

may be _certain_ that there is no allusion to _rouge_ in the passage;

and therefore we contend for the retention of the original text, as

neither irreconcilable with good sense, nor alien, but rather the

reverse, from Shakespeare’s occasional modes of expression.

When Imogen says that Posthumus had made her

“Put into contempt the suits

Of princely _fellows_,”

she means, of princely _equals_. This is undoubted. Posthumus

was beneath her in rank; yet, for his sake, she had declined the

proposals of suitors as highborn as herself. “Fellows” is modernised

into _followers_. The change of “_pretty, and_ full of view,” into

_privy, yet_ full of view, is a sensible emendation, yet we hesitate

to recommend it for the text. Pisanio tells Imogen that when she

disguises herself as a youth she must “change _fear_ and niceness

into a waggish _courage_.” The word “fear” here seems to prove that

“courage” is the right reading. The MS. correction is “waggish

_carriage_.”

_Scene 6._--Imogen, disguised, says,

“I see a man’s life is a tedious one,

I have _tired_ myself; and for two nights together

Have made the ground my bed.”

“Tired” should be _’tired_--_i. e._ altered myself like a boy. But

this is not a new reading. The word is the same, whether printed

_tired_ or _’tired_.

_Act IV. Scene 1._--Cloten speaking of Imogen, says, “Yet this

_imperseverant_ thing (_i. e._, Imogen) loves him (_i. e._,

Posthumus) in my despight.” “Imperseverant” is explained by Messrs

Dyce and Arrowsmith to mean _undiscerning_. The latter, says Mr

Singer, “has adduced (in _Gnats and Queries_, vol. vii. p. 400)

numerous instances of the use of _perseverance_ for _discernment_.”

The MS. substitution of “_perverse errant_” seems, therefore, to be

quite uncalled for.

_Scene 2._--Arviragus says that the redbreast will bring flowers--

“Yea, and furred moss besides, when flowers are none,

To winter-ground thy corse.”

That is, the corse of Imogen, who is supposed to be dead. “To

_winter-ground_ a plant,” says Steevens, “is to protect it from

the inclemency of the winter season by straw, &c.” This is quite

satisfactory, and renders the correction _winter-guard_ unnecessary.

The change of “so” into _lo_ may be accepted in the speech of Imogen

when she awakens from her trance.

_Act V. Scene 1._--The last passage on which the old corrector tries

his hand is this. He can make nothing of it, nor can we, nor, so far

as we know, can any one else. Posthumus, addressing the gods, says--

“Alack,

You snatch some hence for little faults; that’s love,

To have them fall no more; you some permit

To second ills with ills, each _elder_ worse,

And make them _dread it_, to the doer’s thrift.”

There is no difficulty with “elder;” it, of course, means, each crime

being worse than its predecessor. “And make them dread it,” &c.; this

may mean--and make them go on inspiring dread, to the profit of the

doer; or, as Steevens explains it, “To make them _dread it_ is to

make them _persevere in the commission of dreadful crimes_.” This,

it must be confessed, is not satisfactory; but we like it quite as

well as the MS. emendation. “And make _men_ dread it, to the doer’s

thrift.” But whatever may be the merit of this new reading, the

change of “elder” into _later_ is, at any rate, quite uncalled for.

Neither can we assent to Mr Singer’s amendment of the place, which

is--

“You some permit

To second ills with ills each _alder-worst_;

And make them _dreaded_ to the doer’s _shrift_.”

On the whole, it is certainly safest to let the old text stand as it

is, until something better can be suggested.

* * * * *

Having now washed our hands as clean as we possibly could of the

old MS. corrector, we must, in proceeding to dry them--that is, to

sum up--first of all notice whether there be not very small specks

of dirt still sticking to them. We are sorry to say that there are

several. In our anxiety to do every justice to the old scholiast,

and in our determination to redeem to the uttermost the pledge which

we came under to him and to our readers--namely, to bring forward

everything which told in the remotest way in his favour--we find

that we have somewhat overshot the mark; we have fulfilled our

obligation in terms too ample; we have been too indulgent to this

shadowy sinner, whose very skeleton Apollo and the nine muses are

now, no doubt, flaying alive in Hades, if they have not done so long

ago. In a word, we have something to retract: not, however, anything

that has been said _against_ him, but one or two small things that

have been said _for_ him. And, therefore, as we are not altogether a

character like old Kirkaldy of Grange, whom the chronicles describe

as “ane stoute man, and always ready to defend at the point of the

sword whatever he had said,” we may as well eat in our leek at once,

without more ado.

We speak at present only of those readings (and fortunately they

are very small and very few) which we countenanced or recommended

for the text on the authority of the old MS. corrector. In most

cases, any mere favourable opinion which we may have expressed of

some of the new readings we shall allow to stand, for such opinions

are unchanged, and the expression of them was very far from being a

recommendation of these readings for the text. It is only the text

which we are now solicitous about; and, therefore, insignificant as

the sentiments of any humble reviewer may be, still, for the credit

of the periodical in which he writes, and also lest the text of

Shakespeare should run any risk of being compromised at his hands, it

is his duty to retract his opinions to whatever extent he may feel

that they have been rather inconsiderately advanced.

We approved, in the first instance, of “get” for _let_,

(_Blackwood’s Magazine_, Aug., p. 188); that approbation we retract.

“Portent-like,” the common reading, is better than either _potent

like_ or _potently_, (_Blackwood’s Magazine_, p. 195). “Sheer ale,”

and not _shire ale_, (_Blackwood’s Magazine_, p. 198), should hold

the text. Katherine’s answer to Petruchio (_Blackwood’s Magazine_,

p. 199) is all right and ought not to be changed. “Supplications in

the quill” ought to keep its place in the text against Mr Singer’s

_in the coil_, (_Blackwood’s Magazine_, September, p. 315). “In the

quill,” simply means _in writing_, as Steevens long ago told us. We

observe nothing more that we feel called upon to retract.

This deduction leaves, as nearly as we can count them, _thirty_

new readings at the credit of the old corrector. We believe that

the whole of these might be placed in the text without the risk of

damaging it in any very perceptible degree; a few of them would

improve it: indeed, some of the best of them were introduced into

it long ago, while others have been suggested independently of the

old corrector. So that his contributions to the improvement of

Shakespeare are, after all, not very considerable. The only two

really valuable and original emendations which he has proposed seem

to us to be--_these welling heavens_, for “the swelling heavens,”

(_Blackwood’s Magazine_, p. 310), and _thirst_ complaint, for “first

complaint,” (_Blackwood’s Magazine_, p. 321.)

This, then, is all that we obtain after winnowing this old savage’s

“elements of criticism:” _two_ respectable emendations out of _twenty

thousand_ (for at that figure Mr Collier calculates them) blundering

attempts, all of which, except these two and a very few others, hit

the nail straight upon the point, instead of right upon the head.

One thing we at any rate now know, that the conjectural criticism

of England must have been at its lowest possible ebb during the

seventeenth century, if this nameless old Aristarchus is to be looked

upon as its representative, or was president of the Royal Society of

Literature.

The concluding question is,--What rank is this scholiast entitled

to hold among the commentators, great and small, on Shakespeare?

And the answer is, that he is not entitled to hold any rank at all

among them. He cannot be placed, even at a long interval, behind

the very worst of them. He is blown and thrown out of the course

before he reaches the distance-post. He is disqualified not only by

his incompetency, but by his virtually avowed determination not to

_restore_ to Shakespeare his original language, but to _take away_

from Shakespeare his original language, and to substitute his own

crudities in the place of it. We are as certain that this was his

intention and his practice, as if we had been told so by himself.

That he was an early scholiast is certain. It is also in the highest

degree probable--indeed, undoubted, as Mr Knight has suggested--that

he was in his prime (_his_ prime!) during the Commonwealth, when

the Puritans had the ascendancy, and the theatres were closed. That

he had been a hanger-on of the theatres in bygone days, and that

he hoped to be a hanger-on of them again, is also pretty clear. So

there he sat during the slack time polishing away at Shakespeare,

“nursing his wrath to keep it warm,” biding his time till Charlie

should come over the water again, and theatricals revive. We can have

some sympathy with that, but none with the occupation in which he was

engaged--paring and pruning the darling of the universe--shaving and

trimming him; taming down the great bard in such a way as to make

him more acceptable to the tastes, as he thought, of a more refined,

if not a more virtuous generation. For this kind of work we have no

toleration. This critic was evidently the first of that school of

modernisers of the text of Shakespeare which, commencing with him,

culminated and fell in Davenant and Dryden, never more, it is to be

hoped, to rise.

