profligacy, already noticed as gaining ground in English society
about the middle of the eighteenth century, had reached the highest
pitch towards its close. Nothing could be more absurd than the
dresses of 1785, the enormous hats and prodigious _buffonts_ and
buckram monstrosities of the women, except perhaps the rush into
the opposite extreme which took place at the commencement of the
French Revolution. One of the caricatures of 1787, under the title
of "Mademoiselle Parapluie," shows us a young lady serving as an
umbrella, sheltering a whole family from a shower beneath the
tremendous brim of her hat, (a regular fore-and-after), and under the
protecting shadow of a protuberance, concerning whose composition
(crinoline not having then been invented) future ages must remain in
deplorable darkness. Then, every thing was sacrificed to breadth in
costume. Pass we over six or seven years, and the lady of fashion
who, at their commencement, could hardly get through a moderate-sized
doorway, might almost glide head-foremost through the keyhole. A
thin scanty robe, clinging close to the form, a turban and a single
lofty plume, a waist close up under the arms, a watch the size of
a Swedish turnip, with a profusion of seals and pendants, compose
the fashionable female attire of that day. The dress of the men is
equally ridiculous, both in cut and material, the great rage then
being for striped stuffs, known as Zebras, and employed for coats
as well as for the absurd pantaloons, puffed out round the hips and
buttoned tight on the leg, in vogue amongst the beaux of the period.
The modes that succeeded these were equally exaggerated and ugly. And
the frivolity and extravagance of the time kept pace with the follies
of dress. There was a rage for strange sights and extraordinary
exhibitions; and the Londoners, especially, carried this passion to
an extent that rendered them easy dupes of charlatans and impostors.
"It stands recorded in the newspapers of the time, on the 9th of
September 1785,--'Handbills were distributed this morning that a bold
adventurer meant to walk upon the Thames from Riley's Tea Gardens.'
We are further informed that, at the hour appointed, thousands of
people had crowded to the spot, and the river was so thickly covered
with boats, that it was no easy matter to find enough water uncovered
to walk upon." Of course the thing was a mere trick, and the Cockneys
had their disappointment for their pains. Then balloons were the
crotchet of the hour, and they also came from France, where they had
been brought to a certain degree of perfection, but where it was
soon found they were more positively dangerous than probably useful;
for in May 1784, "a royal _ordonnance_ forbade the construction or
sending up of 'any aërostatic machine,' without an express permission
from the king, on account of the various dangers attendant upon
them; intimating, however, that this precaution was not intended
to let the 'sublime discovery' fall into neglect, but only to
confine the experiments to the direction of intelligent persons."
In England, the fancy for them increased, and was the subject of
various caricatures and pamphlets, until the death of a couple of
Frenchmen, thrown to the earth from an immense height, cooled the
soaring courage of the aëronauts. A more destructive and permanent
folly was the passion for gambling, which, in spite of the attacks of
the press, of grave censure and cutting satire, pervaded all ranks
of society. There was a perfect fury for faro; and ladies of high
fashion, and of aristocratic name, thought it not beneath them to
convert their houses into hells. Three of these sporting dames, who
had made themselves a name as keepers of banks, to which they enticed
young men of fortune, were popularly known as "Faro's daughters."
Lord Kenyon, when deciding on a gambling case, pledged himself, in
a moment of virtuous indignation, to sentence _the first ladies in
the land_ to the pillory, should they be brought before him for a
similar offence. Not long afterwards, several titled gamblers were
actually arraigned at his tribunal, but he forgot his threat, and
let them off with a fine. The hint, however, was enough for Gillray,
then in his glory, and for his brothers of the comic brush, and the
moral exposure and castigation which 'Faro's daughters' endured at
the hands of the caricaturists, can have been hardly less stinging
and annoying than actual exposure to the hooting and pelting of the
mob. General demoralisation, the natural consequence of gambling,
characterised this period. Men and women, ruined at the board of
green cloth, recruited their finances as best they might; and when no
other resource remained, the latter bartered their reputation, and
the former took to the road. Those were the palmy days of highway
robbery. "We are in a state of war at home that is shocking," writes
Horace Walpole in 1782. "I mean from the enormous profusion of
housebreakers, highwaymen, and footpads; and, what is worse, from
the savage barbarities of the two latter, who commit the most wanton
cruelties. The grievance is so crying, that one dares not stir out
after dinner but well armed. If one goes abroad to dinner, you would
think he was going to the relief of Gibraltar." Sixty-two years ago,
in January 1786, "the mail was stopped in Pall Mall, close to the
palace, and deliberately pillaged, at so early an hour as a quarter
past eight in the evening."
