O Oxford pedants! Oxford pedants! ye whose politics and religion are

both derived from Scott's novels! what a pity it is that some lad of

honest parents, whose mind ye are endeavouring to stultify with your

nonsense about "Complines and Claverse," has not the spirit to start up

and cry, "Confound your gibberish! I'll have none of it. Hurrah for the

Church, and the principles of my _father_!"

CHAPTER VII. SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

Now what could have induced Scott to write novels tending to make people

Papists and Jacobites, and in love with arbitrary power? Did he think

that Christianity was a gaudy mummery? He did not, he could not, for he

had read the Bible; yet was he fond of gaudy mummeries, fond of talking

about them. Did he believe that the Stuarts were a good family, and fit

to govern a country like Britain? He knew that they were a vicious,

worthless crew, and that Britain was a degraded country as long as they

swayed the sceptre; but for those facts he cared nothing, they governed

in a way which he liked, for he had an abstract love of despotism, and an

abhorrence of everything savouring of freedom and the rights of man in

general. His favourite political picture was a joking, profligate,

careless king, nominally absolute--the heads of great houses paying court

to, but in reality governing, that king, whilst revelling with him on the

plunder of a nation, and a set of crouching, grovelling vassals (the

literal meaning of vassal is a wretch), who, after allowing themselves to

be horsewhipped, would take a bone if flung to them, and be grateful; so

that in love with mummery, though he knew what Christianity was, no

wonder he admired such a church as that of Rome, and that which Laud set

up; and by nature formed to be the holder of the candle to ancient worm-

eaten and profligate families, no wonder that all his sympathies were

with the Stuarts and their dissipated insolent party, and all his hatred

directed against those who endeavoured to check them in their

proceedings, and to raise the generality of mankind something above a

state of vassalage that is wretchedness. Those who were born great,

were, if he could have had his will, always to remain great, however

worthless their characters. Those who were born low, were always to

remain so, however great their talents--though if that rule were carried

out, where would he have been himself?

In the book which he called the "History of Napoleon Bonaparte," in which

he plays the sycophant to all the legitimate crowned heads in Europe,

whatever their crimes, vices, or miserable imbecilities, he, in his

abhorrence of everything low which by its own vigour makes itself

illustrious, calls Murat of the sabre the son of a pastry-cook, of a

Marseilleise pastry-cook. It is a pity that people who give themselves

hoity-toity airs--and the Scotch in general are wonderfully addicted to

giving themselves hoity-toity airs, and checking people better than

themselves with their birth {332} and their country--it is a great pity

that such people do not look at home--son of a pastry-cook, of a

Marseilleise pastry-cook! Well, and what was Scott himself? Why, son of

a pettifogger, of an Edinburgh pettifogger. "Oh, but Scott was descended

from the old cow-stealers of Buccleuch, and therefore . . ." Descended

from old cow-stealers, was he? Well, had he had nothing to boast of

beyond such a pedigree, he would have lived and died the son of a

pettifogger, and been forgotten, and deservedly so; but he possessed

talents, and by his talents rose like Murat, and like him will be

remembered for his talents alone, and deservedly so. "Yes, but Murat was

still the son of a pastry-cook, and though he was certainly good at the

sabre, and cut his way to a throne, still . . ." Lord! what fools there

are in the world; but as no one can be thought anything of in this world

without a pedigree, the writer will now give a pedigree for Murat, of a

very different character from the cow-stealing one of Scott, but such a

one as the proudest he might not disdain to claim. Scott was descended

from the old cow-stealers of Buccleuch--was he? Good! and Murat was

descended from the old Moors of Spain, from the Abencerages (sons of the

saddle) of Granada. The name Murat is Arabic, and is the same as Murad

(Le Desire, or the wished-for one). Scott, in his genteel life of

Bonaparte, says that "when Murat was in Egypt, the similarity between the

name of the celebrated Mameluke Mourad and that of Bonaparte's Meilleur

Sabreur was remarked, and became the subject of jest amongst the comrades

of the gallant Frenchman." But the writer of the novel of Bonaparte did

not know that the names were one and the same. Now which was the best

pedigree, that of the son of the pastry-cook, or that of the son of the

pettifogger? Which was the best blood? Let us observe the workings of

the two bloods. He who had the blood of the "sons of the saddle" in him

became the wonderful cavalier of the most wonderful host that ever went

forth to conquest, won for himself a crown, and died the death of a

soldier, leaving behind him a son, only inferior to himself in strength,

in prowess, and in horsemanship. The descendant of the cow-stealer

became a poet, a novel writer, the panegyrist of great folks and genteel

people; became insolvent because, though an author, he deemed it

ungenteel to be mixed up with the business part of authorship; died

paralytic and broken-hearted because he could no longer give

entertainments to great folks; leaving behind him, amongst other

children, who were never heard of, a son, who through his father's

interest, had become lieutenant-colonel in a genteel cavalry regiment. A

son who was ashamed of his father because his father was an author; a son

who--paugh--why ask which was the best blood!

So, owing to his rage for gentility, Scott must needs become the

apologist of the Stuarts and their party; but God made this man pay

dearly for taking the part of the wicked against the good; for lauding up

to the skies miscreants and robbers, and calumniating the noble spirits

of Britain, the salt of England, and his own country. As God had driven

the Stuarts from their throne, and their followers from their estates,

making them vagabonds and beggars on the face of the earth, taking from

them all they cared for, so did that same God, who knows perfectly well

how and where to strike, deprive the apologist of that wretched crew of

all that rendered life pleasant in his eyes, the lack of which paralysed

him in body and mind, rendered him pitiable to others, loathsome to

himself,--so much so, that he once said, "Where is the beggar who would

change places with me, notwithstanding all my fame?" Ah! God knows

perfectly well how to strike. He permitted him to retain all his

literary fame to the very last--his literary fame for which he cared

nothing; but what became of the sweetnesses of life, his fine house, his

grand company, and his entertainments? The grand house ceased to be his;

he was only permitted to live in it on sufferance, and whatever grandeur

it might still retain, it soon became as desolate a looking house as any

misanthrope could wish to see--where were the grand entertainments and

the grand company? there are no grand entertainments where there is no

money; no lords and ladies where there are no entertainments--and there

lay the poor lodger in the desolate house, groaning on a bed no longer

his, smitten by the hand of God in the part where he was most vulnerable.

Of what use telling such a man to take comfort, for he had written the

"Minstrel" and "Rob Roy,"--telling him to think of his literary fame?

Literary fame, indeed! he wanted back his lost gentility:--

"Retain my altar,

I care nothing for it--but, oh! touch not my _beard_."

PORNY'S _War of the Gods_.

He dies, his children die too, and then comes the crowning judgment of

God on what remained of his race, and the house which he had built. He

was not a Papist himself, nor did he wish any one belonging to him to be

Popish, for he had read enough of the Bible to know that no one can be

saved through Popery, yet had he a sneaking affection for it, and would

at all times, in an underhand manner, give it a good word both in writing

and discourse, because it was a gaudy kind of worship, and ignorance and

vassalage prevailed so long as it flourished--but he certainly did not

wish any of his people to become Papists, nor the house which he had

built to become a Popish house, though the very name he gave it savoured

of Popery; but Popery becomes fashionable through his novels and

poems--the only one that remains of his race, a female grandchild,

marries a person who, following the fashion, becomes a Papist, and makes

her a Papist too. Money abounds with the husband, who buys the house,

and then the house becomes the rankest Popish house in Britain. A

superstitious person might almost imagine that one of the old Scottish

Covenanters, whilst the grand house was being built from the profits

resulting from the sale of writings favouring Popery and persecution, and

calumniatory of Scotland's saints and martyrs, had risen from the grave,

and banned Scott, his race, and his house, by reading a certain psalm.

In saying what he has said about Scott, the author has not been

influenced by any feeling of malice or ill-will, but simply by a regard

for truth, and a desire to point out to his countrymen the harm which has

resulted from the perusal of his works;--he is not one of those who would

depreciate the talents of Scott--he admires his talents, both as a prose

writer and a poet; as a poet especially he admires him, and believes him

to have been by far the greatest, with perhaps the exception of

Mickiewicz, who only wrote for unfortunate Poland, that Europe has given

birth to during the last hundred years. As a prose writer he admires him

less, it is true, but his admiration for him in that capacity is very

high, and he only laments that he prostituted his talents to the cause of

the Stuarts and gentility. What book of fiction of the present century

can you read twice, with the exception of "Waverley" and "Rob Roy"? There

is "Pelham," it is true, which the writer of these lines has seen a

Jewess reading in the steppe of Debreczin, and which a young Prussian

Baron, a great traveller, whom he met at Constantinople in '44, told him

he always carried in his valise. And, in conclusion, he will say, in

order to show the opinion which he entertains of the power of Scott as a

writer, that he did for the spectre of the wretched Pretender what all

the kings of Europe could not do for his body--placed it on the throne of

these realms; and for Popery, what Popes and Cardinals strove in vain to

do for three centuries--brought back its mummeries and nonsense into the

temples of the British Isles.

Scott during his lifetime had a crowd of imitators, who, whether they

wrote history so called--poetry so called--or novels--nobody would call a

book a novel if he could call it anything else--wrote Charlie o'er the

water nonsense; and now that he has been dead a quarter of a century,

there are others daily springing up who are striving to imitate Scott in

his Charlie o'er the water nonsense--for nonsense it is, even when

flowing from his pen. They, too, must write Jacobite histories, Jacobite

songs, and Jacobite novels, and much the same figure as the scoundrel

menials in the comedy cut when personating their masters, and retailing

their masters' conversation, do they cut as Walter Scotts. In their

histories, they too talk about the Prince and Glenfinnan, and the

pibroch; and in their songs about "Claverse" and "Bonny Dundee." But

though they may be Scots, they are not Walter Scotts. But it is perhaps

chiefly in the novel that you see the veritable hog in armour; the time

of the novel is of course the '15 or '45; the hero a Jacobite, and

connected with one or other of the enterprises of those periods; and the

author, to show how unprejudiced he is, and what _original_ views he

takes of subjects, must needs speak up for Popery, whenever he has

occasion to mention it; though, with all his originality, when he brings

his hero and the vagabonds with which he is concerned before a

barricadoed house, belonging to the Whigs, he can make them get into it

by no other method than that which Scott makes his rioters employ to get

into the Tolbooth, _burning down_ the door.

