ABOUT THE HUMILITY OF PROFESSIONAL SAINTS, A SUCCESSION OF TAILS, A
BRIDE AND BRIDEGROOM, AND OTHER HEAVENLY MATTERS, DIPLOMACY INCLUDED.
Perceiving that Brigadier Downright had an observant mind, and that he
was altogether superior to the clannish feeling which is so apt to
render a particular species inimical to all others, I asked permission
to cultivate his acquaintance; begging, at the same time, that he would
kindly favor me with such remarks as might be suggested by his superior
wisdom and extensive travels, on any of those customs or opinions that
would naturally present themselves in our actual situation. The
brigadier took the request in good part, and we began to promenade the
rooms in company. As the Archbishop of Aggregation, who was to perform
the marriage ceremony, was shortly expected, the conversation very
naturally turned on the general state of religion in the monikin
region.
I was delighted to find that the clerical dogmas of this insulated
portion of the world were based on principles absolutely identical with
those of all Christendom. The monikins believe that they are a
miserable lost set of wretches, who are so debased by nature, so eaten
up by envy, uncharitableness, and all other evil passions, that it is
quite impossible they can do anything that is good of themselves; that
their sole dependence is on the moral interference of the great
superior power of creation; and that the very first, and the one
needful step of their own, is to cast themselves entirely on this power
for support, in a proper spirit of dependence and humility. As
collateral to, and consequent on, this condition of the mind, they lay
the utmost stress on a disregard of all the vanities of life, a proper
subjection of the lusts of the flesh, and an abstaining from the pomp
and vainglory of ambition, riches, power, and the faculties. In short,
the one thing needful was humility—humility—humility. Once thoroughly
humbled to a degree that put them above the danger of backsliding, they
obtained glimpses of security, and were gradually elevated to the hopes
and the condition of the just.
The brigadier was still eloquently discoursing on this interesting
topic, when a distant door opened, and a gold stick, or some other sort
of stick, announced the right reverend father in God, his grace the
most eminent and most serene prelate, the very puissant and thrice
gracious and glorified saint, the Primate of All Leaphigh!
The reader will anticipate the eager curiosity with which I advanced to
get a glimpse of a saint under a system as sublimated as that of the
great monikin family. Civilization having made such progress as to
strip all the people, even to the king and queen, entirely of
everything in the shape of clothes, I did not well see under what new
mantle of simplicity the heads of the church could take refuge! Perhaps
they shaved off all the hair from their bodies in sign of supereminent
self-abasement, leaving themselves naked to the cuticle, that they
might prove, by ocular evidence, what a poor ungainly set of wretches
they really were, carnally considered; or perhaps they went on
all-fours to heaven, in sign of their unfitness to enter into the
presence of the pure of mind in an attitude more erect and confident.
Well, these fancies of mine only went to prove how erroneous and false
are the conclusions of one whose capacity has not been amplified and
concatenated by the ingenuities of a very refined civilization. His
grace the most gracious father in God, wore a mantle of extraordinary
fineness and beauty, the material of which was composed of every tenth
hair taken from all the citizens of Leaphigh, who most cheerfully
submitted to be shaved, in order that the wants of his most eminent
humility might be decently supplied. The mantle, wove from such a warp
and such a woof, was necessarily very large; and it really appeared to
me that the prelate did not very well know what to do with so much of
it, more especially as the contributions include a new robe annually. I
was now desirous of getting a sight of his tail; for, knowing that the
Leaphighers take great pride in the length and beauty of that
appurtenance, I very naturally supposed that a saint who wore so fine
and glorious a robe, by way of humility, must have recourse to some
novel expedient to mortify himself on his sensitive subject, at least.
I found that the ample proportions of the mantle concealed not only the
person, but most of the movements of the archbishop; and it was with
many doubts of my success that I led the brigadier behind the episcopal
train to reconnoitre. The result disappointed expectation again.