After having for some years drawn their principal themes for
satire from the social follies and political dissensions of their
countrymen, the English caricaturists and song-writers found
"fresh fields and pastures new" in foreign menaces and threatened
invasion. In their usual presumptuous tone, French newspapers and
proclamations spoke of the conquest of England by the conqueror of
Italy, as of a project whose realisation admitted not the smallest
doubt. This country had not then that confidence of invincibility
which she gathered from subsequent victories in the field; and the
positive assertions of France, that she had but to throw an army
on the English coast to secure prompt and powerful co-operation
from the Jacobin party, caused considerable alarm in the country.
To kindle true patriotism, and raise the courage of the nation,
recourse was had to loyal songs, and anti-French caricatures. The
anti-Jacobin lent efficient aid, and Gillray put his shoulder to
the wheel. The periodical and the artist were a host in themselves.
Clever verses, and pointed caricatures, followed each other in quick
succession. Soon Buonaparte betook himself to Egypt, the victory of
the Nile spread rejoicing through the land, and caricatures caught
the exultation of the hour. John Bull was represented at dinner,
forking French frigates down his capacious gullet, and supplied
with the provender, as fast as he could devour it, by Nelson and
other nautical cooks. Buonaparte, stripped to the waist, with all
enormous cocked-hat on his head, and the claret flowing freely from
his nose, receives fistic punishment at the hands of Jack Tar. The
suppression of the Irish rebellion of '98, and the death of General
Hoche, who had replaced Buonaparte as the threatened invader of the
British Isles, confirmed the feeling of security our naval triumphs
had inspired. The Peace of Amiens set the wags of the pencil on a
new tack, and Monsieur François was represented as imprinting "The
first Kiss these Ten Years" on the lips of burly, blushing Britannia,
who, whilst accepting the salute, hints a doubt of her admirer's
sincerity. The doubt was justified by the rupture that speedily
followed. The camp of Boulogne was formed; the French army were
reminded of the pleasant pastime, in the shape of rape and robbery,
that awaited them in the island famed for wealth and beauty. On
this side the Channel nothing was left undone that might increase
English contempt and hatred for the blustering bullies upon the
other. Individuals and associations printed and disseminated "loyal
tracts," as they were called. "Every kind of wit and humour was
brought into play to enliven these sallies of patriotism; sometimes
they came forth in the shape of national playbills, sometimes they
were coarse and laughable dialogues between the Corsican and John
Bull." Libels on Buonaparte, burlesques on his acts, parodies of his
bulletins, accounts of the atrocities of his armies, were daily put
forth, mingled with countless songs and tracts of encouragement and
defiance. Some of these were spirited, but generally the substance
and intention were better than the form--at least so they now
appear to us, who read them without the additional savour imparted
by the appropriateness of their time of production. Gillray keeps
better, and one still must smile at his John Bull, standing in
mid-Channel with trousers tucked up to his thighs, offering a fair
fight to his meagre enemy, who contemplates him with a visage of
grim dismay from above the triple batteries of the French coast. It
is said that Buonaparte was much annoyed by personalities levelled
at himself and his family, in some of the caricatures of 1803. They
were often very coarse, and conveyed unhandsome imputations on the
conduct of his female relatives; some of whom--rather flighty dames,
if all tales be true--gave by their conduct plausible grounds for
such attacks. Napoleon himself was represented in every odious and
contemptible shape that could be devised,--as a butcher, a pigmy,
an ogre, and even as a _fiddle_, transformed by an abominable pun
into a _base villain_, upon which John Bull, a complacent smile upon
his honest face, plays with sword instead of bow. This was after
Maida, when the British army had begun to share the high esteem in
which repeated victories had long caused our fleets to be held.