To express the more than utter foolishness of this latter Charlie o'er

the water nonsense, whether in rhyme or prose, there is but one word, and

that word a Scotch word. Scotch, the sorriest of jargons, compared with

which even Roth Welsch is dignified and expressive, has yet one word to

express what would be inexpressible by any word or combination of words

in any language, or in any other jargon in the world; and very properly;

for as the nonsense is properly Scotch, so should the word be Scotch

which expresses it--that word is "fushionless," pronounced

_fooshionless_; and when the writer has called the nonsense

fooshionless--and he does call it fooshionless--he has nothing more to

say, but leaves the nonsense to its fate.

CHAPTER VIII. ON CANTING NONSENSE.

The writer now wishes to say something on the subject of canting

nonsense, of which there is a great deal in England. There are various

cants in England, amongst which is the religious cant. He is not going

to discuss the subject of religious cant: lest, however, he should be

misunderstood, he begs leave to repeat that he is a sincere member of the

old-fashioned Church of England, in which he believes there is more

religion, and consequently less cant, than in any other church in the

world; nor is he going to discuss many other cants; he shall content

himself with saying something about two--the temperance cant and the

unmanly cant. Temperance canters say that "it is unlawful to drink a

glass of ale." Unmanly canters say that "it is unlawful to use one's

fists." The writer begs leave to tell both these species of canters that

they do not speak the words of truth.

It is very lawful to take a cup of ale, or wine, for the purpose of

cheering or invigorating yourself when you are faint and downhearted; and

likewise to give a cup of ale or wine to others when they are in a

similar condition. The Holy Scripture sayeth nothing to the contrary,

but rather encourageth people in so doing by the text, "Wine maketh glad

the heart of man." But it is not lawful to intoxicate yourself with

frequent cups of ale or wine, nor to make others intoxicated, nor does

the Holy Scripture say that it is. The Holy Scripture no more says that

it is lawful to intoxicate yourself or others, than it says that it is

unlawful to take a cup of ale or wine yourself, or to give one to others.

Noah is not commended in the Scripture for making himself drunken on the

wine he brewed. Nor is it said that the Saviour, when He supplied the

guests with first-rate wine at the marriage feast, told them to make

themselves drunk upon it. He is said to have supplied them with first-

rate wine, but He doubtless left the quantity which each should drink to

each party's reason and discretion. When you set a good dinner before

your guests, you do not expect that they should gorge themselves with the

victuals you set before them. Wine may be abused, and so may a leg of

mutton.

Second. It is lawful for any one to use his fists in his own defence, or

in the defence of others, provided they can't help themselves; but it is

not lawful to use them for purposes of tyranny or brutality. If you are

attacked by a ruffian, as the elderly individual in Lavengro is in the

inn-yard, it is quite lawful, if you can, to give him as good a thrashing

as the elderly individual gave the brutal coachman; and if you see a

helpless woman--perhaps your own sister--set upon by a drunken lord, a

drunken coachman, or a drunken coalheaver, or a brute of any description,

either drunk or sober, it is not only lawful, but laudable, to give them,

if you can, a good drubbing: but it is not lawful, because you have a

strong pair of fists, and know how to use them, to go swaggering through

a fair, jostling against unoffending individuals; should you do so, you

would be served quite right if you were to get a drubbing, more

particularly if you were served out by some one less strong, but more

skilful than yourself--even as the coachman was served out by a pupil of

the immortal Broughton--sixty years old, it is true, but possessed of

Broughton's guard and chop. Moses is not blamed in the Scripture for

taking part with the oppressed, and killing an Egyptian persecutor. We

are not told how Moses killed the Egyptian; but it is quite as creditable

to Moses to suppose that he killed the Egyptian by giving him a buffet

under the left ear, as by stabbing him with a knife. It is true, that

the Saviour in the New Testament tells his disciples to turn the left

cheek to be smitten, after they had received a blow on the right; but He

was speaking to people divinely inspired, or whom He intended divinely to

inspire--people selected by God for a particular purpose. He likewise

tells these people to part with various articles of raiment when asked

for them, and to go a-travelling without money, and to take no thought of

the morrow. Are those exhortations carried out by very good people in

the present day? Do Quakers, when smitten on the right cheek, turn the

left to the smiter? When asked for their coat, do they say, "Friend,

take my shirt also"? Has the Dean of Salisbury no purse? Does the

Archbishop of Canterbury go to an inn, run up a reckoning, and then say

to his landlady, "Mistress, I have no coin"? Assuredly the Dean has a

purse, and a tolerably well-filled one; and, assuredly, the Archbishop,

on departing from an inn, not only settles his reckoning, but leaves

something handsome for the servants, and does not say that he is

forbidden by the gospel to pay for what he has eaten, or the trouble he

has given, as a certain Spanish cavalier said he was forbidden by the

statutes of chivalry. Now, to take the part of yourself, or the part of

the oppressed, with your fists, is quite as lawful in the present day as

it is to refuse your coat and your shirt also to any vagabond who may ask

for them, and not to refuse to pay for supper, bed, and breakfast, at the

Feathers, or any other inn, after you have had the benefit of all three.

The conduct of Lavengro with respect to drink may, upon the whole, serve

as a model. He is no drunkard, nor is he fond of intoxicating other

people; yet when the horrors are upon him he has no objection to go to a

public-house and call for a pint of ale, nor does he shrink from

recommending ale to others when they are faint and downcast. In one

instance, it is true, he does what cannot be exactly justified; he

encourages the Priest in the dingle, in more instances than one, in

drinking more hollands and water than is consistent with decorum. He has

a motive indeed in doing so; a desire to learn from the knave in his cups

the plans and hopes of the Propaganda of Rome. Such conduct, however,

was inconsistent with strict fair dealing and openness; and the author

advises all those whose consciences never reproach them for a single

unfair or covert act committed by them, to abuse him heartily for

administering hollands and water to the Priest of Rome. In that instance

the hero is certainly wrong; yet in all other cases with regard to drink,

he is manifestly right. To tell people that they are never to drink a

glass of ale or wine themselves, or to give one to others, is cant; and

the writer has no toleration for cant of any description. Some cants are

not dangerous; but the writer believes that a more dangerous cant than

the temperance cant, or as it is generally called, teetotalism, is

scarcely to be found. The writer is willing to believe that it

originated with well-meaning, though weak people; but there can be no

doubt that it was quickly turned to account by people who were neither

well meaning nor weak. Let the reader note particularly the purpose to

which this cry has been turned in America; the land, indeed, _par

excellence_, of humbug and humbug cries. It is there continually in the

mouth of the most violent political party, and is made an instrument of

almost unexampled persecution. The writer would say more on the

temperance cant, both in England and America, but want of space prevents

him. There is one point on which he cannot avoid making a few brief

remarks--that is the inconsistent conduct of its apostles in general. The

teetotal apostle says, it is a dreadful thing to be drunk. So it is,

teetotaller; but if so, why do you get drunk? I get drunk? Yes, unhappy

man, why do you get drunk on smoke and passion? Why are your garments

impregnated with the odour of the Indian weed? Why is there a pipe or a

cigar always in your mouth? Why is your language more dreadful than that

of a Poissarde? Tobacco-smoke is more deleterious than ale, teetotaller;

bile more potent than brandy. You are fond of telling your hearers what

an awful thing it is to die drunken. So it is, teetotaller. Then take

good care that you do not die with smoke and passion, drunken, and with

temperance language on your lips; that is, abuse and calumny against all

those who differ from you. One word of sense you have been heard to say,

which is, that spirits may be taken as a medicine. Now you are in a

fever of passion, teetotaller; so, pray take this tumbler of brandy; take

it on the homoeopathic principle, that heat is to be expelled by heat.

You are in a temperance fury, so swallow the contents of this tumbler,

and it will, perhaps, cure you. You look at the glass wistfully--you say

you occasionally take a glass medicinally--and it is probable you do.

Take one now. Consider what a dreadful thing it would be to die passion

drunk; to appear before your Maker with _in_temperate language on your

lips. That's right! You don't seem to wince at the brandy. That's

right!--well done! All down in two pulls. Now you look like a

reasonable being!

If the conduct of Lavengro with regard to drink is open to little

censure, assuredly the use which he makes of his fists is entitled to

none at all. Because he has a pair of tolerably strong fists, and knows

to a certain extent how to use them, is he a swaggerer or oppressor? To

what ill account does he turn them? Who more quiet, gentle, and

inoffensive than he? He beats off a ruffian who attacks him in a dingle;

has a kind of friendly tussle with Mr. Petulengro, and behold the extent

of his fistic exploits.

Ay, but he associates with prize-fighters; and that very fellow,

Petulengro, is a prize-fighter, and has fought for a stake in a ring.

Well, and if he had not associated with prize-fighters, how could he have

used his fists? Oh, anybody can use his fists in his own defence,

without being taught by prize-fighters. Can they? Then why does not the

Italian, or Spaniard, or Affghan use his fists when insulted or outraged,

instead of having recourse to the weapons which he has recourse to?

Nobody can use his fists without being taught the use of them by those

who have themselves been taught, no more than any one can "whiffle"

without being taught by a master of the art. Now let any man of the

present day try to whiffle. Would not any one who wished to whiffle have

to go to a master of the art. Assuredly! but where would he find one at

the present day? The last of the whifflers hanged himself about a

fortnight ago on a bell-rope in a church steeple of "the old town," from

pure grief that there was no further demand for the exhibition of his

art, there being no demand for whiffling since the discontinuation of

Guildhall banquets. Whiffling is lost. The old chap left his sword

behind him; let any one take up the old chap's sword and try to whiffle.