Instead of being destitute of a tail, or of concealing that with which
nature had supplied him beneath his mantle, the most gracious dignitary
wore no less than six caudae, viz., his own, and five others added to
it, by some subtle process of clerical ingenuity that I shall not
attempt to explain; one “bent on the other,” as the captain described
them in a subsequent conversation. This extraordinary train was allowed
to sweep the floor; the only sign of humility, according to my
uninstructed faculties, I could discern about the person and appearance
of this illustrious model of clerical self-mortification and humility.
The brigadier, however, was not tardy in setting me right. In the first
place, he gave me to understand that the hierarchy of Leaphigh was
illustrated by the order of their tails. Thus, a deacon wore one and a
half; a curate, if a minister, one and three-quarters, and a rector
two; a dean, two and a half, an archdeacon, three; a bishop, four; the
Primate of Leaphigh, five, and the Primate of ALL Leaphigh, six. The
origin of the custom, which was very ancient, and of course very much
respected, was imputed to the doctrine of a saint of great celebrity,
who had satisfactorily proved that as the tail was the intellectual or
the spiritual part of a monikin, the farther it was removed from the
mass of matter, or the body, the more likely it was to be independent,
consecutive, logical, and spiritualized. The idea had succeeded
astonishingly at first; but time, which will wear out even a cauda, had
given birth to schisms in the church on this interesting subject; one
party contending that two more joints ought to be added to the
archbishop’s embellishment, by way of sustaining the church, and the
other that two joints ought to be incontinently abstracted, in the way
of reform.
These explanations were interrupted by the appearance of the bride and
bridegroom, at different doors. The charming Chatterissa advanced with
a most prepossessing modesty, followed by a glorious train of noble
maidens, all keeping their eyes, by a rigid ordinance of hymeneal
etiquette, dropped to the level of the queen’s feet. On the other hand,
my lord Chatterino, attended by that coxcomb Hightail, and others of
his kidney, stepped towards the altar with a lofty confidence, which
the same etiquette exacted of the bridegroom. The parties were no
sooner in their places, than the prelate commenced.
The marriage ceremony, according to the formula of the established
church of Leaphigh, is a very solemn and imposing ceremony. The
bridegroom is required to swear that he loves the bride and none but
the bride; that he has made his choice solely on account of her merits,
uninfluenced even by her beauty; and that he will so far command his
inclinations as, on no account, ever to love another a jot. The bride,
on her part, calls heaven and earth to witness, that she will do just
what the bridegroom shall ask of her; that she will be his bondwoman,
his slave, his solace and his delight; that she is quite certain no
other monikin could make her happy, but, on the other hand, she is
absolutely sure that any other monikin would be certain to make her
miserable. When these pledges, oaths, and asseverations were duly made
and recorded, the archbishop caused the happy pair to be wreathed
together, by encircling them with his episcopal tail, and they were
then pronounced monikin and monikina. I pass over the congratulations,
which were quite in rule, to relate a short conversation I held with
the brigadier.
“Sir,” said I, addressing that person, as soon as the prelate said
‘amen,’ “how is this? I have seen a certificate, myself, which showed
that there was a just admeasurement of the fitness of this union, on
the score of other considerations than those mentioned in the
ceremony?”
“That certificate has no connection with this ceremony.”
“And yet this ceremony repudiates all the considerations enumerated in
the certificate?”
“This ceremony has no connection with that certificate.”
“So it would seem; and yet both refer to the same solemn engagement!”
“Why, to tell you the truth, Sir John Goldencalf, we monikins (for in
these particulars Leaphigh is Leaplow) have two distinct governing
principles in all that we say or do, which may be divided into the
theoretical and the practical—moral and immoral would not be
inapposite—but, by the first we control all our interests, down as far
as facts, when we immediately submit to the latter. There may possibly
be something inconsistent in appearance in such an arrangement; but
then our most knowing ones say that it works well. No doubt among men,
you get along without the embarrassment of so much contradiction.”