With regard to Mr Collier we shall just remark, that although he has

obviously committed a mistake (“to err is human,” &c.) in attaching

any value to these new readings, and has plainly been imposed upon

in thinking them _restorations_ of Shakespeare, still his mistake is

not irretrievable, and ought not to make the public forgetful of the

antecedent services which he has rendered to our genuine Shakesperian

literature. His learning is undoubted; and his judgment, if not

very acute, is sound, if he will but allow it fair play, and obey

its behests as faithfully as he formerly did, when he adhered with

the tenacity of a man of sense to the authorised and undoubted text.

This now appears to us, and, we should imagine, to every one else who

has attended to the new readings, as greatly less corrupt than, on a

slighter inspection, we have been in the habit of supposing. We can

only answer for ourselves; but this we can say, that the ineffectual

operations of the old MS. corrector have opened our eyes to a depth

of purity and correctness in the received text of Shakespeare, of

which we had formerly no suspicion; and _that_ is the true good which

the proceedings of this old bungler have effected--they have settled

for ever the question as to the purity and trustworthiness of the

ordinary editions of Shakespeare. We now believe that the text of no

author in the world is so immaculate as that of our great national

poet, or stands in less need of emendation, or departs so little

from the words of its original composer. Mr Collier, too, thought

so once--let him think so again, and his authority will instantly

recover: this transient cloud will pass away.

In regard to his edition of Shakespeare, which, we believe, is

by this time published with the MS. corrector’s perversions

inserted in the text, that is now a blunder past all mending. We

can only say this of it, that effectual precautions having been

now taken by others, and by us, to prevent this publication from

ever becoming the _standard_ edition of Shakespeare, we do not

grudge it any amount of success which may fall to its share. We are

rather desirous to promote its interests, knowing that it can now

do no harm, and will not speedily come to a reprint. Even now it

must be a very singular book. Hereafter it will be an exceedingly

remarkable book--one entitled to take high rank among the morbid

curiosities of literature, and to stand on the same shelf--fit

companion--with Bentley’s edition of Milton. The serious truth is,

that no Shakesperian collection can be complete without it. Every

Shakesperian collector ought, beyond a doubt, to provide himself

with a copy. People who intend to be satisfied with only _one_

Shakespeare, ought certainly not to take up with this edition;

but those who can indulge themselves with several copies, ought

unquestionably to purchase it. We say this in all seriousness and

gravity, notwithstanding the riddling which we have thought it

incumbent on us to inflict on the old MS. corrector.

FOOTNOTES:

[14] Vide _Alte handschriftliche Emendationen zum Shakespeare_.--P.

93.

[15] The attempts made by a judicious foreigner to amend the text of

our great dramatist are interesting, and deserve notice, even though

not altogether successful. Herr Delius proposes _thereby_; but we

must give the whole passage. The false Iachimo, endeavouring to bring

Posthumus into discredit with Imogen, says, “Had _I_ such a wife, I

certainly would not do as Posthumus does,

Join gripes with hands Made hard with hourly falsehood (falsehood as

With labour), _then by_ peeping in an eye, Base and illustrious as

the smoky light That’s fed with stinky tallow.”

“Then by” is the original text, but it is ungrammatical. For “then

by” Dr Delius proposes to read _thereby_ (_dabei_, _unterdess_--that

is, besides, meanwhile). But this attempt, though creditable, is not

successful. _Thereby_, as here used, is very nearly, but it is _not

quite_ an English idiom, and was certainly not Shakespeare’s word.

RAIL AND SADDLE IN SPAIN.[16]

The proceedings of the bankruptcy courts occasionally make public

painful cases, in which long-suffering parents have been compelled

to cut adrift incorrigible prodigals. In vain have the generous

“governors” and affectionate mothers bled themselves, pelican-wise,

to supply the cravings of extravagant youth; in vain have they

compounded with Jews, satisfied tailors, paid long accounts for

London-made port and indigenous champagne, met bills of whose “value

received” twenty per cent had been given in cash, the remainder in

green spectacles, paving stones, and stuffed birds. There is a limit

to human patience, a bottom even to paternal pockets; indulgence

becomes imbecility when impudence is added to insolvency, and at last

further aid and countenance are withheld. The spendthrift grumbler

sulks, swears he is the most ill-used of mortals, and is finally

lodged in a sponging-house or enlisted in a dragoon regiment. Such

appears to us to be the present relative position of England and

Spain. For nearly half a century John Bull has been “better than a

mother” to the cashless, helpless, graceless Spaniards. He has fought

their battles, filled their treasury, helped them to constitutions,

assisted them with advice, which they have sometimes been too proud

to take, at others too silly to profit by. The seed thus sown has

produced an abundant harvest of ingratitude. We have acted the part

of Aunt Cli to the scape-grace, Jonathan Jefferson, and we have met

the same reward. The Spaniard has used us, and now he abuses us.

Has the day really dawned upon which English capitalists are to

be proof against Spanish swindlers? We almost, although with

difficulty--for there is no more gullible animal than your capitalist

on the look-out for an investment, with his pockets stuffed with

cash, and consols at par--believe that it has. Spain can hardly

credit the fact, and is rabid at the apprehension. The fright

has driven her from her propriety. She proscribes our newspapers,

forbids us to bury our dead, and vents mysterious but awful menaces

in the columns of the respectable Madrid journal, whose editor

is the Spanish Home Secretary, its purveyor of funds the Spanish

Queen-mother. A nameless something, we have lately been repeatedly

assured by the _España_, is to be done, if the English press

continue its denunciations of Spanish schemes and roguery; and the

same journal wrote wrathfully and ominously when a warning was

given to the British public that, if they chose to intrust their

money to Peninsular speculators and peculators, they must look to

themselves alone, and not to their government, for aid in recovering

it. “Spain,” then wrote the Rianzares journal, “will know how to

vindicate her honour, as on former occasions.” If this means anything

beyond an ebullition of petulant spleen, it probably refers to the

brief notice to quit given to Sir Henry Bulwer. Lord Howden had

better look to himself, and keep his portmanteau packed, for he is

evidently exposed to receive his passport at any moment, because his

stubborn ungrateful countrymen decline making further advances upon

such flimsy security as Spanish bonds--as depreciated and worthless a

pledge as Spanish honour.

The whole history of Spain’s transactions with her foreign creditors

may be made plain, in few lines, to the meanest capacity. Spain

owed a large sum of money, and a good deal of interest upon it. She

went to her creditors and said, “I am at war, troops must be paid,

my treasury is empty; I want some more money. I am fighting for

freedom from an odious tyranny; you, free men, cannot but sympathise

with me; lend me the cash. We will add the amount to what I already

owe you; capitalise the over-due _coupons_, the whole will make

a nice round sum, upon which I bind myself regularly to pay the

interest.” Spain has always been seductive and smooth-tongued; her

fine, sonorous, knightly language--the sole remnant of chivalry she

has retained--inspires confidence by its high-sounding phrases and

noble expressions. The creditors believed her assurances, and, in an

incautious hour, parted with their money, a portion of which was duly

applied to the first one or two dividends, and then payment again

stopped, and was not resumed. Years passed on, the war terminated,

Spain was at peace and comparatively prosperous, her revenue largely

increased, notwithstanding the absurd tariffs that grievously

restricted her exports; still no effort was made to remove from the

national character the stigma of ingratitude and insolvency. At last,

when it was supposed that the creditors, weary of waiting, would

accept almost anything for the sake of a settlement--when, it has

been said and believed by many, a considerable amount of bonds had

been bought for Spanish government account, at the wretched price

to which the government’s refusal of payment had sunk them in the

market--a disgraceful compromise was offered, and finally forced upon

the creditors, who could not help themselves, and who looked in vain,

whilst thus swindled, for efficient advocacy and support, to those

Whig statesmen and fervent admirers of constitutional government in

the Peninsula, whose smiling approval and countenance had been given

to the transfer of good English money to faithless Spanish pockets.