Now much the same hand as he would make who should take up the whiffler's

sword and try to whiffle, would he who should try to use his fists who

had never had the advantage of a master. Let no one think that men use

their fists naturally in their own disputes--men have naturally recourse

to any other thing to defend themselves or to offend others; they fly to

the stick, to the stone, to the murderous and cowardly knife, or to abuse

as cowardly as the knife, and occasionally more murderous. Now which is

best when you hate a person, or have a pique against a person, to clench

your fist and say "Come on," or to have recourse to the stone, the knife,

or murderous calumny? The use of the fist is almost lost in England. Yet

are the people better than they were when they knew how to use their

fists? The writer believes not. A fisty combat is at present a great

rarity, but the use of the knife, the noose, and of poison, to say

nothing of calumny, are of more frequent occurrence in England than

perhaps in any country in Europe. Is polite taste better than when it

could bear the details of a fight? The writer believes not. Two men

cannot meet in a ring to settle a dispute in a manly manner without some

trumpery local newspaper letting loose a volley of abuse against "the

disgraceful exhibition," in which abuse it is sure to be sanctioned by

its dainty readers; whereas some murderous horror, the discovery, for

example, of the mangled remains of a woman in some obscure den, is

greedily seized hold on by the moral journal, and dressed up for its

readers, who luxuriate and gloat upon the ghastly dish. Now, the writer

of Lavengro has no sympathy with those who would shrink from striking a

blow, but would not shrink from the use of poison or calumny; and his

taste has little in common with that which cannot tolerate the hardy

details of a prize-fight, but which luxuriates on descriptions of the

murder dens of modern England. But prize-fighters and pugilists are

blackguards, a reviewer has said; and blackguards they would be provided

they employed their skill and their prowess for purposes of brutality and

oppression; but prize-fighters and pugilists are seldom friends to

brutality and oppression; and which is the blackguard, the writer would

ask, he who uses his fists to take his own part, or instructs others to

use theirs for the same purpose, or the being who from envy and malice,

or at the bidding of a malicious scoundrel, endeavours by calumny,

falsehood, and misrepresentation to impede the efforts of lonely and

unprotected genius?

One word more about the race, all but extinct, of the people

opprobriously called prize-fighters. Some of them have been as noble,

kindly men as the world ever produced. Can the rolls of the English

aristocracy exhibit names belonging to more noble, more heroic men than

those who were called respectively Pearce, Cribb, and Spring? Did ever

one of the English aristocracy contract the seeds of fatal consumption by

rushing up the stairs of a burning edifice, even to the topmost garret,

and rescuing a woman from seemingly inevitable destruction? The writer

says No. A woman was rescued from the top of a burning house; but the

man who rescued her was no aristocrat; it was Pearce, not Percy, who ran

up the burning stairs. Did ever one of those glittering ones save a

fainting female from the libidinous rage of six ruffians? The writer

believes not. A woman was rescued from the libidinous fury of six

monsters on . . . Down; but the man who rescued her was no aristocrat; it

was Pearce, not Paulet, who rescued the woman, and thrashed my lord's six

gamekeepers--Pearce, whose equal never was, and probably never will be,

found in sturdy combat. Are there any of the aristocracy of whom it can

be said that they never did a cowardly, cruel, or mean action, and that

they invariably took the part of the unfortunate and weak against cruelty

and oppression? As much can be said of Cribb, of Spring, and the other;

but where is the aristocrat of whom as much can be said? Wellington?

Wellington, indeed! a skilful general, and a good man of valour, it is

true, but with that cant word of "duty" continually on his lips, did he

rescue Ney from his butchers? Did he lend a helping hand to Warner?

In conclusion, the writer would strongly advise those of his

country-folks who may read his book to have nothing to do with the two

kinds of canting nonsense described above, but in their progress through

life to enjoy as well as they can, but always with moderation, the good

things of this world, to put confidence in God, to be as independent as

possible, and to take their own parts. If they are low-spirited, let

them not make themselves foolish by putting on sackcloth, drinking water,

or chewing ashes, but let them take wholesome exercise, and eat the most

generous food they can get, taking up and reading occasionally, not the

lives of Ignatius Loyola and Francis Spira, but something more agreeable;

for example, the life and adventures of Mr. Duncan Campbell, the deaf and

dumb gentleman; the travels of Captain Falconer in America, and the

Journal of John Randall, who went to Virginia and married an Indian wife;

not forgetting, amidst their eating and drinking, their walks over

heaths, and by the sea-side, and their agreeable literature, to be

charitable to the poor, to read the Psalms, and to go to church twice on

a Sunday. In their dealings with people, to be courteous to everybody,

as Lavengro was, but always independent like him; and if people meddle

with them, to give them as good as they bring, even as he and Isopel

Berners were in the habit of doing; and it will be as well for him to

observe that he by no means advises women to be too womanly, but bearing

the conduct of Isopel Berners in mind, to take their own parts, and if

anybody strikes them, to strike again.

Beating of women by the lords of the creation has become very prevalent

in England since pugilism has been discountenanced. Now the writer

strongly advises any woman who is struck by a ruffian to strike him

again; or if she cannot clench her fists, and he advises all women in

these singular times to learn to clench their fists, to go at him with

tooth and nail, and not to be afraid of the result, for any fellow who is

dastard enough to strike a woman, would allow himself to be beaten by a

woman, were she to make at him in self-defence, even if, instead of

possessing the stately height and athletic proportions of the aforesaid

Isopel, she were as diminutive in stature, and had a hand as delicate,

and a foot as small, as a certain royal lady, who was some time ago

assaulted by a fellow upwards of six feet high, whom the writer has no

doubt she could have beaten had she thought proper to go at him. Such is

the deliberate advice of the author to his countrymen and women--advice

in which he believes there is nothing unscriptural or repugnant to common

sense.

The writer is perfectly well aware that, by the plain language which he

has used in speaking of the various kinds of nonsense prevalent in

England, he shall make himself a multitude of enemies; but he is not

going to conceal the truth, or to tamper with nonsense, from the fear of

provoking hostility. He has a duty to perform, and he will perform it

resolutely; he is the person who carried the Bible to Spain; and as

resolutely as he spoke in Spain against the superstitions of Spain, will

he speak in England against the nonsense of his own native land. He is

not one of those who, before they sit down to write a book, say to

themselves, what cry shall we take up? what principles shall we advocate?

what principles shall we abuse? before we put pen to paper we must find

out what cry is the loudest, what principle has the most advocates,

otherwise, after having written our book, we may find ourselves on the

weaker side.

A sailor of the "Bounty," waked from his sleep by the noise of the

mutiny, lay still in his hammock for some time, quite undecided whether

to take part with the captain, or to join the mutineers. "I must mind

what I do," said he to himself, "lest, in the end, I find myself on the

weaker side;" finally, on hearing that the mutineers were successful, he

went on deck, and seeing Bligh pinioned to the mast, he put his fist to

his nose, and otherwise insulted him. Now, there are many writers of the

present day whose conduct is very similar to that of the sailor. They

lie listening in their corners till they have ascertained which principle

has most advocates; then, presently, they make their appearance on the

deck of the world with their book; if truth has been victorious, then has

truth their hurrah! but if truth is pinioned against the mast, then is

their fist thrust against the nose of truth, and their gibe and their

insult spirted in her face. The strongest party had the sailor, and the

strongest party has almost invariably the writer of the present day.

CHAPTER IX. PSEUDO-CRITICS.

A certain set of individuals calling themselves critics have attacked

Lavengro with much virulence and malice. If what they call criticism had

been founded on truth, the author would have had nothing to say. The

book contains plenty of blemishes, some of them, by-the-bye, wilful ones,

as the writer will presently show; not one of these, however, has been

detected and pointed out; but the best passages in the book, indeed

whatever was calculated to make the book valuable, have been assailed

with abuse and misrepresentation. The duty of the true critic is to play

the part of a leech, and not of a viper. Upon true and upon malignant

criticism there is an excellent fable by the Spaniard Iriarte. The viper

says to the leech, "Why do people invite your bite, and flee from mine?"

"Because," says the leech, "people receive health from my bite, and

poison from yours." "There is as much difference," says the clever

Spaniard, "between true and malignant criticism, as between poison and

medicine." Certainly a great many meritorious writers have allowed

themselves to be poisoned by malignant criticism; the writer, however, is

not one of those who allow themselves to be poisoned by pseudo-critics;

no! no! he will rather hold them up by their tails, and show the

creatures wriggling, blood and foam streaming from their broken jaws.

First of all, however, he will notice one of their objections. "The book

isn't true," say they. Now one of the principal reasons with those that

have attacked Lavengro for their abuse of it is, that it is particularly

true in one instance, namely, that it exposes their own nonsense, their

love of humbug, their slavishness, their dressings, their goings out,

their scraping and bowing to great people; it is the showing up of

"gentility nonsense" in Lavengro that has been one principal reason for

the raising of the above cry; for in Lavengro is denounced the besetting

folly of the English people, a folly which those who call themselves

guardians of the public taste are far from being above. "We can't abide

anything that isn't true!" they exclaim. Can't they? Then why are they

so enraptured with any fiction that is adapted to purposes of humbug,

which tends to make them satisfied with their own proceedings, with their

own nonsense, which does not tell them to reform, to become more alive to

their own failings, and less sensitive about the tyrannical goings on of

the masters, and the degraded condition, the sufferings, and the trials

of the serfs in the star Jupiter? Had Lavengro, instead of being the

work of an independent mind, been written in order to further any of the

thousand and one cants, and species of nonsense prevalent in England, the

author would have heard much less about its not being true, both from

public detractors and private censurers.