A droll caricature, by Woodward, represents Napoleon abusing his
master-shipwright for not keeping him better supplied with ships;
whilst the unfortunate constructor, with hair on end, and a shrug
to his ears, excuses himself upon the ground that, as fast as he
builds, the English capture. It is to be remarked that hardly any of
the caricatures of Napoleon attempt a likeness of him. They usually
represent him as a lantern-jawed, disconsolate-looking wretch, with
a prodigious cocked-hat and plume of feathers--that is to say, quite
the contrary, both in head and head-dress, of what he really was.
Both Gillray and his successors seem to have preferred sketching him
as the received personification of a Frenchman, to giving a burlesque
portrait or real caricature of the man. We trace this peculiarity,
in many instances, up to the year 1814, when George Cruikshank, in
depicting a Cossack "snuffing out Boney," (an allusion to French
disasters in Russia), still represents the then plump Emperor as a
lean, long-chinned scarecrow, with sash and feathers. Rowlandson
does nearly the same thing, in his vulgar print of Napoleon's
reception in the Island of Elba; and the only caricature reproduced
by Mr Fairholt, in which is preserved the general character of the
Emperor's head, is an anonymous one, where the head is placed on a
dog's shoulders, and "Blucher the Brave," by a rough grasp on the
nape of the quadruped's neck, extracts "the groan of abdication
from the Corsican Bloodhound." Probably the classic regularity of
Napoleon's countenance discouraged the caricaturists from attempting
his likeness. They were deterred by the difficulty of burlesquing a
face whose grave expression and perfect proportion gave no hold to
ridicule, and made it pretty certain that the general resemblance
would be sacrificed to the exaggeration of even a single feature.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] _England under the House of Hanover; its History and Condition
during the reigns of the three Georges, illustrated from the
Caricatures and Satires of the day._ By THOMAS WRIGHT, Esq.,
M.A.F.S.A. &c. With numerous illustrations, executed by F. W.
FAIRHOLT, F.S.A. In two volumes. London: 1848.
A PARCEL FROM PARIS.
It is some time since we had a gossip about French literature and
_littérateurs_. The fact is, that, since the blessed days of February
drove crestfallen monarchy from France, and began the pleasant state
of things under which that country has since so notably flourished,
literature has been at a complete stand-still in the land beyond the
Channel. We refer especially to the light and amusing class of books
it has been our habit occasionally to notice and extract from. With
these the revolution has played the very mischief. Feuilletons have
made way for bulletins of barricade contests, for reports of state
trials, for the new dictator's edicts and proclamations. The rush
at the _Cabinets de Lecture_ has been for lists of genuine killed
and wounded, not for imaginary massacres, by M. Dumas' heroes, of
hosts of refractory plebeians, or for the full and particular account
of the gallant defence of Bussy d'Amboise, against a quarter of a
hundred hired assassins--all picked men-at-arms, and all setting on
him at once, but of whom, nevertheless, he slays twenty-four, and
only by the twenty-fifth is slain. And, by the bye, what pity it is
that a few of our friend Alexander's redoubted swordsmen could not
have been summoned from their laurel-shaded repose in Père la Chaise,
to avert the recent catastrophe of the house of Orleans. Just a brace
and a half of his king-making _mousquetaires_ would have done the
trick in a trice. Rumour certainly says that, in February last, a
tall dark-complexioned gentleman, with a bran-new African _Kepi_ on
his martial brow, a foil, freshly unbuttoned, in his strong right
hand, and a yell of liberty upon his massive lips, was seen to head
a furious assault upon the Tuileries, at a time when that palace was
undefended. Ill-natured tongues have asserted that this adventurous
forlorn-hope leader was no other than the author of _Monte Christo_;
but of this we credit not a syllable. It is notorious that M. Dumas
is under the deepest obligations to the ex-king of the French, to
whose kind and efficacious patronage (when Duke of Orleans) his first
very sudden, very brilliant, and not altogether deserved success
as a dramatist was mainly due. Equally well known is it that the
popular writer was the favoured and intimate associate of two of
Louis Philippe's sons--the Dukes of Orleans and Montpensier. Take,
in conjunction with these facts, M. Dumas' established reputation
for steady consistency, gravity, and gratitude, and of course