The results are known to the world, and may be briefly summed up.

The same people who, in the Peninsular war, did their utmost to

rob British troops of their laurels, claiming, to this very day,

the glory of victories in which not a battalion of their _bisoños_

figured, except in the rear, or to be routed; and insinuating, upon

occasion, that Wellington’s army was a sort of auxiliary corps

to their own heroic legions--repaid our military intervention

and enormous pecuniary aid in their subsequent civil discords,

by betraying us for an Orleanist alliance, grossly insulting our

government in the person of its ambassador, and insolently snapping

their fingers in the face of the British holder of Spanish bonds.

We have no desire to resuscitate defunct questions; but certain it

is, that many very sensible people--whom, as they are not members

of the Peace Society, there is no reason to consider particularly

belligerent or disposed to “crumple up” countries on light

grounds--throughout England, and especially in the city of London,

are of opinion that, upon more than one occasion during the last six

years, the imposing force which in 1851 menaced for a doubtful claim

the paltry capital of a petty state, would have been better employed

off Cadiz, in insisting on an equitable adjustment of the very large

debt rightfully and unquestionably owing to thousands of British

subjects. This, of course, is a mere ignorant, common-sense view of

the case; we have no doubt it could be quickly demonstrated from

Vattel, and other great authorities, that common sense is the only

good quality it possesses, and that it is utterly opposed to wise

statesmanship and international law. Meanwhile, however, like the

Count in the _Nozze_, the creditor dances to Figaro’s fiddle; Spanish

ministers and financiers, who, but the other day, had scarcely a

dollar to pay for a dinner, are as rich as Rothschild; Spanish

dowager-queens hoard millions upon millions, and are prepared with

princely dowries for their numerous progeny by handsome guardsmen;

but the poor, long-suffering Spanish bondholder, defrauded of his

due, and cut down to a fraction per cent, vegetates in penury, or

inquires the way to the Union.

These, in round terms, and stripped of unnecessary details, are

the facts of the case--facts that defy refutation; these are the

disreputable circumstances under which Spain, having, as the

Orientals say, made her face white--that is to say, having acted

as her own commissioner of bankrupts, and whitewashed herself upon

the most favourable terms--once more, with unblushing effrontery,

presents herself in the character of a borrower. The pretext this

time is a different one; the ingenious Peninsula has got “a new

dodge.” Formerly the guineas were handed over to the sound of

martial music and clashing arms, amidst cries of “Down with the

Inquisition!” and “_Viva la constitution!_” Now it is the clink of

the hammer we hear, and a vivid panorama unfolds itself before us.

It is of the nature of a dissolving view. In the first instance we

behold a rich and fertile country, a land flowing with milk and

honey, or, better still, teeming with corn, and wine, and oil. But

its prosperity is crippled for want of communications. Behold yonder

shirtless and miserable peasant, issuing from his filthy tumble-down

habitation! Abundance surrounds him; wine is more plentiful with him

than water; not all the efforts of himself and family, aided by the

pigs and by that sedate-looking jackass, suffice to consume a fourth

part of the delicious fruit produced by his orchard, with so little

painstaking on his part. How gladly would he exchange a cart-load

of wine and fruit for a shirt to interpose between his tawny skin

and his garments of coarse woollen cloth, for a light linen jacket,

for cool neat dresses for his wife and daughters, for a few of those

articles of furniture which the poorest English cottage possesses,

but in which his dwelling is so lamentably deficient! But how can

he do this? His neighbours are either as well supplied as himself

with the produce of the soil, or they have neither money to buy it

with, nor goods to barter for it. For leagues and leagues around,

there is neither town nor village in whose overstocked market his

commodities would find a sale, or have more than a nominal value.

True, at the coast there are people waiting, red-haired barbarians

from foreign parts, addicted to strong drinks and plum-puddings, and

perfectly willing to take his wine and raisins, and to give him, in

return, clothing suited to his climate, crockery for his kitchen, a

better knife to prune his vines, and an implement of tillage somewhat

superior to that extraordinary antediluvian plough, which in England

would be put under a glass case, and exhibited as an Aztec curiosity.

He has heard that there are such people, and bethinks him how he can

convey to them his fruit and wine-skins. It is very far from his

hamlet to the nearest _camino réal_, and in the interval there is no

road much better than a bridle-path. Carriers there are none; of

canals he has never heard; he looks at his jackass, but the _burro_

sagaciously shakes his ears, as if to decline so distant a journey.

So the poor peasant leans upon his spade, and wipes away a tear, in

the midst of his useless abundance; pours out upon the ground the

wine of last year, to make room for the better vintage of this one,

and purchases, at an exorbitant price, of the _contrabandista_, the

smuggled manufactures, whose original cost has been quadrupled by the

danger and difficulty of their introduction, and by the long journey

on mule-back from the coast.

This affecting picture now melts away, the scene changes--we have

all witnessed the sort of thing at the Polytechnic, and those who

have not will find something very like it in most Spanish railway

prospectuses--and we are transported into a country where on all

sides is to be traced the gratifying progress of industry, commerce,

and prosperity. “’Tis _Spain_, but _slothful Spain_ no more!” All

is bustle and movement. Busy towns, improving villages, a thriving

peasantry, sharp misery disappearing, comfort and civilisation

rapidly advancing. The secret of the change, the charm that has

wrought it, is to be found in one word, and that word is RAILWAY.

Diverging from _la corte_, from that capital of the civilised world,

_the_ court _par excellence_, by Spaniards never sufficiently to be

lauded--from sandy, treeless, waterless Madrid, in summer a furnace,

in winter an ice-house--long iron lines extend in all directions, to

every frontier, throwing out branches right and left as they proceed,

and finally joining other lines which run parallel to the sea-board.

That which gold--when it flowed, in a broad continuous stream, from a

newly-discovered continent--was powerless permanently to bring about

in the prosperity of Spain, is now effected and assured by the ruder

agency of iron. The very nature of the Spaniard is transformed; he is

no longer indolent and procrastinating, but active and prompt; the

most go-ahead Yankee might take a lesson from him. He has abolished

his suicidal tariff, and is applying himself, heart and soul, to the

amelioration of that which must long constitute his country’s true

wealth--the olive and vine, the corn-field and orchard, the fleece

and the silkworm. The stimulus has spread throughout the land, and is

felt by all classes. The peasant, whom we lately beheld hungry and

half naked in the midst of abundance, is now a prosperous farmer, and

annually sends coastwards many a good cask of wine and case of fruit.

The contrabandista has turned stoker; and the lazzaroni lad whom we

saw, in the last picture, crouched in the shadow of a crumbling wall,

and pursuing entomological researches in the interior of his tattered

vest, is hardly to be recognised in that active chap, in a glazed cap

and uniform jacket, who is hard at work greasing the wheels of the

locomotives.

It is impossible to deny the immense superiority of the latter over

the former of these two pictures. The pre-railroad one is sketched

from life; the post-railroad is the offspring of the imagination of a

Spanish railway projector. The former might be signed, “Truth,” the

latter, “Salamanca.” The artists, it will be noticed, are of very

opposite schools.

The question of Spanish railways is to be contemplated and examined

under two distinct points of view. First, as regards their probable

effects upon the state of the country, its trade, prosperity, &c.;

secondly, with respect to the prospect of profit, and chances of

repayment of those foreigners who may be induced to embark in any

of the numerous schemes propounded. The first of these two points

may be succinctly disposed of. “The general poverty of Spain is very

great,” wrote a good authority on the subject in 1845.[17] Since then

eight years have elapsed, years of peace and of a tranquillity almost

uninterrupted; yet, within the last few weeks, we have been assured

by recent travellers in the country, and by Spaniards--who cannot

deny the wretched condition they deplore and feel ashamed of, but are

impotent to improve--that Spanish poverty and misery are in no degree

diminished. The want of means of communication must be reckoned,

if not amongst the causes of that unfortunate state of things, at

least amongst the obstacles to its removal. And there can be no

reasonable doubt that the establishment of an extensive system of

railroads would be productive of great improvement and advantage to

Spain. These _would_ not be so rapidly manifest as in more populous

and industrious countries, and amongst a more energetic race. Years

might be required to do what months have accomplished elsewhere.