"But Lavengro pretends to be an autobiography," say the critics; and here

the writer begs leave to observe, that it would be well for people who

profess to have a regard for truth, not to exhibit in every assertion

which they make a most profligate disregard of it; this assertion of

theirs is a falsehood, and they know it to be a falsehood. In the

preface Lavengro is stated to be a dream; and the writer takes this

opportunity of stating that he never said it was an autobiography; never

authorised any person to say that it was one; and that he has in

innumerable instances declared in public and private, both before and

after the work was published, that it was not what is generally termed an

autobiography: but a set of people who pretend to write criticisms on

books, hating the author for various reasons,--amongst others, because,

having the proper pride of a gentleman and a scholar, he did not, in the

year '43, choose to permit himself to be exhibited and made a zany of in

London, and especially because he will neither associate with, nor curry

favour with, them who are neither gentlemen nor scholars,--attack his

book with abuse and calumny. He is, perhaps, condescending too much when

he takes any notice of such people; as, however, the English public is

wonderfully led by cries and shouts, and generally ready to take part

against any person who is either unwilling or unable to defend himself,

he deems it advisable not to be altogether quiet with those who assail

him. The best way to deal with vipers is to tear out their teeth; and

the best way to deal with pseudo-critics is to deprive them of their

poison-bag, which is easily done by exposing their ignorance. The writer

knew perfectly well the description of people with whom he would have to

do, he therefore very quietly prepared a stratagem, by means of which he

could at any time exhibit them, powerless and helpless, in his hand.

Critics, when they review books, ought to have a competent knowledge of

the subjects which those books discuss.

Lavengro is a philological book, a poem if you choose to call it so. Now,

what a fine triumph it would have been for those who wished to vilify the

book and its author, provided they could have detected the latter

tripping in his philology--they might have instantly said that he was an

ignorant pretender to philology--they laughed at the idea of his taking

up a viper by its tail, a trick which hundreds of country urchins do

every September, but they were silent about the really wonderful part of

the book, the philological matter--they thought philology was his

stronghold, and that it would be useless to attack him there; they of

course would give him no credit as a philologist, for anything like fair

treatment towards him was not to be expected at their hands, but they

were afraid to attack his philology--yet that was the point, and the only

point, in which they might have attacked him successfully; he was

vulnerable there. How was this? Why, in order to have an opportunity of

holding up pseudo-critics by the tails, he wilfully spelt various foreign

words wrong--Welsh words, and even Italian words--did they detect these

misspellings? not one of them, even as he knew they would not, and he now

taunts them with ignorance; and the power of taunting them with ignorance

is the punishment which he designed for them--a power which they might

but for their ignorance have used against him. The writer, besides

knowing something of Italian and Welsh, knows a little of Armenian

language and literature, but who knowing anything of the Armenian

language, unless he had an end in view, would say that the word for sea

in Armenian is anything like the word tide in English? The word for sea

in Armenian is dzow, a word connected with the Tebetian word for water,

and the Chinese shuy, and the Turkish su, signifying the same thing; but

where is the resemblance between dzow and tide? Again, the word for

bread in ancient Armenian is hats; yet the Armenian on London Bridge is

made to say zhats, which is not the nominative of the Armenian noun for

bread, but the accusative: now, critics, ravening against a man because

he is a gentleman and a scholar, and has not only the power but also the

courage to write original works, why did not you discover that weak

point? Why, because you were ignorant, so here ye are held up! Moreover,

who with a name commencing with Z, ever wrote fables in Armenian? There

are two writers of fables in Armenian--Varthan and Koscht, and

illustrious writers they are, one in the simple, and the other in the

ornate style of Armenian composition, but neither of their names begins

with a Z. Oh, what a precious opportunity ye lost, ye ravening crew, of

convicting the poor, half-starved, friendless boy of the book, of

ignorance or misrepresentation, by asking who with a name beginning with

Z ever wrote fables in Armenian; but ye couldn't help yourselves, ye are

duncie. We duncie! Ay, duncie. So here ye are held up by the tails,

blood and foam streaming from your jaws.

The writer wishes to ask here, what do you think of all this, Messieurs

les Critiques? Were ye ever served so before? But don't you richly

deserve it? Haven't you been for years past bullying and insulting

everybody whom you deemed weak, and currying favour with everybody whom

ye thought strong? "_We_ approve of this. We disapprove of that. Oh,

this will never do. These are fine lines!" The lines perhaps some

horrid sycophantic rubbish addressed to Wellington, or Lord So-and-so. To

have your ignorance thus exposed, to be shown up in this manner, and by

whom? A gypsy! Ay, a gypsy was the very right person to do it. But is

it not galling after all?

Ah, but _we_ don't understand Armenian, it cannot be expected that _we_

should understand Armenian, or Welsh, or . . . Hey, what's this? The

mighty _we_ not understand Armenian or Welsh, or . . . Then why does the

mighty _we_ pretend to review a book like Lavengro? From the arrogance

with which it continually delivers itself, one would think that the

mighty _we_ is omniscient; that it understands every language; is versed

in every literature; yet the mighty _we_ does not even know the word for

bread in Armenian. It knows bread well enough by name in English, and

frequently bread in England only by its name, but the truth is, that the

mighty _we_, with all its pretension, is in general a very sorry

creature, who, instead of saying nous disons, should rather say nous dis:

Porny in his "Guerre des Dieux," very profanely makes the three in one

say, Je faisons; now, Lavengro, who is anything but profane, would

suggest that critics, especially magazine and Sunday newspaper critics,

should commence with nous dis, as the first word would be significant of

the conceit and assumption of the critic, and the second of the extent of

the critic's information. The _we_ says its say, but when fawning

sycophancy or vulgar abuse are taken from that say, what remains? Why a

blank, a void like Ginnungagap.

As the writer, of his own accord, has exposed some of the blemishes of

his book--a task which a competent critic ought to have done--he will now

point out two or three of its merits, which any critic, not altogether

blinded with ignorance, might have done, or not replete with gall and

envy would have been glad to do. The book has the merit of communicating

a fact connected with physiology, which in all the pages of the multitude

of books was never previously mentioned--the mysterious practice of

touching objects to baffle the evil chance. The miserable detractor

will, of course, instantly begin to rave about such a habit being common:

well and good; but was it ever before described in print, or all

connected with it dissected? He may then vociferate something about

Johnson having touched:--the writer cares not whether Johnson--who, by-

the-bye, during the last twenty or thirty years, owing to people having

become ultra Tory mad from reading Scott's novels and the "Quarterly

Review," has been a mighty favourite, especially with some who were in

the habit of calling him a half crazy old fool--touched, or whether he

did not; but he asks where did Johnson ever describe the feelings which

induced him to perform the magic touch, even supposing that he did

perform it? Again, the history gives an account of a certain book called

the "Sleeping Bard," the most remarkable prose work of the most difficult

language but one, of modern Europe,--a book, for a notice of which, he

believes, one might turn over in vain the pages of any review printed in

England, or, indeed, elsewhere.--So here are two facts, one literary and

the other physiological, for which any candid critic was bound to thank

the author, even as in the Romany Rye there is a fact connected with Iro

Norman Myth, for the disclosing of which any person who pretends to have

a regard for literature is bound to thank him, namely, that the

mysterious Finn or Fingal of "Ossian's Poems" is one and the same person

as the Sigurd Fofnisbane of the Edda and the Wilkina, and the Siegfried

Horn of the Lay of the Niebelungs.

The writer might here conclude, and, he believes, most triumphantly; as,

however, he is in the cue for writing, which he seldom is, he will for

his own gratification, and for the sake of others, dropping metaphors

about vipers and serpents, show up in particular two or three sets or

cliques of people, who, he is happy to say, have been particularly

virulent against him and his work, for nothing indeed could have given

him greater mortification than their praise.

In the first place, he wishes to dispose of certain individuals who call

themselves men of wit and fashion--about town--who he is told have abused

his book "vaustly"--their own word. These people paint their cheeks,

wear white kid gloves, and dabble in literature, or what they conceive to

be literature. For abuse from such people, the writer was prepared. Does

any one imagine that the writer was not well aware, before he published

his book, that, whenever he gave it to the world, he should be attacked

by every literary coxcomb in England who had influence enough to procure

the insertion of a scurrilous article in a magazine or newspaper! He has

been in Spain, and has seen how invariably the mule attacks the horse;

now why does the mule attack the horse? Why, because the latter carries

about with him that which the envious hermaphrodite does not possess.

They consider, forsooth, that his book is low--but he is not going to

waste words about them--one or two of whom, he is told, have written very

duncie books about Spain, and are highly enraged with him, because

certain books which he wrote about Spain were not considered duncie. No,

he is not going to waste words upon them, for verily he dislikes their

company, and so he'll pass them by, and proceed to others.

The Scotch Charlie o'er the water people have been very loud in the abuse

of Lavengro--this again might be expected; the sarcasms of the Priest

about the Charlie o'er the water nonsense of course stung them. Oh! it

is one of the claims which Lavengro has to respect, that it is the first,

if not the only work, in which that nonsense is, to a certain extent,

exposed. Two or three of their remarks on passages of Lavengro, he will

reproduce and laugh at. Of course your Charlie o'er the water people are

genteel exceedingly, and cannot abide anything low. Gypsyism they think

is particularly low, and the use of gypsy words in literature beneath its

gentility; so they object to gypsy words being used in Lavengro where

gypsies are introduced speaking--"What is Romany forsooth?" say they.

Very good! And what is Scotch? has not the public been nauseated with

Scotch for the last thirty years? "Ay, but Scotch is not"--the writer

believes he knows much better than the Scotch what Scotch is and what it

is not; he has told them before what it is, a very sorry jargon. He will

now tell them what it is not--a sister or an immediate daughter of the

Sanscrit, which Romany is. "Ay, but the Scotch are"--foxes, foxes,

nothing else than foxes, even like the gypsies--the difference between

the gypsy and Scotch fox being that the first is wild, with a mighty

brush, the other a sneak with a gilt collar and without a tail.