I now advanced to pay my respects to the Countess of Chatterino, who
stood supported by the countess-dowager, a lady of great dignity and
elegance of demeanor. The moment I appeared, the elaborate air of
modesty, vanished from the charming countenance of the bride, in a look
of natural pleasure; and, turning to her new mother, she pointed me out
as a man! The courteous old dowager gave me a very kind reception,
inquiring if I had enough good things to eat, whether I was not much
astonished at the multitude of strange sights I beheld in Leaphigh,
said I ought to be much obliged to her son for consenting to bring me
over, and invited me to come and see her some fine morning.
I bowed my thanks, and then returned to join the brigadier, with a view
to seek an introduction to the archbishop. Before I relate the
particulars of my interview with that pious prelate, however, it may be
well to say that this was the last I ever saw of any of the Chatterino
set, as they retired from the presence immediately after the
congratulations were ended. I heard, however, previously to leaving the
region, which was within a month of the marriage, that the noble pair
kept separate establishments, on account of some disagreement about an
incompatibility of temper—or a young officer of the guards—I never knew
exactly which; but as the estates suited each other so well, there is
little doubt that, on the whole, the match was as happy as could be
expected.
The archbishop received me with a great deal of professional
benevolence, the conversation dropping very naturally into a comparison
of the respective religious systems of Great Britain and Leaphigh. He
was delighted when he found we had an establishment; and I believe I
was indebted to his knowledge of this fact for his treating me more as
an equal than he might otherwise have done, considering the difference
in species. I was much relieved by this; for, at the commencement of
the conversation, he had sounded me a little on doctrine, at which I am
far from being expert, never having taken an interest in the church,
and I thought he looked frowning at some of my answers; but, when he
heard that we really had a national religion, he seemed to think all
safe, nor did he once, after that, inquire whether we were pagans or
Presbyterians. But when I told him we had actually a hierarchy, I
thought the good old prelate would have shaken my hand off, and
beatified me on the spot!
“We shall meet in heaven some day!” he exclaimed, with holy delight;
“men or monikins, it can make no great difference, after all. We shall
meet in heaven; and that, too, in the upper mansions!”
The reader will suppose that, an alien, and otherwise unknown, I was
much elated by this distinction. To go to heaven in company with the
Archbishop of Leaphigh was in itself no small favor; but to be thus
noticed by him at court was really enough to upset the philosophy of a
stranger. I was sorely afraid, all the while, he would descend to
particulars, and that he might have found some essential points of
difference to nip his new-born admiration. Had he asked me, for
instance, how many caudae our bishops wear, I should have been
badgered; for, as near as I could recollect, their personal
illustration was of another character. The venerable prelate, however,
soon gave me his blessing, pressed me warmly to come to his palace
before I sailed, promised to send some tracts by me to England, and
then hurried away, as he said, to sign a sentence of excommunication
against an unruly presbyter, who had much disturbed the harmony of the
church, of late, by an attempt to introduce a schism that he called
“piety.”
The brigadier and myself discussed the subject of religion at some
length, when the illustrious prelate had taken his leave. I was told
that the monikin world was pretty nearly equally divided into two
parts, the old and the new. The latter had remained uninhabited, until
within a few generations, when certain monikins, who were too good to
live in the old world, emigrated in a body, and set up for themselves
in the new. This, the brigadier admitted, was the Leaplow account of
the matter; the inhabitants of the old countries, on the other hand,
invariably maintaining that they had peopled the new countries by
sending all those of their own communities there, who were not fit to
stay at home. This little obscurity in the history of the new world, he
considers of no great moment, as such trifling discrepancies must
always depend on the character of the historian. Leaphigh was by no
means the only country in the elder monikin region. There were among
others, for instance, Leapup and Leapdown; Leapover and Leapthrough;
Leaplong and Leapshort; Leapround and Leapunder. Each of these
countries had a religious establishment, though Leaplow, being founded
on a new social principle, had none. The brigadier thought, himself, on
the whole, that the chief consequences of the two systems were, that
the countries which had establishments had a great reputation for
possessing religion, and those that had no establishments were well
enough off in the article itself, though but indifferently supplied on
the score of reputation.