But ultimately the irresistible power of the greatest invention of

this century must make itself felt. “Nothing,” says an accomplished

English lady, and intelligent observer of Spain, of whose interesting

work, the result of three years’ travel and sojourn in that country,

we shall presently speak, “could tend more to improve Spain than

the establishment of great main lines of railway.” Whilst agreeing

in this respect with Lady Louisa Tenison, we think it desirable to

extend our investigation a little farther than she has done, and to

examine the probable position of the persons who may be induced to

advance money for the construction of those important arteries.

The mountainous character of Spain has been frequently and justly

urged as a great, if not an insuperable, obstacle to the formation

of long lines of railroad in that country. Ford, in his usual

lively and satirical strain, long ago denounced these as impossible

of construction.[18] The subject, however, is too serious to be

jocularly dismissed in a couple of amusing pages. We readily admit

the extreme difficulty and expense of tunnelling “mighty cloud-capped

_sierras_ which are solid masses of hard stone;” but a little

perseverance and investigation sometimes enables one to turn a

difficulty which he could not hope to level, and we have been assured

by practical Englishmen, whose attention has been particularly

directed to the subject, that, in some of the most formidable of

Peninsular mountain-chains, research brings to light defiles through

which a moderate amount of labour would enable the locomotive to

wind or incline its way. Then long tracts of level in the interior

of the country offer some compensation for costly work in mountain

districts; and, upon the whole, and at a proximate compensation,

Spanish railroads would probably not be so expensive in construction

as has been believed and affirmed by many. The most costly and

difficult of all would be the Northern Line, about which such a stir

has lately been made, which has caused such agitation and convulsions

in the Spanish Cabinet, and led to such unpleasant exposure of the

greedy manœuvres and reckless cupidity of the Rianzares gang, and

of that very slippery gentleman, Señor Salamanca. The Northern Line

(two hundred and fifty miles long, as now projected) would have to

make its way through two tremendous mountain barriers--the Somosierra

range and that continuation of the Pyrenees which extends through the

whole of the north of Spain to Cape Finisterre. Whoever is acquainted

with the Basque provinces knows that they are little else than one

mass or agglomeration of mountains, through which any railway must

pass that is to communicate with Bayonne. As a set-off to this, it is

urged that, in the Castilian plains, there would be little else to do

than to lay down the sleepers and rails. In railway matters it is not

easy to see how impossibilities are to be compensated, consistently

with the completeness of a line; and certainly, in the words of Ford,

“any tunnels which ever perforate _those_ ranges will reduce that at

Box to the delving of the poor mole.” The projected Northern Company

has contracted (rather prematurely) with Mr Salamanca, to make the

line for about six millions sterling, or £24,000 a-mile; but little

dependence will be placed, by sane persons, upon Spanish estimates,

contracts, and contractors; and meanwhile, pending the sanction by

the Cortes of the royal decree authorising the line, the project is a

mere bubble, a _château en Espagne_, as the French say.

Supposing, however, the Cortes to be bullied, tricked, or wheedled

out of their consent, the mountains bored, the tunnels made, the

line opened--all for the stipulated six millions--what are the

probabilities of a return to the shareholders in this precious

speculation? In the first place, it must be observed that the Spanish

government, which has just fobbed off its creditors with a shilling

or two in the pound, proposes, with that honourable consistency

and good faith that habitually characterises it in all financial

and most other matters, to guarantee to the shareholders in this

and several other extensive railways six per cent interest on the

capital advanced. It is the old story. The capitalist gets the first

dividend or two (paid out of his own money, of course), and then,

when all calls are paid up, the Spanish treasury sports its oak, and

the finance minister of the day, looking lugubriously through the

vasistas, posts up “no effects.” The shareholder perhaps consoles

himself with the reflection that in a year or two the line will be

open; and that then, when the proceeds of a lucrative traffic pour

in, there can be no pretext of inability to pay, and he will get both

dividend and arrears. To satisfy him as to his prospects, we shall

quote two highly competent authorities--

“Speculators will do well to reflect that Spain is a land

which never yet has been able to construct or support even

a sufficient number of common roads or canals for her poor

and passive commerce and circulation. The distances are

far too great, and the traffic far too small, to call yet

for the rail. The outlay will be on an inverse ratio to

the remuneration; for the one will be enormous and the

other paltry. The Spaniard, a creature of routine and foe

to innovations, is not a locomotive animal;--local, and a

fixture by nature, he hates moving like a Turk, and has a

particular horror of being hurried.”--FORD, p. 799.

Thus far the Handbook man. We turn to an interesting and important

letter on the subject of Spanish railroads in the journal whose

untimely revelations have procured it the hard sentence of exclusion

from Spain.

“It cannot be too often urged that ‘Royal decrees’ have

no legal force until confirmed by the Cortes, and even

then, in questions of finance, they usually exceed the

capabilities of the country; therefore, however strong the

desire of Spain to see locomotives crossing the country,

it is impossible for the finances to pay six per cent

interest, even upon lines already guaranteed. If such were

possible, it would be additionally disgraceful, whilst the

interest on the national debt is not paid. There are many

legitimate and profitable means of employing capital in

Spain, independently of the delusive guarantee of ‘Royal

decrees,’ or the guaranteed interest, which will be paid

only so long as it suits the present temporary object of

drawing forth foreign capital. Many instances could be

given of the success that has attended glass, iron, lead,

and other works, when established in proper localities,

which give a return of 30, 40, and, I am assured, of even

50 per cent per annum, without any protection from the

government. Until railways can also be established on

their own intrinsic merits, relying exclusively on the

traffic to remunerate the shareholders, it is not safe

to attempt them, as, at the first unfavourable change in

Spanish finances, the interest is sure to remain unpaid.

It is very easy, as in the case of the Northern line, to

make a brilliant prospectus, and trace a line upon the

map, passing through numerous towns; but those who have

travelled in Spain do not forget that there is not enough

passenger traffic between Madrid and France to fill a

diligence throughout the year. Neither Valladolid, Burgos,

Vitoria, nor any of the other towns mentioned, contain a

locomotive population; and, in the entire distance, until

the industrious Basque provinces be approached, there is

scarcely a manufacturing village.”--_Paris Correspondence

of the Times_, 30th August 1853.

The greater part of what is here truthfully and forcibly stated is

equally applicable to all long lines of railway in Spain. It is

unnecessary to pile up facts, or to expend more time in demonstrating

the risk, or rather the certain loss incurred by all who lend money

to the thriftless, faithless Spaniard, for the carrying out of his

new mania for _ferro-carriles_. His object is to supply himself with

railroads at foreign cost. He has not the remotest intention of

paying interest, when the lines are once completed; so that, if the

traffic does but pay its expenses, he has the property for nothing.

We do not hesitate to denounce the whole scheme of Spanish railroads

as an impudent and gigantic attempt at a wholesale national swindle.

The only persons who would be benefited by it, in case of its

success, would be that sprightly Wizard of the North, Mr Salamanca,

and a few other speculators of his kidney, Queen Christina, the Duke

of Rianzares, and their particular friends and adherents.

We should be sincerely glad, for the sake of the Spanish nation,

whose many good qualities we (whilst utterly condemning, contemning,

and abominating their dishonest government, their intriguing

licentious royal family, their greedy dishonest speculators, and

their useless lazy army of _empleados_) highly and justly admire,

to see their land lapped to-morrow in an iron network, could it be

done by stroke of fairy-wand or touch of Aladdin’s lamp. But that

the fifty millions sterling (we are informed that is the sum needed

for the whole scheme of Spanish railway) should be filched from

British pockets, into which Don Spaniard has so repeatedly, and on

such various pretexts, dipped his digits--never withdrawing them

empty--is what we most decidedly object to. The only lines for which

there is at present room in Spain, and that are likely to give a

profit to the shareholders, are short lines in the most populous and

industrious districts. And these should only be gone into when they

are got up by private companies, and without government intervention

of any kind. The directors should be able to head their prospectus,

as Paris shopkeepers head their advertisements, with the words,

“_Sans garantie du gouvernement_.” No reliance can be placed on

anything in which a Spanish government has a right to interfere: a

feeling now pretty prevalent, and which has swamped, at least for

the present--and we hope for a long time to come--the schemes of

the Spanish Hudson. Lines like the Madrid and Aranguez, (did it

belong to a company, instead of to the state), like the Barcelona

and Mataro--a private line, paying a good interest--and like the

proposed eighteen-mile line, connecting Cadiz, Port St Mary’s, and

Xerez, are those that may safely be gone into. The last named (which

is, if we are not mistaken, independent of the government) ought,

with decent management and reasonable economy, to be one of the most

profitable bits of railway in Europe. And it is strong evidence of

the wholesome distaste at present entertained in this country for

everything Spanish, that the London committee appointed to allot a

portion of the shares in this certainly most promising enterprise

received scarcely a single _bona fide_ application, and were fain

to abandon the idea of distributing any in England. So that there

seems some hope that John Bull, who usually buys his experience dear,

and who has only lately become fully convinced how very insolvent

a virtue is Spanish patriotism, will not wait till he burns his

fingers, to make up his mind as to the very rotten nature of Spanish

railroads.