A Charlie o'er the water person attempts to be witty, because the writer

has said that perhaps a certain old Edinburgh High School porter, of the

name of Boee, was perhaps of the same blood as a certain Bui, a Northern

Kemp who distinguished himself at the battle of Horinger Bay. A pretty

matter, forsooth, to excite the ridicule of a Scotchman! Why, is there a

beggar or trumpery fellow in Scotland who does not pretend to be

somebody, or related to somebody? Is not every Scotchman descended from

some king, kemp, or cow-stealer of old, by his own account at least? Why,

the writer would even go so far as to bet a trifle that the poor creature

who ridicules Boee's supposed ancestry, has one of his own, at least as

grand and as apocryphal as old Boee's of the High School.

The same Charlie o'er the water person is mightily indignant that

Lavengro should have spoken disrespectfully of William Wallace; Lavengro,

when he speaks of that personage, being a child of about ten years old,

and repeating merely what he had heard. All the Scotch, by-the-bye, for

a great many years past, have been great admirers of William Wallace,

particularly the Charlie o'er the water people, who in their nonsense-

verses about Charlie generally contrive to bring in the name of William,

Willie, or Wullie Wallace. The writer begs leave to say that he by no

means wishes to bear hard against William Wallace, but he cannot help

asking why, if William, Willie, or Wullie Wallace was such a particularly

nice person, did his brother Scots betray him to a certain renowned

southern warrior, called Edward Longshanks, who caused him to be hanged

and cut into four in London, and his quarters to be placed over the gates

of certain towns? They got gold, it is true, and titles, very nice

things no doubt; but, surely, the life of a patriot is better than all

the gold and titles in the world--at least Lavengro thinks so,--but

Lavengro has lived more with gypsies than Scotchmen, and gypsies do not

betray their brothers. It would be some time before a gypsy would hand

over his brother to the harum-beck, even supposing you would not only

make him a king, but a justice of the peace, and not only give him the

world, but the best farm on the Holkham estate; but gypsies are wild

foxes, and there is certainly a wonderful difference between the way of

thinking of the wild fox who retains his brush, and that of the scurvy

kennel creature who has lost his tail.

Ah! but thousands of Scotch, and particularly the Charlie o'er the water

people, will say, "We didn't sell Willie Wallace, it was our forbears who

sold Willie Wallace . . . If Edward Longshanks had asked us to sell

Wullie Wallace, we would soon have shown him that" . . . Lord better ye,

ye poor trumpery set of creatures, ye would not have acted a bit better

than your forefathers; remember how ye have ever treated the few amongst

ye who, though born in the kennel, have shown something of the spirit of

the wood. Many of ye are still alive who delivered over men, quite as

honest and patriotic as William Wallace, into the hands of an English

minister, to be chained and transported for merely venturing to speak and

write in the cause of humanity, at the time when Europe was beginning to

fling off the chains imposed by kings and priests. And it is not so very

long since Burns, to whom ye are now building up obelisks rather higher

than he deserves, was permitted by his countrymen to die in poverty and

misery, because he would not join with them in songs of adulation to

kings and the trumpery great. So say not that ye would have acted with

respect to William Wallace one whit better than your fathers--and you in

particular, ye children of Charlie, whom do ye write nonsense-verses

about? A family of dastard despots, who did their best, during a century

and more, to tread out the few sparks of independent feeling still

glowing in Scotland--but enough has been said about ye. Amongst those

who have been prodigal in abuse and defamation of Lavengro, have been

your modern Radicals, and particularly a set of people who filled the

country with noise against the King and Queen, Wellington and the Tories,

in '32. About these people the writer will presently have occasion to

say a good deal, and also of real Radicals. As, however, it may be

supposed that he is one of those who delight to play the sycophant to

kings and queens, to curry favour with Tories, and to bepraise

Wellington, he begs leave to state that such is not the case.

About kings and queens he has nothing to say; about Tories, simply that

he believes them to be a bad set; about Wellington, however, it will be

necessary for him to say a good deal, of mixed import, as he will

subsequently frequently have occasion to mention him in connection with

what he has to say about pseudo-Radicals.

CHAPTER X. PSEUDO-RADICALS.

About Wellington, then, he says, that he believes him at the present day

to be infinitely overrated. But there certainly was a time when he was

shamefully underrated. Now what time was that? Why, the time of pseudo-

radicalism, _par excellence_, from '20 to '32. Oh, the abuse that was

heaped on Wellington by those who traded in radical cant--your newspaper

editors and review writers! and how he was sneered at then by your Whigs,

and how faintly supported he was by your Tories, who were half ashamed of

him; for your Tories, though capital fellows as followers, when you want

nobody to back you, are the faintest creatures in the world when you cry

in your agony, "Come and help me!" Oh, assuredly Wellington was

infamously used at that time, especially by your traders in Radicalism,

who howled at and hooted him; said he had every vice--was no general--was

beaten at Waterloo--was a poltroon--moreover, a poor illiterate creature,

who could scarcely read or write; nay, a principal Radical paper said

bodily he could not read, and devised an ingenious plan for teaching

Wellington how to read. Now this was too bad; and the writer, being a

lover of justice, frequently spoke up for Wellington, saying that as for

vice, he was not worse than his neighbours; that he was brave; that he

won the fight at Waterloo, from a half-dead man, it is true, but that he

did win it. Also, that he believed he had read "Rules for the Manual and

Platoon Exercises" to some purpose; moreover, that he was sure he could

write, for that he, the writer, had once written to Wellington, and had

received an answer from him; nay, the writer once went so far as to

strike a blow for Wellington; for the last time he used his fists was

upon a Radical sub-editor, who was mobbing Wellington in the street, from

behind a rank of grimy fellows; but though the writer spoke up for

Wellington to a certain extent when he was shamefully underrated, and

once struck a blow for him when he was about being hustled, he is not

going to join in the loathsome sycophantic nonsense which it has been the

fashion to use with respect to Wellington these last twenty years. Now

what have those years been to England? Why, the years of

ultra-gentility, everybody in England having gone gentility mad during

the last twenty years, and no people more so than your pseudo-Radicals.

Wellington was turned out, and your Whigs and Radicals got in, and then

commenced the period of ultra-gentility in England. The Whigs and

Radicals only hated Wellington as long as the patronage of the country

was in his hands, none of which they were tolerably sure he would bestow

on them; but no sooner did they get it into their own, than they

forthwith became admirers of Wellington. And why? Because he was a

duke, petted at Windsor and by foreign princes, and a very genteel

personage. Formerly many of your Whigs and Radicals had scarcely a

decent coat on their backs; but now the plunder of the country was at

their disposal, and they had as good a chance of being genteel as any

people. So they were willing to worship Wellington because he was very

genteel, and could not keep the plunder of the country out of their

hands. And Wellington has been worshipped, and prettily so, during the

last fifteen or twenty years. He is now a noble, fine-hearted creature;

the greatest general the world ever produced; the bravest of men;

and--and--mercy upon us! the greatest of military writers! Now the

present writer will not join in such sycophancy. As he was not afraid to

take the part of Wellington when he was scurvily used by all parties, and

when it was dangerous to take his part, so he is not afraid to speak the

naked truth about Wellington in these days, when it is dangerous to say

anything about him but what is sycophantically laudatory. He said, in

'32, that as to vice, Wellington was not worse than his neighbours; but

he is not going to say, in '54, that Wellington was a noble-hearted

fellow; for he believes that a more cold-hearted individual never

existed. His conduct to Warner, the poor Vaudois, and Marshal Ney,

showed that. He said, in '32, that he was a good general and a brave

man; but he is not going, in '54, to say that he was the best general, or

the bravest man the world ever saw. England has produced a better

general--France two or three--both countries many braver men. The son of

the Norfolk clergyman was a braver man; Marshal Ney was a braver man. Oh,

that battle of Copenhagen! Oh, that covering the retreat of the Grand

Army! And though he said in '32 that he could write, he is not going to

say in '54 that he is the best of all military writers. On the contrary,

he does not hesitate to say that any Commentary of Julius Caesar, or any

chapter in Justinus, more especially the one about the Parthians, is

worth the ten volumes of Wellington's Despatches; though he has no doubt

that, by saying so, he shall especially rouse the indignation of a

certain newspaper, at present one of the most genteel journals

imaginable--with a slight tendency to liberalism, it is true, but

perfectly genteel--which is nevertheless the very one which, in '32,

swore bodily that Wellington could neither read nor write, and devised an

ingenious plan for teaching him how to read.

Now, after the above statement, no one will venture to say, if the writer

should be disposed to bear hard upon Radicals, that he would be

influenced by a desire to pay court to princes, or to curry favour with

Tories, or from being a blind admirer of the Duke of Wellington; but the

writer is not going to declaim against Radicals, that is, real

Republicans, or their principles; upon the whole, he is something of an

admirer of both. The writer has always had as much admiration for

everything that is real and honest as he has had contempt for the

opposite. Now real Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, a much

finer thing than Toryism, a system of common robbery, which is

nevertheless far better than Whiggism {351}--a compound of petty larceny,

popular instruction, and receiving of stolen goods. Yes, real

Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, and your real Radicals and

Republicans are certainly very fine fellows, or rather were fine fellows,

for the Lord only knows where to find them at the present day--the writer

does not. If he did, he would at any time go five miles to invite one of

them to dinner, even supposing that he had to go to a workhouse in order

to find the person he wished to invite. Amongst the real Radicals of

England, those who flourished from the year '16 to '20, there were

certainly extraordinary characters, men partially insane, perhaps, but

honest and brave--they did not make a market of the principles which they

professed, and never intended to do so; they believed in them, and were

willing to risk their lives in endeavouring to carry them out. The

writer wishes to speak in particular of two of these men, both of whom

perished on the scaffold--their names were Thistlewood and Ings.