it is impossible to believe that he ever acted so basely to his
benefactors. But, even admitting republican predilections on his
part, his love of liberty would assuredly prevent his constraining
those well-known stanch supporters of the right divine, Messrs Athos,
Artagnan, and Company, who, if set down in Paris in 1848, would have
played the very deuce with the young republic. The giant Porthos
would have stridden along the boulevards, kicking over the barricades
as easily as he raised, single-handed, the stone which six of the
degenerate inhabitants of Bellisle were unable to lift, (_Vide "Le
Vicomte de Bragelonne;"_) whilst the astute Gascon Artagnan would
have packed General Cavaignac in a magnified _bonbon_-box, with
air-holes in the lid, and _Copahine-Mège_ or _Chocolat-Cuillier_ on
the label; and would have conveyed him on board a fishing smack,
there detaining him till he pledged his honour that the king should
have his own again. And, upon the whole, and whatever budding honours
and civic crowns M. Dumas may anticipate under the genial reign of
republicanism, it would have been more to his present interest to
have stuck to monarchy, and led his legions to its rescue. Under the
new regime his occupation is gone; his literary merchandise vainly
seeks a market. Paris, engrossed by domestic broils and political
discussions, by its anarchy, its misery, and its hunger--no longer
cares for the fabulous exploits of Gascon paladins, and of privates
in the Guards, who make thrones to totter, and armies to fly, by
the prowess of their single arm. But M. Dumas is not disheartened.
When the drama languishes, and the feuilleton grows unproductive,
he falls back upon the _Premier-Paris_. When readers are scarce for
twelve-volume romances, and plays in ten acts and thirty _tableaux_
cease to draw, he starts upon a fresh tack--proposes enlightening
the public on politics, regenerating France through the leaders of
a newspaper. We were greatly amused by his advertisement of the
journal, intended to act as lantern to this shining light of the
new political day. "Our task is easy"--these were its concluding
words--"_Dieu dicte, nous écrivons!_" Setting aside the slight
profanity of this startling assertion, one cannot but admire the
characteristic modesty of the self-conferred secretaryship. We are
assured, however, that M. Dumas has been found far less able and
attractive at the head of the column, than he was in his old place at
the foot of the page.
The disjointed times being decidedly unfavourable to _belles
lettres_, we were scarcely surprised at the first non-arrival of
the monthly parcel, in which our punctual Paris agent is wont to
forward us the literary novelties of the preceding thirty days.
On a second and a third omission, we grew uneasy, and suspected
the Red Republicans of abstracting our packages _in transitu_; but
absolved the democrats on receipt of advice, that if the books did
not arrive, it was because they were not sent; and that, if they
were not sent, it was because there were none, or as good as none,
to send. At last a case has reached us--half the usual size, but
containing, nevertheless, the French literature of the entire summer.
A poor display indeed! The pens of the novelists have shrivelled in
their grasp; their plump goose-quills have dwindled into emaciated
tooth-picks. Instead of the exuberant eight-volume romance, with
promise of continuation, we have single volumes, meagre tales,
that seem nipped in the bad, blighted by the breath of revolution.
No author, not already involved in one of those tremendous series
with which French writers have lately abused the public patience,
now cares to exceed a volume or two. M. Sue, having got into the
middle of the seven capital sins, is fain to flounder on through
the ocean of iniquity; but his pen flags, evidently affected by
the discouraging influence of the times. M. Dumas has brought out
the final volume of "_Les Quarante Cinq_," a romance which we may
observe, _en passant_, is a scandalous specimen of what the French
call _faire la ligne_--doing the line, writing against paper, upon
the Vauxhall principle of making the smallest possible substance
cover the utmost possible surface. It is pity to see a man of
remarkable talent, which M. Dumas really is, thus degrading himself
into a mere mercantile speculator, lumbering his books with pages
upon pages of useless and meaningless dialogue--if dialogue that is
to be called, of which the following stuff is a specimen:--
"You are the Chevalier d'Artagnan."
"Then let me pass."
"Useless!"
"Why useless?"
"Because his Eminence is not at home."
"What! His Eminence not at home! Where is he then?"