Enough upon this head. In Spanish phrase, we place ourselves at

the feet of the fair authoress of the remarkably handsome volume,

two lines in which have led us into the foregoing reflections,

and ask her pardon for our want of gallantry in allowing our own

lucubrations to take precedence of her strong claims to notice. Lady

Louisa Tenison furnishes us with practical proof that, if “great

lines of railroad” be a desideratum in Spain, they are by no means

indispensable in order that delicately-nurtured dames should visit

with safety and enjoyment the most beautiful, and some of the wildest

districts of the Peninsula. The romance of travel is evidently at

an end, as far as Europe is concerned, when English ladies ride

through Spain for months together, encountering as few adventures

as though their palfreys pranced in Hyde Park. What, not one brush

with banditti, or narrow escape from ambushed assassins! Not a single

midnight alarm in the lonely _venta_, or hand-to-hand conflict with

ferocious _contrabandistas_, in the gloomy _sierra_, or on the wild

_despoblado_? We grieve to say, not one. Persons there are who,

having rambled more or less in Spain, and desiring to perpetrate a

book, deem it their duty to the public, and to their publishers,

to give spice to the volume by blending fiction with fact. They

carefully note exaggerated tales, and polite hoaxes, put upon them

by waggish muleteers, or at Madrid _tables-d’hôte_; embellish them

to the best of their ability, and, the cookery complete, present

the comical _olla_ to British palates. Ladies and gentlemen taste,

and wonder, and vow that Spain shall be the last division of the

earth’s surface in which _they_ will set foot, to be carried off

to the mountains for ransom, or shot at round corners by lurking

bravoes. For our part, we entertain no dislike to the gasconading

class of travellers in Spain, whom we hold to be rather amusing than

otherwise; and all we would beg of them is to sail under their true

colours, to call their books “A Romantic Tour,” or “Imaginative

Wanderings,” and so give their readers a chance of sifting the chaff

from the grain. It seems an article of faith with them, that a plain,

intelligent narrative of what they saw and observed will not satisfy

the public; that they must invent, if they would be read. In this

respect, Lady Louisa Tenison’s volume will prove them mistaken. It

is an unaffected and highly interesting record of her observations

on Spain and its people. Three years’ abode, and a good knowledge

of the language, should surely qualify so intelligent a person as

Lady Louisa evidently is, to write a book on any country free from

even an approach to error. Of all countries, however, Spain is the

most difficult of which to acquire a thorough knowledge. That Lady

Louisa may have fallen into some slight misconceptions is very

possible, and ill-conditioned critics, who prefer detecting the flies

to admiring the amber, may perhaps note them; but we are acquainted

with no book on Spain, by an Englishman, of which the same may not

be said. Captain Widdrington (Cook) is one of the most uniformly

accurate, temperate, and impartial writers on the Peninsula with whom

we are acquainted; but we daresay an enemy, bent on picking holes in

his coat, might catch him tripping. Even Ford, who has treated the

subject more _in extenso_, and in greater detail, and who may be said

to have daguerreotyped Spain, fixing his tints with a slight racy

dash of Chili vinegar, which makes Spaniards (who, whilst concealing

their thin skin under a cloak of superb indifference and disdain,

are sensitive to the opinion of foreigners) smart extremely, has not

altogether escaped blunders, especially when touching upon modern

Spanish politics. Of the book now before us we can say, with great

truth, that very few of the many upon the same subject that have

appeared within the last fifteen years have given sketches of Spain

and Spaniards at once so fair, so sensible, and so generous.

To see Spain, there is nothing like the saddle. Ford and Borrow

have emphatically told us this, and all who have been in the

country will confirm their decision. Long rides may at first be

attended with some weariness of limb and loss of leather; but

these soon yield to custom, and, moreover, when persons travel for

pleasure, they seldom need to make forced marches. Let them select

an easy-pacing Spanish horse and a commodious saddle, and be sure

that, in a fine climate and over rough roads, the advantages of this

mode of progress more than balance its disagreeables. Lady Louisa

Tenison, during her various journeys and excursions, frequently

got to horse, riding English fashion, greatly to the admiration of

the natives of the more remote places she passed through. Thus she

avoided the tedious confinement of _galeras_ and other essentially

Spanish and especially wearisome vehicles, and saw many things

and much country which she could not possibly have got at except

on horseback. No less astonished, we dare to swear, than at her

riding-habit and sidesaddle, were the good people of Castile and

Andalusia at the English lady’s appearing at all in the heart of

their sierras, in their remote villages and unfrequented posadas.

Prodigiously must they have been puzzled to conjecture her motives

for quitting the comforts of Cadiz and Malaga, to endure hardship

and encounter fatigue; for, as she truly says, “As to any enthusiasm

about beautiful views, or undergoing any fatigue or trouble in

their pursuit, such nonsensical things are classed amongst the

other eccentric fancies of the very mad English. A person drawing

for the mere love of art is hardly considered in his senses. I have

often been asked for how much I would sell my drawings; and, when I

replied that they were done merely for amusement, a smile of mingled

incredulity and pity convinced me that I was considered not over

wise or candid; and, upon one occasion, in the Court of the Lions,

whilst copying the arabesques, some inquisitive visitors came to

the conclusion that I was painting new patterns for fans!” And at

Grazalema, in the sierra of Ronda--a little town plastered, as Ford

says, “like a martlet’s nest on the rocky hill,” and one of the

places where the inhabitants, unused to the intrusion of foreigners,

thronged the streets to gaze and wonder at the amazons--the balcony

on which Lady Louisa stationed herself with her sketch-book was

escaladed by an adventurous youngster, bent on ascertaining the

nature of her mysterious proceedings. “Nothing could be more amusing

than the tone of contemptuous surprise in which he exclaimed to the

crowd, ‘_Nada particular; todo blanco!_’ an announcement which was

received by his friends with evident signs of disappointment. The

excitement spread even to the upper classes in Grazalema, and I had

an embassy from some young señoritas, who wished to see what I had

been doing--a request I could not well comply with, for the best of

reasons, that, at that early stage, there really was nothing to be

seen.” However unsatisfactory to the Grazalema critic, the result

of Lady Louisa’s sketches at that place has been one of the best of

the charming views and characteristic illustrations, of which nearly

fifty are distributed through her volume.

Most travellers in Spain, possessed of an eye and a taste for the

national and characteristic, deplore the Frenchification that country

has for some time past undergone, and whose progress becomes annually

more rapid and apparent.

On landing, Lady Louisa Tenison was unpleasantly impressed by

this--at Malaga, where she dwelt for the winter after her arrival in

Andalusia. We must not wonder if some of a lady’s first observations

are about a bonnet. She regrets to see this comparatively unbecoming

covering creeping in--even in the south, and supplanting the

graceful mantilla--Parisian fashion ousting Spanish grace. Spanish

ladies ought to understand that the rich masses of their abundant

hair--their _opulente chevelure_, as a French novelist would call

it--are unfavourable to bonnet-wearing. Parisian women, upon the

other hand, who have generally thin hair, offer excellent polls

whereupon to perch the masterpieces of milliners. But it is quite

horrible to think of a dark-eyed, olive-complexioned Andalusian

maiden covering her exuberant tresses, which, when unbound, descend

to her very heels, and drape her like a garment--so that she might

ride, a second Godiva, unabashed through Coventry’s or Cadiz’

streets--with a rose-coloured _capote_, in lieu of the beautiful veil

of black or white lace which, as Lady Louisa justly remarks, lends

her a peculiar charm that cannot be rivalled. Then, in choice of

colours, the daughters of Spain, it appears, are lamentably deficient

in taste.