Thistlewood, the best known of them, was a brave soldier, and had served

with distinction as an officer in the French service: he was one of the

excellent swordsmen of Europe; had fought several duels in France, where

it is no child's play to fight a duel; but had never unsheathed his sword

for single combat, but in defence of the feeble and insulted--he was kind

and open-hearted, but of too great simplicity; he had once ten thousand

pounds left him, all of which he lent to a friend, who disappeared and

never returned him a penny. Ings was an uneducated man, of very low

stature, but amazing strength and resolution, he was a kind husband and

father, and though a humble butcher, the name he bore was one of the

royal names of the heathen Anglo-Saxons. These two men, along with five

others, were executed, and their heads hacked off, for levying war

against George the Fourth; the whole seven dying in a manner which

extorted cheers from the populace; the most of them uttering

philosophical or patriotic sayings. Thistlewood, who was, perhaps, the

most calm and collected of all, just before he was turned off, said, "We

are now going to discover the great secret." Ings, the moment before he

was choked, was singing "Scots wha ha' wi' Wallace bled." Now there was

no humbug about those men, nor about many more of the same time and of

the same principles. They might be deluded about Republicanism, as

Algernon Sidney was, and as Brutus was, but they were as honest and brave

as either Brutus or Sidney; and as willing to die for their principles.

But the Radicals who succeeded them were beings of a very different

description; they jobbed and traded in Republicanism, and either parted

with it, or at the present day are eager to part with it for a

consideration. In order to get the Whigs into power, and themselves

places, they brought the country by their inflammatory language to the

verge of a revolution, and were the cause that many perished on the

scaffold; by their incendiary harangues and newspaper articles they

caused the Bristol conflagration, for which six poor creatures were

executed; they encouraged the mob to pillage, pull down and burn, and

then rushing into garrets looked on. Thistlewood tells the mob the Tower

is a second Bastile; let it be pulled down. A mob tries to pull down the

Tower; but Thistlewood is at the head of that mob; he is not peeping from

a garret on Tower Hill like Gulliver at Lisbon. Thistlewood and Ings say

to twenty ragged individuals, Liverpool and Castlereagh are two

satellites of despotism; it would be highly desirable to put them out of

the way. And a certain number of ragged individuals are surprised in a

stable in Cato Street, making preparations to put Castlereagh and

Liverpool out of the way, and are fired upon with muskets by Grenadiers,

and are hacked at with cutlasses by Bow Street runners; but the twain who

encouraged those ragged individuals to meet in Cato Street are not far

off, they are not on the other side of the river, in the Borough, for

example, in some garret or obscure cellar. The very first to confront

the Guards and runners are Thistlewood and Ings; Thistlewood whips his

long thin rapier through Smithers' lungs, and Ings makes a dash at

Fitzclarence with his butcher's knife. Oh, there was something in those

fellows! honesty and courage--but can as much be said for the inciters of

the troubles of '32. No; they egged on poor ignorant mechanics and

rustics, and got them hanged for pulling down and burning, whilst the

highest pitch to which their own daring ever mounted was to mob

Wellington as he passed in the streets.

Now, these people were humbugs, which Thistlewood and Ings were not. They

raved and foamed against kings, queens, Wellington, the aristocracy, and

what not, till they had got the Whigs into power, with whom they were in

secret alliance, and with whom they afterwards openly joined in a system

of robbery and corruption, more flagitious than the old Tory one, because

there was more cant about it; for themselves they got consulships,

commissionerships, and in some instances governments; for their sons

clerkships in public offices; and there you may see those sons with the

never-failing badge of the low scoundrel-puppy, the gilt chain at the

waistcoat pocket; and there you may hear and see them using the

languishing tones, and employing the airs and graces which wenches use

and employ, who, without being in the family way, wish to make their

keepers believe that they are in the family way. Assuredly great is the

cleverness of your Radicals of '32, in providing for themselves and their

families. Yet, clever as they are, there is one thing they cannot

do--they get governments for themselves, commissionerships for their

brothers, clerkships for their sons, but there is one thing beyond their

craft--they cannot get husbands for their daughters, who, too ugly for

marriage, and with their heads filled with the nonsense they have imbibed

from gentility novels, go over from Socinus to the Pope, becoming sisters

in fusty convents, or having heard a few sermons in Mr. Platitude's

"chapelle," seek for admission at the establishment of mother S . . .,

who, after employing them for a time in various menial offices, and

making them pluck off their eyebrows hair by hair, generally dismisses

them on the plea of sluttishness; whereupon they return to their papas to

eat the bread of the country, with the comfortable prospect of eating it

still in the shape of a pension after their sires are dead. Papa (_ex

uno disce omnes_) living as quietly as he can; not exactly enviably it is

true, being now and then seen to cast an uneasy and furtive glance

behind, even as an animal is wont, who has lost by some mischance a very

sightly appendage; as quietly however as he can, and as dignifiedly, a

great admirer of every genteel thing and genteel personage, the Duke in

particular, whose "Despatches," bound in red morocco, you will find on

his table. A disliker of coarse expressions, and extremes of every kind,

with a perfect horror for revolutions and attempts to revolutionise,

exclaiming now and then, as a shriek escapes from whipped and bleeding

Hungary, a groan from gasping Poland, and a half-stifled curse from

downtrodden but scowling Italy, "Confound the revolutionary canaille, why

can't it be quiet!" in a word, putting one in mind of the parvenu in the

"Walpurgis Nacht." The writer is no admirer of Gothe, but the idea of

that parvenu was certainly a good one. Yes, putting one in mind of the

individual who says--

"Wir waren wahrlich auch nicht dumm,

Und thaten oft was wir nicht sollten;

Doch jetzo kehrt sich alles um und um,

Und eben da wir's fest erhalten wollten."

We were no fools, as every one discern'd,

And stopp'd at nought our projects in fulfilling;

But now the world seems topsy-turvy turn'd,

To keep it quiet just when we were willing.

Now, this class of individuals entertain a mortal hatred for Lavengro and

its writer, and never lose an opportunity of vituperating both. It is

true that such hatred is by no means surprising. There is certainly a

great deal of difference between Lavengro and their own sons; the one

thinking of independence, and philology, whilst he is clinking away at

kettles, and hammering horse-shoes in dingles; the others stuck up at

public offices with gilt chains at their waistcoat-pockets, and giving

themselves the airs and graces of females of a certain description. And

there certainly _is_ a great deal of difference between the author of

Lavengro and themselves--he retaining his principles and his brush; they

with scarlet breeches on, it is true, but without their republicanism and

their tails. Oh, the writer can well afford to be vituperated by your

pseudo-Radicals of '32!

Some time ago the writer was set upon by an old Radical and his wife; but

the matter is too rich not to require a chapter to itself.

CHAPTER XI. THE OLD RADICAL.

"This very dirty man, with his very dirty face,

Would do any dirty act, which would get him a place."

Some time ago the writer was set upon by an old Radical and his wife; but

before he relates the manner in which they set upon him, it will be as

well to enter upon a few particulars tending to elucidate their reasons

for doing so.

The writer had just entered into his eighteenth year, when he met at the

table of a certain Anglo-Germanist, an individual, apparently somewhat

under thirty, of middle stature, a thin and weaselly figure, a sallow

complexion, a certain obliquity of vision, and a large pair of

spectacles. This person, who had lately come from abroad, and had

published a volume of translations, had attracted some slight notice in

the literary world, and was looked upon as a kind of lion in a small

provincial capital. After dinner he argued a great deal, spoke

vehemently against the Church, and uttered the most desperate Radicalism

that was perhaps ever heard, saying, he hoped that in a short time there

would not be a king or queen in Europe, and enveighing bitterly against

the English aristocracy, and against the Duke of Wellington in

particular, whom, he said, if he himself was ever president of an English

republic--an event which he seemed to think by no means improbable--he

would hang for certain infamous acts of profligacy and bloodshed which he

had perpetrated in Spain. Being informed that the writer was something

of a philologist, to which character the individual in question laid

great pretensions, he came and sat down by him, and talked about

languages and literature. The writer, who was only a boy, was a little

frightened at first, but, not wishing to appear a child of absolute

ignorance, he summoned what little learning he had, and began to blunder

out something about the Celtic languages and their literature, and asked

the Lion who he conceived Finn Ma Coul to be? and whether he did not

consider the "Ode to the Fox," by Red Rhys of Eryry, to be a masterpiece

of pleasantry? Receiving no answer to these questions from the Lion,

who, singular enough, would frequently, when the writer put a question to

him, look across the table, and flatly contradict some one who was

talking to some other person, the writer dropped the Celtic languages and

literature, and asked him whether he did not think it a funny thing that

Temugin, generally called Genghis Khan, should have married the daughter

of Prester John? {356} The Lion, after giving a side-glance at the

writer through his left spectacle glass, seemed about to reply, but was

unfortunately prevented, being seized with an irresistible impulse to

contradict a respectable doctor of medicine, who was engaged in

conversation with the master of the house at the upper and farther end of

the table, the writer, being a poor ignorant lad, sitting of course at

the bottom. The doctor, who had served in the Peninsula, having observed

that Ferdinand the Seventh was not quite so bad as had been represented,

the Lion vociferated that he was ten times worse, and that he hoped to

see him and the Duke of Wellington hanged together. The doctor, who,

being a Welshman, was somewhat of a warm temper, growing rather red, said

that at any rate he had been informed that Ferdinand the Seventh knew

sometimes how to behave himself like a gentleman--this brought on a long

dispute, which terminated rather abruptly. The Lion having observed that

the doctor must not talk about Spanish matters with one who had visited

every part of Spain, the doctor bowed and said he was right, for that he

believed no people in general possessed such accurate information about

countries as those who had travelled them as bagmen. On the Lion asking

the doctor what he meant, the Welshman, whose under jaw began to move

violently, replied that he meant what he said. Here the matter ended,

for the Lion, turning from him, looked at the writer. The writer,

imagining that his own conversation hitherto had been too trivial and

commonplace for the Lion to consider it worth his while to take much

notice of it, determined to assume a little higher ground, and after

repeating a few verses of the Koran, and gabbling a little Arabic, asked

the Lion what he considered to be the difference between the Hegira and

the Christian era, adding that he thought the general computation was in

error by about one year; and being a particularly modest person, chiefly,

he believes, owing to his having been at school in Ireland, absolutely

blushed at finding that the Lion returned not a word in answer. "What a

wonderful individual I am seated by," thought he, "to whom Arabic seems a

vulgar speech, and a question about the Hegira not worthy of an answer!"

not reflecting that as lions come from the Saharra, they have quite

enough of Arabic at home, and that the question about the Hegira was

rather mal a propos to one used to prey on the flesh of hadjis. "Now I

only wish he would vouchsafe me a little of his learning," thought the

boy to himself, and in this wish he was at last gratified; for the Lion,

after asking him whether he was acquainted at all with the Sclavonian

languages, and being informed that he was not, absolutely dumbfoundered

him by a display of Sclavonian erudition.