I inquired of the brigadier if he did not think an establishment had
the beneficial effect of sustaining truth, by suppressing heresies,
limiting and curtailing prurient theological fancies, and otherwise
setting limits to innovations. My friend did not absolutely agree with
me in all these particulars; though he very frankly allowed that it had
the effect of keeping TWO truths from falling out, by separating them.
Thus, Leapup maintained one set of religious dogmas under its
establishment, and Leapdown maintained their converse. By keeping these
truths apart, no doubt, religious harmony was promoted, and the several
ministers of the gospel were enabled to turn all their attention to the
sins of the community, instead of allowing it to be diverted to the
sins of each other, as was very apt to be the case when there was an
antagonist interest to oppose.
Shortly after, the king and queen gave us all our conges. Noah and
myself got through the crowd without injury to our trains, and we
separated in the court of the palace; he to go to his bed and dream of
his trial on the morrow, and I to go home with Judge People’s Friend
and the brigadier, who had invited me to finish the evening with a
supper. I was left chatting with the last, while the first went into
his closet to indite a dispatch to his government, relating to the
events of the evening.
The brigadier was rather caustic in his comments on the incidents of
the drawing-room. A republican himself, he certainly did love to give
royalty and nobility some occasional rubs; though I must do this
worthy, upright monikin the justice to say, he was quite superior to
that vulgar hostility which is apt to distinguish many of his caste,
and which is founded on a principle as simple as the fact that they
cannot be kings and nobles themselves.
While we were chatting very pleasantly, quite at our ease, and in
undress as it were, the brigadier in his bob, and I with my tail aside,
Judge People’s Friend rejoined us, with his dispatch open in his hand.
He read aloud what he had written, to my great astonishment, for I had
been accustomed to think diplomatic communications sacred. But the
judge observed, that in this case it was useless to affect secrecy, for
two very good reasons; firstly, because he had been obliged to employ a
common Leaphigh scrivener to copy what he had written—his government
depending on a noble republican economy, which taught it that, if it
did get into difficulties by the betrayal of its correspondence, it
would still have the money that a clerk would cost, to help it out of
the embarrassment; and, secondly, because he knew the government itself
would print it as soon as it arrived. For his part, he liked to have
the publishing of his own works. Under these circumstances, I was even
allowed to take a copy of the letter, of which I now furnish a
fac-simile.
“SIR:—The undersigned, envoy-extraordinary and minister-plenipotentiary
of the North-Western Leaplow Confederate Union, has the honor to inform
the secretary of state, that our interests in this portion of the earth
are, in general, on the best possible footing; our national character
is getting every day to be more and more elevated; our rights are more
and more respected, and our flag is more and more whitening every sea.
After this flattering and honorable account of the state of our general
concerns, I hasten to communicate the following interesting
particulars.
“The treaty between our beloved North-Western Confederate Union and
Leaphigh, has been dishonored in every one of its articles; nineteen
Leaplow seamen have been forcibly impressed into a Leapthrough vessel
of war; the king of Leapup has made an unequivocal demonstration with a
very improper part of his person, at us; and the king of Leapover has
caused seven of our ships to be seized and sold, and the money to be
given to his mistress.
“Sir, I congratulate you on this very flattering condition of our
foreign relations; which can only be imputed to the glorious
constitution of which we are the common servants, and to the just dread
which the Leaplow name has so universally inspired in other nations.