“The gaudy colours which now prevail have destroyed the

elegance that always accompanies black, in which alone,

some years since, a lady could appear in public. No further

proof of this is required than to see the same people at

church, where black is still considered indispensable,

and on the Alameda with red dresses and yellow shawls, or

some colours equally gaudy, and combined with as little

regard to taste. The love of brilliant and showy colours

appears a ruling passion in the present day, and offers a

singular contrast to the fashion of twenty years ago, when

a lady who should have ventured into the street dressed in

anything but black, would have been mobbed and insulted by

the people.”--(_Castile and Andalucia_, p. 8–9.)

And at Seville, we grieve to learn, “the fan is rapidly giving way

to the parasol.” Surely the monkeys on Gibraltar rock are not more

imitative than the charming Sevillanas and Malagueñas. The men, too,

have laid aside the graceful and dignified _capa_, to adopt that

most odious and abortive invention--dreamed by some puny French

tailor after a heavy supper--the paletot! How is it that Spaniards,

who boast of their _Españolismo_, who consider it an insult to be

called _Afrancesados_, and who scorn their northern neighbours as

_gavachos_, scruple not eagerly to adopt every French mode? Colbert

once said that the fashions were to France what the mines of Peru

were to Spain. They have since been proved to be a much more durable

and valuable possession. Potosi is lost to Spain; but France still

keeps, and is likely long to retain, the monopoly of frippery and

finery, and Andalusian ladies, albeit no rich galleons now bear

the treasures of another hemisphere into the port of Cadiz, find

the wherewithal to become tributary to Parisian bonnet-makers. At

Seville, however, Lady Louisa was glad to observe few bonnets--few

enough to attract notice when seen, and to enhance, by the contrast,

the beauty of the mantilla. Her first visit to the theatre, at

Malaga, confirmed an impression she had taken up on landing,

that Spanish beauty has been exaggerated by poets, painters, and

travellers--three classes of persons to whom license in that respect

is generally accorded. “My first disappointment was the almost total

absence of beauty amongst the Spanish women.... They have magnificent

eyes, beautiful hair, and generally fine teeth; but more than that

cannot be said by those who are content to give an honest and candid

opinion.” The admissions are liberal; and the three things named, if

they do not constitute beauty, at any rate go a very long way towards

it. But let us visit the Malaga theatre.

“All the best people were there, but only two or three

very pretty faces were to be seen in the boxes. The pit,

divided into seats, each having its own number, is wholly

appropriated to gentlemen. When first we arrived, the

Alcalde, or one of the Ayuntamiento, always presided in

the centre over the royal box; but this practice has been

discontinued lately, and the audience may now indulge in

applause or disapprobation unrestrained.... One of the

pieces which had the greatest run was a Spanish comic

opera, called the ‘Tio Caniytas,’ which has taken immensely

the last two years. An unhappy Englishman is the hero of

the play; and his endeavours to cultivate the society of a

youthful gipsy, in order to acquire with more facility the

Gitano language, afford the Spaniards a good opportunity of

turning our countrymen into ridicule; and he is victimised,

in turn, by the old uncle and by the lover of his dark

instructress. There are some very pretty airs introduced,

and a characteristic dance called the Vito.”

Let the reader here turn to page 183 for an extremely spirited sketch

of this gipsy dance, and for an equally graphic prose description

of its peculiarities. Then return to the Malaga theatre, to look

on and laugh at “a piece called the _Mercado de Londres_, (the

London Market), brought out whilst we were there, and illustrating

the adventures of a Spaniard in London. The incidents were not

very flattering to our national pride, as the story turned on the

interesting subject of a man selling his wife--an event which they

seem to think of common occurrence in _Soberbia Albion_.”

The belief that in England men frequently sell their wives, and that

such sale and transfer are perfectly legal and binding upon the

three persons implicated in the transaction, is prevalent in various

Continental countries, and is rather strengthened than destroyed by

the indignant logic with which simple-hearted Englishmen are apt to

combat it. Even if they thereby succeed in dissipating the absurd

notion (which is not often the case), the foreigner, for the most

part, affects to abide in his conviction, in order to tease the

John Bull. Less civilised or less prosperous nations are delighted

to find or fancy a stain on the scutcheon of one whose superiority

they cannot but feel, although they may not admit it. The only way

to treat them in such cases--particularly Spaniards, who are very

satirical, and quick at hitting upon a “raw”--is to out-herod them

at once, to gallop far a-head of their ridiculous assumptions, and

assure them that if they go to England, they will find, upon every

market-day and market-place, rows of women tethered and ticketed

for sale. They soon discover that they are made game of, and end by

discrediting that which they at first were inclined to believe. But

we shall quit the theatre, and step across with Lady Louisa Tenison

to the Protestant cemetery. “It is beautifully situated on the slope

of the hills just below the fortress, and was a great boon obtained

by the late Mr Mark, British Consul at Malaga. The intolerance of

the Spanish nation in not allowing followers of any religion but

their own to receive Christian burial in their country, is indeed

disgraceful. At Cadiz, Malaga, and still more recently at Madrid,

exceptions have been made; but everywhere else in Spain none but

Catholics can be buried in consecrated ground.” The manner in which

the exception at Madrid was made has lately been the subject of

so much comment and discussion, that not much remains to be said

about it. The intolerance, that Lady Louisa justly stigmatises as

disgraceful, is to be laid at the door of the Spanish government,

rather than at that of the nation, and perhaps is to be imputed

less to the ministry of the day than to certain occult monkish

influences. We cannot bring ourselves to believe that the present

prime minister of Spain, General Lersundi, who began his military

career twenty years ago as a private volunteer in the ranting,

roaring, hard-fighting, loud-swearing corps of Chapelgorris--fellows

who would as soon have robbed a church as a larder, and from whose

hands few convents (or nuns either) that ever came in their way

escaped unscathed--can approve or sympathise with the ridiculous

stipulations, worthy of Spain’s blackest days of bigotry, which he

was compelled to annex to his permission of Protestant interments

at Madrid. But he was doubtless compelled to yield to the combined

weight of the priest and the palace. How is the virtuous Isabella

to obtain pardon for her peccadilloes, for the _péchés mignons_ to

which she is infamously addicted, if she does not atone for them

by a double dose of piety, and, above all, by proving herself the

“Most Catholic” of queens, and saving her capital from the scandal

of witnessing the sober ceremonial of a Protestant funeral? The

unchristianlike uncharitableness that is breathed by almost every

line of General Lersundi’s well-known letter to Lord Howden, must,

we are convinced, be disapproved by numbers of Spaniards, and by

all enlightened Roman Catholics, whatsoever their nation. Early in

the sixteenth century, when France had but recently emerged from

the semi-barbarism and bloody religious persecutions of the middle

ages, a French sovereign, Louis XIII., published an edict forbidding

his Catholic subjects to apply to the Huguenots the offensive name

of heretics. The Reformed Church had its places of worship, its

cemeteries--everything, in short, which is refused to it two hundred

and forty years later, upon the soil of that Spain which may be said,

without exaggeration, to owe its very existence as an independent

state to Protestant blood and treasure. In Spain, Protestants are

still heretics and outcasts--ay, in the mouths of many, _Judios_,

(Jews), included through ignorant bigotry with those despised

children of Israel whom, notwithstanding their accursed descent,

Spanish governments are often very glad to have recourse to, and

to flatter and make much of, when pinched for coin, and anxious

for an advance on quicksilver mines or Cuban revenue. For Spanish

ministers are of that family of saucy dogs who do not scruple to eat

unclean puddings, and profess a most Vespasianic indifference to

the source of gold, so long as they get it into their hands; for,

as the Spanish proverb says, money is always orthodox. And let us

see what says, on this head, witty and hard-hitting Master Ford, who

is always worth listening to, whether he be discoursing of Spain or

gibbeting the addle-brained absurdities of an Urquhart. He bids us

“visit, by all means, the Protestant burial-ground (the same of which

Lady Louisa Tenison has just spoken), not because it is a pleasant

‘traveller’s bourn,’ but because it was the first permitted, in our

time, for the repose of heretical carcases, which used to be buried

in the sea-sands, like dead dogs, and beyond the low-water mark;