Years rolled by--the writer was a good deal about, sometimes in London,

sometimes in the country, sometimes abroad; in London he occasionally met

the man of the spectacles, who was always very civil to him, and indeed

cultivated his acquaintance. The writer thought it rather odd that,

after he himself had become acquainted with the Sclavonian languages and

literature, the man of the spectacles talked little or nothing about

them. In a little time, however, the matter ceased to cause him the

slightest surprise, for he had discovered a key to the mystery. In the

meantime, the man of the spectacles was busy enough; he speculated in

commerce, failed, and paid his creditors twenty pennies in the pound;

published translations, of which the public at length became heartily

tired; having, indeed, got an inkling of the manner in which those

translations were got up. He managed, however, to ride out many a storm,

having one trusty sheet-anchor--Radicalism. This he turned to the best

advantage--writing pamphlets and articles in reviews, all in the Radical

interest, and for which he was paid out of the Radical fund; which

articles and pamphlets, when Toryism seemed to reel on its last legs,

exhibited a slight tendency to Whiggism. Nevertheless, his abhorrence of

desertion of principle was so great in the time of the Duke of

Wellington's administration, that when S . . . left the Whigs and went

over, he told the writer, who was about that time engaged with him in a

literary undertaking, that the said S . . . was a fellow with a character

so infamous, that any honest man would rather that you should spit in his

face, than insult his ears with the mention of the name of S . . .

The literary project having come to nothing,--in which, by-the-bye, the

writer was to have all the labour, and his friend all the credit,

provided any credit should accrue from it,--the writer did not see the

latter for some years, during which time considerable political changes

took place; the Tories were driven from, and the Whigs placed in, office,

both events being brought about by the Radicals coalescing with the

Whigs, over whom they possessed great influence for the services which

they had rendered. When the writer next visited his friend, he found him

very much altered; his opinions were by no means so exalted as they had

been--he was not disposed even to be rancorous against the Duke of

Wellington, saying that there were worse men than he, and giving him some

credit as a general; a hankering after gentility seeming to pervade the

whole family, father and sons, wife and daughters, all of whom talked

about genteel diversions--gentility novels, and even seemed to look with

favour on high Churchism, having in former years, to all appearance, been

bigoted Dissenters. In a little time the writer went abroad; as, indeed,

did his friend; not, however, like the writer, at his own expense, but at

that of the country--the Whigs having given him a travelling appointment,

which he held for some years, during which he is said to have received

upwards of twelve thousand pounds of the money of the country, for

services which will, perhaps, be found inscribed on certain tablets, when

another Astolfo shall visit the moon. This appointment, however, he lost

on the Tories resuming power--when the writer found him almost as radical

and patriotic as ever, just engaged in trying to get into Parliament,

into which he got by the assistance of his Radical friends, who, in

conjunction with the Whigs, were just getting up a crusade against the

Tories, which they intended should be a conclusive one.

A little time after the publication of "The Bible in Spain," the Tories

being still in power, this individual, full of the most disinterested

friendship for the author, was particularly anxious that he should be

presented with an official situation, in a certain region a great many

miles off. "You are the only person for that appointment," said he; "you

understand a great deal about the country, and are better acquainted with

the two languages spoken there than any one in England. Now I love my

country, and have, moreover, a great regard for you, and as I am in

Parliament, and have frequent opportunities of speaking to the Ministry,

I shall take care to tell them how desirable it would be to secure your

services. It is true they are Tories, but I think that even Tories would

give up their habitual love of jobbery in a case like yours, and for once

show themselves disposed to be honest men and gentlemen; indeed, I have

no doubt they will, for having so deservedly an infamous character, they

would be glad to get themselves a little credit, by a presentation which

could not possibly be traced to jobbery or favouritism." The writer

begged his friend to give himself no trouble about the matter, as he was

not desirous of the appointment, being in tolerably easy circumstances,

and willing to take some rest after a life of labour. All, however, that

he could say was of no use, his friend indignantly observing that the

matter ought to be taken entirely out of his hands, and the appointment

thrust upon him for the credit of the country. "But may not many people

be far more worthy of the appointment than myself?" said the writer.

"Where?" said the friendly Radical. "If you don't get it, it will be

made a job of, given to the son of some steward, or perhaps to some quack

who has done dirty work; I tell you what, I shall ask it for you, in

spite of you; I shall, indeed!" and his eyes flashed with friendly and

patriotic fervour through the large pair of spectacles which he wore.

And, in fact, it would appear that the honest and friendly patriot put

his threat into execution. "I have spoken," said he, "more than once to

this and that individual in Parliament, and everybody seems to think that

the appointment should be given to you. Nay, that you should be forced

to accept it. I intend next to speak to Lord A . . ." And so he did, at

least it would appear so. On the writer calling upon him one evening,

about a week afterwards, in order to take leave of him, as the writer was

about to take a long journey for the sake of his health, his friend no

sooner saw him than he started up in a violent fit of agitation, and

glancing about the room, in which there were several people, amongst

others two Whig members of Parliament, said, "I am glad you are come; I

was just speaking about you. This," said he, addressing the two members,

"is so and so, the author of so and so, the well-known philologist; as I

was telling you, I spoke to Lord A . . . this day about him, and said

that he ought forthwith to have the head appointment in . . .; and what

did the fellow say? Why, that there was no necessity for such an

appointment at all, and if there were, why . . . and then he hummed and

ha'd. Yes," said he, looking at the writer, "he did indeed. What a

scandal! what an infamy! But I see how it will be, it will be a job. The

place will be given to some son of a steward or to some quack, as I said

before. Oh, these Tories! Well, if this does not make one . . ." Here

he stopped short, crunched his teeth, and looked the image of

desperation.

Seeing the poor man in this distressed condition, the writer begged him

to be comforted, and not to take the matter so much to heart; but the

indignant Radical took the matter very much to heart, and refused all

comfort whatever, bouncing about the room, and, whilst his spectacles

flashed in the light of four spermaceti candles, exclaiming, "It will be

a job--a Tory job! I see it all, I see it all, I see it all!"

And a job it proved, and a very pretty job, but no Tory job; shortly

afterwards the Tories were out, and the Whigs were in. From that time

the writer heard not a word about the injustice done to the country in

not presenting him with the appointment to . . .; the Radical, however,

was busy enough to obtain the appointment, not for the writer, but for

himself, and eventually succeeded, partly through Radical influence, and

partly through that of a certain Whig lord, for whom the Radical had

done, on a particular occasion, work of a particular kind. So, though

the place was given to a quack, and the whole affair a very pretty job,

it was one in which the Tories had certainly no hand.

In the meanwhile, however, the friendly Radical did not drop the writer.

Oh, no! On various occasions he obtained from the writer all the

information he could about the country in question, and was particularly

anxious to obtain from the writer, and eventually did obtain, a copy of a

work written in the court language of that country, edited by the writer.

A language exceedingly difficult, which the writer, at the expense of a

considerable portion of his eyesight, had acquired, at least as far as by

the eyesight it could be acquired. What use the writer's friend made of

the knowledge he had gained from him, and what use he made of the book,

the writer can only guess; but he has little doubt that when the question

of sending a person to . . . was mooted in a Parliamentary

Committee--which it was at the instigation of the Radical supporters of

the writer's friend--the Radical, on being examined about the country,

gave the information which he had obtained from the writer as his own,

and flashed the book and its singular characters in the eyes of the

Committee; and then of course his Radical friends would instantly say,

"This is the man! there is no one like him. See what information he

possesses; and see that book written by himself in the court language of

Serendib. This is the only man to send there. What a glory, what a

triumph it would be to Britain, to send out a man so deeply versed in the

mysterious lore of . . ., as our illustrious countryman; a person who

with his knowledge could beat with their own weapons the wise men of . . .

Is such an opportunity to be lost? Oh, no! surely not; if it is, it

will be an eternal disgrace to England, and the world will see that Whigs

are no better than Tories."

Let no one think the writer uncharitable in these suppositions. The

writer is only too well acquainted with the antecedents of the individual

to entertain much doubt that he would shrink from any such conduct,

provided he thought that his temporal interest would be forwarded by it.

The writer is aware of more than one instance in which he has passed off

the literature of friendless young men for his own, after making them a

slight pecuniary compensation, and deforming what was originally

excellent by interpolations of his own. This was his especial practice

with regard to translation, of which he would fain be esteemed the king.

This Radical literato is slightly acquainted with four or five of the

easier dialects of Europe, on the strength of which knowledge he would

fain pass for a universal linguist, publishing translations of pieces

originally written in various difficult languages; which translations,

however, were either made by himself from literal renderings done for him

into French or German, or had been made from the originals into English,

by friendless young men, and then deformed by his alterations.