“The king has just had a drawing-room, in which I took great care to
see that the honor of our beloved country should be faithfully attended
to. My cauda was at least three inches longer than that of the
representative of Leapup, the minister most favored by nature in this
important particular; and I have the pleasure of adding, that her
majesty the queen deigned to give me a very gracious smile. Of the
sincerity of that smile there can be no earthly doubt, sir; for, though
there is abundant evidence that she did apply certain unseemly words to
our beloved country lately, it would quite exceed the rules of
diplomatic courtesy, and be unsustained by proof, were we to call in
question her royal sincerity on this public occasion. Indeed, sir, at
all the recent drawing-rooms I have received smiles of the most sincere
and encouraging character, not only from the king, but from all his
ministers, his first-cousin in particular; and I trust they will have
the most beneficial effects on the questions at issue between the
Kingdom of Leaphigh and our beloved country. If they would now only do
us justice in the very important affair of the long-standing and
long-neglected redress, which we have been seeking in vain at their
hands for the last seventy-two years, I should say that our relations
were on the best possible footing.
“Sir, I congratulate you on the profound respect with which the Leaplow
name is treated, in the most distant quarters of the earth, and on the
benign influence this fortunate circumstance is likely to exercise on
all our important interests.
“I see but little probability of effecting the object of my special
mission, but the utmost credit is to be attached to the sincerity of
the smiles of the king and queen, and of all the royal family.”
“In a late conversation with his majesty, he inquired in the kindest
manner after the health of the Great Sachem [this is the title of the
head of the Leaplow government], and observed that our growth and
prosperity put all other nations to shame; and that we might, on all
occasions, depend on his most profound respect and perpetual
friendship. In short, sir, all nations, far and near, desire our
alliance, are anxious to open new sources of commerce, and entertain
for us the profoundest respect, and the most inviolable esteem. You can
tell the Great Sachem that this feeling is surprisingly augmented under
his administration, and that it has at least quadrupled during my
mission. If Leaphigh would only respect its treaties, Leapthrough would
cease taking our seamen, Leapup have greater deference for the usages
of good society, and the king of Leapover would seize no more of our
ships to supply his mistress with pocket-money, our foreign relations
might be considered to be without spot. As it is, sir, they are far
better off than I could have expected, or indeed had ever hoped to see
them; and of one thing you may be diplomatically certain, that we are
universally respected, and that the Leaplow name is never mentioned
without all in company rising and waving their caudae.”
“(Signed.) JUDAS PEOPLE’S FRIEND.”
“Hon.————-, etc.”
“P. S. (Private.)”
“Dear Sir:—If you publish this dispatch, omit the part where the
difficulties are repeated, I beg you will see that my name is put in
with those of the other patriots, against the periodical rotation of
the little wheel, as I shall certainly be obliged to return home soon,
having consumed all my means. Indeed, the expense of maintaining a
tail, of which our people have no notion, is so very great, that I
think none of our missions should exceed a week in duration.
“I would especially advise that the message should dilate on the
subject of the high standing of the Leaplow character in foreign
nations; for, to be frank with you, facts require that this statement
should be made as often as possible.”
When this letter was read, the conversation reverted to religion. The
brigadier explained that the law of Leaphigh had various peculiarities
on this subject, that I do not remember to have heard of before. Thus,
a monikin could not be born without paying something to the church, a
practice which early initiated him into his duties towards that
important branch of the public welfare; and, even when he died, he left
a fee behind him, for the parson, as an admonition to those who still
existed in the flesh, not to forget their obligations. He added that
this sacred interest was, in short, so rigidly protected, that,
whenever a monikin refused to be plucked for a new clerical or
episcopal mantle, there was a method of fleecing him, by the
application of red-hot iron rods, which generally singed so much of his
skin, that he was commonly willing, in the end, to let the
hair-proctors pick and choose at pleasure.
I confess I was indignant at this picture, and did not hesitate to
stigmatize the practice as barbarous.
“Your indignation is very natural, Sir John, and is just what a
stranger would be likely to feel, when he found mercy, and charity, and
brotherly love, and virtue, and, above all, humility, made the
stalking-horses of pride, selfishness, and avarice. But this is the way
with us monikins; no doubt, men manage better.”