and even this concession offended orthodox fishermen, who feared

that the soles might become infected; but the _Malagueños_, even

to the priest, never exhibited any repugnance to the dollars of

the living Lutheran Briton, for _el dinero es muy catolico_. This

cemetery, which lies outside the town to the east, was obtained and

laid out by our friend Mr Mark, father of the present consul, who

planted and enclosed the ground, and with great tact placed a cross

over the portal, to the amazement of the natives, who exclaimed,

‘_Con que estos Herejes gastan cruces!_’ (“So, then, these heretics

use crosses!”) (_Handbook for Spain_, p. 354.) _Con que_, we quit

the subject, sincerely wishing, with the Christian charity that

characterises us, that the authors, whosoever they be, of the recent

ordinances respecting the burial of Protestants at Madrid, may never

come to be buried either in the sea-sands, or at a cross-road, nor

be smuggled to their graves, as it appears Englishmen are to be who

have the ill-luck to give up the ghost within the precincts of “_la

corte_.” And we return to Lady Louisa Tenison, from whom we have

again been unconsciously wandering--certainly a most unjustifiable

want of taste on our part. We re-open her book at a passage which

makes us laugh outright--_réir a carcajadas_. “Spain,” says her

ladyship, “wants means of developing her resources, under the

guidance of a wise and honest government.” Truly, that does she, but

where are we to look for the government in question? And if she got

it, by a miracle, could one reasonably expect her to keep it? Judging

from the past, assuredly not. One honest government, in our own day,

Spain has had--when Espartero was regent. Its capacity was, perhaps,

not equal to its probity; at any rate, the nation would not endure

it; and its members have relapsed into private life, no richer--a

rare fact to find in the annals of Spanish cabinets--than when they

took office. Wisdom and honesty are indeed an uncommon combination in

the land beyond the Pyrenees. Until some modern Diogenes succeeds,

after long wandering lantern in hand over Spanish hill and valley, in

discovering them united, we may look in vain for such a government as

that which Lady Louisa Tenison, for Spain’s sake, desires to behold.

We will not close this paper without giving a longer exemplification

than we as yet have done of the agreeable tone and style of the

authoress of _Castile and Andalucia_. We select an amusing sketch of

the Spanish court.

“The whole style of everything connected with the

court in Spain is on a scale of great magnificence, as

far as outward appearance is concerned. The palace is

beautifully furnished; and the hall of the ambassadors,

or the throne-room, as we should call it, is gorgeous.

The drawing-rooms held by the Queen are called ‘Besa

Manos,’ as all Spaniards kiss hands every time they visit

the sovereign, and not only on presentation, as with us.

They are held of an afternoon, the gentlemen’s Besa-manos

concluding before that of the ladies begins. Foreigners

are more generally presented at a private audience, and

Spaniards themselves prefer it. The drawing-room is

rather a fatiguing undertaking for the Queen; for, after

the general circle has dispersed, all the members of the

household, down to the lowest dependant in the palace, are

admitted to kiss her hand. The balls are on a scale of

great magnificence; and, although the Queen’s ardour for

dancing has somewhat abated, she is still passionately fond

of it, and keeps it up till four or five in the morning,

her partners finding that the qualification of dancing well

is a greater recommendation than rank or station.

“She has now grown immensely stout; and, with the most

good-natured face in the world, has certainly nothing to

boast of in elegance of manner or dignity of deportment.

She looks what she is--most thoroughly kind-hearted, liking

to enjoy herself, and hating all form and etiquette;

extremely charitable, but always acting on the impulse of

the moment, obeying her own will in all things, instead

of being guided by any fixed principles of action. She

dispenses money with a lavish hand, whilst her finances are

not, by any means, in a flourishing condition. Her hours

are not much adapted to business-like habits; she seldom

gets up till four or five o’clock in the afternoon, and

retires to rest about the same hour in the morning. She has

one most inconvenient fault for a queen, being always two

or three hours behind time. If she fixes a Besa-manos at

two o’clock, she comes in about five; if she has a dinner

party announced at seven, it is nine or ten before she

enters the room; and, if she goes in state to the theatre,

and the performances are announced for eight, her Majesty

makes her appearance about ten.”

What innumerable mute maledictions must courtiers, cooks, and

managers heap upon her unpunctual Majesty of Spain. Punctuality, it

has been said, is the politeness of the great. In sovereigns, it is

both politic and a duty. How great a contrast between the slip-shod,

lie-abed practices of the Spanish Queen, and the early-rising, well

regulated, active habits of our own royal family.

“The interior arrangement of the palace at Madrid would

rather excite surprise in the minds of those accustomed

to the regularity of the English Court. Isabel Segunda

generally dines alone, and the ladies-in-waiting never

reside in the palace, only going when specially summoned.

The Queen and her husband are now apparently on good

terms. He is a most insignificant-looking little man; the

expression of his countenance, however, is not unpleasing,

but his figure is mean and awkward--a counterpart, in this

respect, of his father, the Infante Don Francisco de Paula.

“The court circle is completed by the Queen-Mother, whose

former beauty has now disappeared, as she has grown very

stout; but she possesses still the same fascinating voice,

the same bewitching manner, and the same syren smile, which

make all who speak to her bow before the irresistible charm

which she knows so well how to exercise. Queen Christina

might have worked an immense amount of good for this

unhappy country, had she devoted her talents and energies

to the improvement of the nation; had she exerted her

powerful influence in a good and noble cause, how much

might she not have accomplished! but instead of earning a

reputation which would have called forth the admiration of

posterity, she preferred sacrificing the interests of the

kingdom for the sake of gratifying her own inordinate love

of wealth, and has, in fact, proved merely worthy of the

family from which she sprang.”

The account of the Queen of Spain’s habits derives particular

pungency from the fact of its being derived from the writer’s

personal observations. Of course Lady Louisa Tenison could but skim

the surface; minutely to investigate and describe the manner of life

of Isabella, would require a far bolder and more unblushing pen than

it would beseem an English lady to handle. The remarks on Queen

Christina are exceedingly just. No queen ever had a finer opportunity

of benefiting her country, making herself adored by her people, and

immortalising her name. Her popularity was once great, her talents

are undeniable, her powers of fascination, the influence she acquires

over all who come in contact with her, are precisely such as have

above been told. Popular as the representative of anti-Carlism and

of constitutionalism, she might have made herself beloved for her

own sake. A large majority of the Spanish nation--which has ever

been noted for its loyalty and monarchical predilections--asked no

better than to esteem and respect her, and not to look upon her

as a mere necessity, a sort of _pis-aller_, imposed upon Spain by

circumstances, and accepted because anything appeared better than

the vacillating, priest-ridden Carlos, and the tyranny he aimed

at restoring. But it was soon discovered that, whilst professing

to combat absolutism, and to represent liberal principles, Maria

Christina was at heart an absolutist and a tyrant, that all her

political tendencies were retrograde, and that she was utterly

selfish, degradingly sensual, and unboundedly covetous. And, to her

shame be it spoken, she brought up her child to be no better than

herself. The opprobrious epithet shouted at the mother by the Carlist

guerillas, during the civil war, was muttered by the Madrileños,

but a very few years later, as often as the daughter showed herself

in the streets of her capital--and with equal truth. The gross

irregularities of Isabella are, at this moment, as notorious in her

capital and throughout Spain as anything of the kind possibly can be.

Christina, having now considerably passed her prime, has taken up,

“for a good old gentlemanly vice,” with avarice. She has a numerous

family by Mr Muñoz, for which she cannot hope, unless she dowers

them very richly, to obtain such brilliant alliances as her ambition

aspires to. So she speculates, accumulates, and hoards; and there

is no saying to what exorbitant figure her fortune has by this time

attained.

When such bright examples are set by royal personages, it is truly

wonderful that any morality or honesty remains in Spain. The quantity

is not large, and it must not be sought amongst the statesmen of the

country.