Well, the Radical got the appointment, and the writer certainly did not

grudge it him. He, of course, was aware that his friend had behaved in a

very base manner towards him, but he bore him no ill-will, and invariably

when he heard him spoken against, which was frequently the case, took his

part when no other person would; indeed, he could well afford to bear him

no ill-will. He had never sought for the appointment, nor wished for it,

nor, indeed, ever believed himself qualified for it. He was conscious,

it is true, that he was not altogether unacquainted with the language and

literature of the country with which the appointment was connected. He

was likewise aware that he was not altogether deficient in courage and in

propriety of behaviour. He knew that his appearance was not particularly

against him; his face not being like that of a convicted pickpocket, nor

his gait resembling that of a fox who has lost his tail; yet he never

believed himself adapted for the appointment, being aware that he had no

aptitude for the doing of dirty work, if called to do it, nor pliancy

which would enable him to submit to scurvy treatment, whether he did

dirty work or not--requisites, at the time of which he is speaking,

indispensable in every British official; requisites, by-the-bye, which

his friend, the Radical, possessed in a high degree; but though he bore

no ill-will towards his friend, his friend bore anything but good-will

towards him; for from the moment that he had obtained the appointment for

himself, his mind was filled with the most bitter malignity against the

writer, and naturally enough; for no one ever yet behaved in a base

manner towards another without forthwith conceiving a mortal hatred

against him. You wrong another, know yourself to have acted basely, and

are enraged, not against yourself--for no one hates himself--but against

the innocent cause of your baseness; reasoning very plausibly, "But for

that fellow, I should never have been base; for had he not existed I

could not have been so, at any rate against him;" and this hatred is all

the more bitter when you reflect that you have been needlessly base.

Whilst the Tories are in power the writer's friend, of his own accord,

raves against the Tories because they do not give the writer a certain

appointment, and makes, or says he makes, desperate exertions to make

them do so; but no sooner are the Tories out, with whom he has no

influence, and the Whigs in, with whom he, or rather his party, has

influence, than he gets the place for himself, though, according to his

own expressed opinion--an opinion with which the writer does not, and

never did, concur--the writer was the only person competent to hold it.

Now had he, without saying a word to the writer, or about the writer with

respect to the employment, got the place for himself when he had an

opportunity, knowing, as he very well knew, himself to be utterly

unqualified for it, the transaction, though a piece of jobbery, would not

have merited the title of a base transaction; as the matter stands,

however, who can avoid calling the whole affair not only a piece of--come,

come, out with the word--scoundrelism on the part of the writer's friend,

but a most curious piece of uncalled-for scoundrelism? and who, with any

knowledge of fallen human nature, can wonder at the writer's friend

entertaining towards him a considerable portion of gall and malignity?

This feeling on the part of the writer's friend was wonderfully increased

by the appearance of Lavengro, many passages of which the Radical in his

foreign appointment applied to himself and family--one or two of his

children having gone over to Popery, the rest become members of Mr.

Platitude's chapel, and the minds of all being filled with ultra notions

of gentility.

The writer, hearing that his old friend had returned to England, to

apply, he believes, for an increase of salary and for a title, called

upon him, unwillingly, it is true, for he had no wish to see a person for

whom, though he bore him no ill-will, he could not avoid feeling a

considerable portion of contempt; the truth is, that his sole object in

calling was to endeavour to get back a piece of literary property which

his friend had obtained from him many years previously, and which, though

he had frequently applied for it, he never could get back. Well, the

writer called; he did not get his property, which, indeed, he had

scarcely time to press for, being almost instantly attacked by his good

friend and his wife--yes, it was then that the author was set upon by an

old Radical and his wife--the wife, who looked the very image of shame

and malignity, did not say much, it is true, but encouraged her husband

in all he said. Both of their own accord introduced the subject of

Lavengro. The Radical called the writer a grumbler, just as if there had

ever been a greater grumbler than himself until, by the means above

described, he had obtained a place: he said that the book contained a

melancholy view of human nature--just as if anybody could look in his

face without having a melancholy view of human nature. On the writer

quietly observing that the book contained an exposition of his

principles, the pseudo-Radical replied that he cared nothing for his

principles--which was probably true, it not being likely that he would

care for another person's principles after having shown so thorough a

disregard for his own. The writer said that the book, of course, would

give offence to humbugs; the Radical then demanded whether he thought him

a humbug?--the wretched wife was the Radical's protection, even as he

knew she would be; it was on her account that the writer did not kick his

good friend; as it was, he looked at him in the face and thought to

himself, "How is it possible I should think you a humbug, when only last

night I was taking your part in a company in which everybody called you a

humbug?"

The Radical, probably observing something in the writer's eye which he

did not like, became all on a sudden abjectly submissive, and, professing

the highest admiration for the writer, begged him to visit him in his

government; this the writer promised faithfully to do, and he takes the

present opportunity of performing his promise.

This is one of the pseudo-Radical calumniators of Lavengro and its

author; were the writer on his death-bed he would lay his hand on his

heart and say, that he does not believe that there is one trait of

exaggeration in the portrait which he has drawn. This is one of the

pseudo-Radical calumniators of Lavengro and its author; and this is one

of the genus who, after having railed against jobbery for perhaps a

quarter of a century, at present batten on large official salaries which

they do not earn. England is a great country, and her interests require

that she should have many a well-paid official both at home and abroad;

but will England long continue a great country if the care of her

interests, both at home and abroad, is in many instances intrusted to

beings like him described above, whose only recommendation for an

official appointment was that he was deeply versed in the secrets of his

party and of the Whigs?

Before he concludes, the writer will take the liberty of saying of

Lavengro that it is a book written for the express purpose of inculcating

virtue, love of country, learning, manly pursuits, and genuine religion,

for example, that of the Church of England, and for awakening a contempt

for nonsense of every kind, and a hatred for priestcraft, more especially

that of Rome.

And in conclusion, with respect to many passages of his book in which he

has expressed himself in terms neither measured nor mealy, he will beg

leave to observe, in the words of a great poet, who lived a profligate

life it is true, but who died a sincere penitent--thanks, after God, to

good Bishop Burnet--

"All this with indignation I have hurl'd

At the pretending part of this proud world,

Who, swollen with selfish vanity, devise

False freedoms, formal cheats, and holy lies,

Over their fellow fools to tyrannise."

--ROCHESTER.

THE END.

Footnotes:

{0a} "Of anything like animal passion there is not a trace in all his

many volumes. Not a hint that he ever kissed a woman or ever took a

little child upon his knee. He was beardless: his voice was not the

voice of a man. His outbursts of wrath never translated themselves into

uncontrollable acts of violence; they showed themselves in all the

rancorous hatred that could be put into words--the fire smouldered in

that sad heart of his. Those big bones and huge muscles and the strong

brain were never to be reproduced in an offspring to be proud of. How if

he were the Narses of Literature--one who could be only what he was,

though we are always inclined to lament that he was not something

more?"--_Daily Chronicle_, _April_ 30, 1900.

{42} The apothecary.

{281} Tipperary.

{311} This was written in 1854.

{312} An obscene oath.

{313} See "Muses' Library," pp. 86, 87. London, 1738.

{314} Genteel with them seems to be synonymous with Gentile and Gentoo;

if so, the manner in which it has been applied for ages ceases to

surprise, for genteel is heathenish. Ideas of barbaric pearl and gold,

glittering armour, plumes, tortures, blood-shedding, and lust, should

always be connected with it, Wace, in his grand Norman poem, calls the

Baron genteel:--

"La furent li gentil Baron," etc.

And he certainly could not have applied the word better than to the

strong Norman thief, armed cap-a-pie, without one particle of ruth or

generosity; for a person to be a pink of gentility, that is heathenism,

should have no such feelings; and, indeed, the admirers of gentility

seldom or never associate any such feelings with it. It was from the

Norman, the worst of all robbers and miscreants, who built strong

castles, garrisoned them with devils, and tore out poor wretches' eyes,

as the Saxon Chronicle says, that the English got their detestable word

genteel. What could ever have made the English such admirers of

gentility, it would be difficult to say, for, during three hundred years,

they suffered enough by it. Their genteel Norman landlords were their

scourgers, their torturers, the plunderers of their homes, the

dishonourers of their wives, and the deflowerers of their daughters.

Perhaps, after all, fear is at the root of the English veneration for

gentility.

{316} Gentle and gentlemanly may be derived from the same root as

genteel; but nothing can be more distinct from the mere genteel, than the

ideas which enlightened minds associate with these words. Gentle and

gentlemanly mean something kind and genial; genteel, that which is

glittering or gaudy. A person can be a gentleman in rags, but nobody can

be genteel.

{332} The writer has been checked in print by the Scotch with being a

Norfolk man. Surely, surely, these latter times have not been exactly

the ones in which it was expedient for Scotchmen to check the children of

any county in England with the place of their birth, more especially

those who have had the honour of being born in Norfolk--times in which

British fleets, commanded by Scotchmen, have returned laden with anything

but laurels from foreign shores. It would have been well for Britain had

she had the old Norfolk man to despatch to the Baltic or the Black Sea

lately, instead of Scotch admirals.

{351} As the present work will come out in the midst of a vehement

political contest, people may be led to suppose that the above was

written expressly for the time. The writer therefore begs to state that

it was written in the year 1854. He cannot help adding that he is

neither Whig, Tory, nor Radical, and cares not a straw what party governs

England, provided it is governed well. But he has no hopes of good

government from the Whigs. It is true that amongst them there is one

very great man, Lord Palmerston, who is indeed the sword and buckler, the

chariots and the horses of the party; but it is impossible for his

lordship to govern well with such colleagues as he has--colleagues which

have been forced upon him by family influence, and who are continually

pestering him into measures anything but conducive to the country's

honour and interest. If Palmerston would govern well, he must get rid of

them; but from that step, with all his courage and all his greatness, he

will shrink. Yet how proper and easy a step it would be! He could

easily get better, but scarcely worse, associates. They appear to have

one object in view, and only one--jobbery. It was chiefly owing to a

most flagitious piece of jobbery, which one of his lordship's principal

colleagues sanctioned and promoted, that his lordship experienced his

late parliamentary disasters.

{356} A fact.