“One or two instances, out of a thousand, may show the

manner in which ministerial influence is exerted. In Pinos

de la Valle, in the province of Granada, the Alcalde, whose

office it is to preside over the elections, was suspended

by the Governor as being adverse to the Government

candidate; and a claim against the town of two hundred

pounds was remitted, in consideration of the ministerial

candidate being returned. In the town of Orgiba, in the

same province, a fine of like amount was imposed, and a

further one threatened, should the ministerial candidate

not be returned; and, as if this were insufficient, the

Alcalde was suspended, the second Alcalde was put aside,

and a friend of the candidate named to conduct the voting,

although a criminal suit was actually pending against him.

It may be asked how a government can be allowed to exercise

so shameful and baneful an influence? The discussion is a

wide and difficult one; but one predominating cause may be

found in that insatiable rage for government employment

which pervades Spain. It is essentially a nation of two

classes--‘_empleados_,’ or persons holding offices,

dependent on the Government for their very bread, and

‘_pretendientes_,’ or seekers after place. Had Le Sage

written in the middle of the nineteenth, instead of at the

commencement of the eighteenth century, he could not have

depicted the system more to the life. Public employment

is the primary resource of every needy man who can read

and write, as well as of thousands who cannot; the very

doorkeepers and porters, who encumber the public offices,

being legion.”

There is no gainsaying this. The _empleomania_, the rage for place,

is at the bottom of much of Spain’s misery and degradation. It

reduces numerous classes, which, in other countries, apply themselves

industriously and profitably to professions, arts, and trades,

to the mean condition for whose designation Spaniards employ two

contemptuous and expressive words, whose satirical force can hardly

be rendered in English--_ojalateros_ and _pordioseros_, wishers and

beggars.

Lady Louisa Tenison’s illustrations prove her as skilful with the

pencil as she is pleasant with the pen, and materially enhance the

attractions of her book. There is novelty in her choice of subjects,

taste and artistical feeling in the manner of their treatment. The

mechanical getting up of the work reflects credit on all concerned;

and, as for Mr Bentley’s binding, it is so brilliant that we were

almost afraid to touch it, and have been obliged to cover it whilst

reviewing, lest our critical judgment should go astray after the

gilding.

FOOTNOTES:

[16] _Castile and Andalucia._ By Lady LOUISA TENISON. London: 1853.

[17] FORD’S _Handbook_, first edition, p. 172.

[18] _Handbook for Spain_, p. 789.

THE WANDERER.

INTRODUCTORY.

The throng of Earth’s slow struggles seek not here,

Nor pomp, nor circumstance, nor moving tale;

But whatsoever of that angelic scale,

Whose feet are Earth-set, whose tops touch the Sphere,

By its own splendours may be rendered clear,

Shall show one soul, whether she rise or fail:

Faith’s sympathetic vision will prevail

To see more true things than to sense appear:

The soul sees with the eye as through a glass,

And, if God wills, without it; be it not said,

“This,” or “that is,” or “is not;” shadows pass

Before us: O! ere long may we be made

To own the temporary things we see

A mere penumbra of Eternity!

I.

PROEM.

A barren heath, with bitter east-winds piping,

A garden full of sunshine and of bees,

A village school, a wandering home, a boyhood

Perplexed and various, shot with sin and shame,

A hot and wayward youth, led by false lights

To sloughs and bogs of danger and contempt,

A vague uneasiness, and ignorance--

For knowledge opens but to one key, Love,

The which I partly sought, but found it not--

Such were the earlier hours of Life’s drear night.

II.

A VOICE.

Oft in the dumb hour that precedes the dawn,

Before the cock crows to the waning stars,

When men sleep soundest, and the world is still,

A voice of strangest import came to me--

A welcome, but an awful voice. It came

From hills and green lanes, woods and dewy lawns;

It breathed of innocent pleasures, now not known,

Or, known, not loved; of feverish regret

For things perchance but little valued then,

Now lost for aye, and bitter to the heart;

It was a moaning and a warning voice;

A moan for Eden lost, a boding vague

Of coldness coming on, as if it said,

“God’s Spirit will not always strive with flesh.”

III.

THE PATH.

Fast fade the fields, yet not so fast as fade

The memories of childhood; fades from me

The misty distance of the Hampshire fields;

England is lost already to my heart,

And half the bitterness of death is past.

The moon has made a path upon the waves

Which will be mine to-morrow--toward the East--

The land that bred me cannot nourish me,

And I go forth. I will not mourn the chance.

IV.

SETTING-OUT.

We parted in the sunshine and the crowd,

The inquisitive gaze of noon; the busy hum

Of man about the port; with strangers by;

And cold Convention, with her tyrant forms,

Removed the solace, and drove home the sting.

We should have sundered on a lonely shore,

Where slowly broadened o’er a misty sea

The shimmer of a large, low-lying moon;

My vessel should have loomed against the night,

Nor shown impatience but by one flapped sail,

And in that hour we should have known a noise

Of water crawling gently up the stones,

And falling softly back with silver sound.

Such noise I hear; not now, tho’ tones of night

There are, which, in unquestioned diapason,

Accompany the murmurs of my soul.

By daylight nature jarred with jangling keys,

But now, all mingles well, the sounds are sad,

And I am sad to find myself alone.

So, standing hand in hand upon the beach

We should have parted, you gone back--ah me!--

To your sweet home, to muse upon the past,

I, to my Destiny beyond the sea,

With a heart touched, not torn, beyond a cure.

V.

THE SAME.

I muse upon your lingering words of love

In search of any comfort, as a child

Might play with desperate hand on his own hurt.

As “May the Eldorado that of old

Haunted your lonely visions, and your speech,

Be found a truth by you!” Or thus, “Alas!

I cannot hope that you shall be exempt

From the common lot;” or, “There is but one land

Whereto we send our dearest in all hope,

And doubt not that to follow them were bliss.”

And in a bygone letter “A poet’s heart

Is in your breast, though little uttered yet.

When the Sun leaves the Earth at eventide,

His glory-beams, which shone alike on all,

Leave but the higher hills; slowly withdrawn,

They linger long upon the peaks, till night

Wraps all alike in irrespective darkness:

And on the spirit of man there dwell at first

Beams of his native Heaven, and deck the child.

None but the higher natures keep those rays

Till Death brings night to all;” and “O love Truth,

But never deck her statuary limbs

With the presumptuous garb of paradox.”

Ah me! not even your partial words can cheer

My burthened soul to-night--hark! the ship’s bell

Marks the beginning of another day,

The day on which I sail! Whate’er I do,

Where’er I go, the world turns round the same,

And the great Universe’s pulses beat,

And He alone who is the Governor

And Centre of the circle of all spheres,

Knows what I am, or heeds; and when I die,

The stars will shine, and the whole globe turn round,

And the great Universe’s pulses beat,

And He alone will heed.

So runs the world--

You there, I here, God only everywhere.

VI.

THE HYPHEN.

I am weary of the ocean, emblem of Eternity.

Boundlessness is too ideal. Time and space suffice to me.

Life at sea is but the shadow of the life we led on land,

And the weary glass of Chronos hardly seems to drop a sand.

Life at sea is life suspended in a Present evermore,

All the Past is dim behind us, all the Future vague before.

’Tis an isthmus leading on from continent to continent,

Where the spirit, worn with waiting, sometimes dreams it is content.

For I dream, cast out from action, nothing more remains to do,

Gazing at the sky and ocean, looking up from blue to blue.

Watching in night’s constellations circles of the wheeling mast,

Nourishing a moody fancy with the visions of the Past;

Or if visions of the Future sometimes dimly glide between,

’Tis when memory shapes the To be, by reversing what has been;

That which was was dark and gloomy, clouds of doubt, and storms of sin,

Till I thought ‘Perchance the outer lends its shade to that within;

But the country which is coming is the home of warmth and light,

And the soul may spread her pinions there more beautifully bright.’

Still I erred; I know that change of climate is not change of soul;

Every ship has care for cargo, wheresoe’er the billows roll,

Where storms toss, or calms entrance her, from the line to either pole.

Let what will be, there is nothing wherewithal I may not cope.

Thus I sing between the lands of disappointment and of hope;

Thus I sing, the night wind freshens in the rigging, loft and low,

Fills the canvass, drives the light spray--on our destined path we go.

VII.

Ἀγνωστῳ Θεῳ.