"Gone."
"Gone?"
"Yes."
"Where?" &c., &c.
This is taken at random, from the volume last published of the
_Vicomte de Bragelonne_, in which romance the marvellous and
Crichtonian musketeers, brought forward again, when hard upon
threescore, show less sign of suffering from the march of years
than does the narrative of their adventures from its unconscionable
protraction. Much more than half the book is made up of such
wearisome conferences as that above-cited, where the interlocutors
carry on a sort of cut-and-thrust conversation, with an economy
of words explicable by the fact that in a French feuilleton, or
volume, one word of dialogue makes a line, as well as ten. With the
assistance of his secretary, M. Maquet, and of his son, Alexander
the Younger, M. Dumas gets through a prodigious amount of this sort
of trash, at once productive to his pocket and damaging to his
reputation; and then, when he finds publishers beginning to grumble,
and the public detecting the device, and rejecting the windy repast,
he applies himself in earnest, and produces something exceedingly
good, of which he is quite capable, if once he gets the spur. It
is to the necessity of thus occasionally redeeming his reputation,
that we are indebted for the few really praiseworthy romances he
has written--for the _Chevalier d'Harmental_, for the earlier
portion of the _Mousquetaires_, and for his masterpiece, _Le Comte
de Monte Christo_. His enemies and libellers have asserted, that
the first-named of these books was written by M. Maquet, and only
fathered by Dumas; but the assertion is absurd, and is belied by the
book itself, replete with that vivid animation which characterises
whatever Alexander writes. Moreover, the man who could write such a
novel would have no need to purchase the name of M. Dumas. He would
not lack a publisher, and his reputation would soon be made. We
believe the fact to be, that Maquet is a sort of industrious drudge,
employed by Dumas to rummage chronicles, and to collate and write
down historical incidents and facts, for his employer to distort
and expand into romances. For, as an historical romance writer, M.
Dumas is utterly without a conscience. By him characters and events
are twisted and turned as best suits his convenience. "I have twenty
years' work before me," he is reported to have said, "to illustrate
French history." Heaven knows what sort of an illustrator he is!
We would advise no one to take their notions of French historical
personages from M. Dumas' novels, or from his history either--for he
writes history also, at times, and the only doubt is, which is the
greatest fiction, his history or his romance. But for the titles, it
were not always easy to distinguish between them. It were unfair,
however, whilst quizzing his absurdities, to lose sight of his
merits. These are numerous and remarkable. His spirit and vivacity
of style are extraordinary; and we can call to mind no living writer
superior to him for invention. _Monte Christo_ is his masterpiece. It
is indeed a very striking and amusing book. With defects that forbid
our calling it a first-rate romance of its class, it is yet far more
entertaining than many that claim and obtain the title. The readers
of the _Journal des Debats_ well remember the eagerness with which
each successive _feuilleton_ was looked for, during its appearance
in that paper. We ourselves abominate the _feuilleton_ system, by
which one is a year or two reading a book, imbibing it by daily
crumbs, like the lady who eats her pillau with a bodkin. We waited
till the work was complete, and then read it off the reel,--not at a
sitting, certainly, considering the length, but early and late, in
bed and at board. And being somewhat fastidious in matter of novels,
it is evident _Monte Christo_ must have great attractions thus to
carry us at a canter through its interminable series of volumes. Its
chief fault is the usual one of its author--exaggeration. We are
sure M. Dumas is one of those persons who love to dream with their
eyes open--to build themselves palaces in fairyland, to arrange
gardens after the fashion of that of Eden, to furnish the most
preterperfect of apartments with the most fabulous of furniture, to
hang diamonds on their trees, and a roc's egg in their drawing-room.
His air-constructed castles find a site in the pages of his romances.
The right way to read them is to forget as fast as possible the
improbabilities and impossibilities. The supernatural being out
of vogue, he does not give to Edmund Dantes the lamp of Aladdin,
but (which is quite equivalent) a few double handfuls of precious
stones, whereof the smallest specimen is caught at by a Jew for a
thousand pounds; whilst one of the largest, hollowed out, forms a
convenient receptacle for a score of pills, as big as peas, which it
is the Count's custom to carry about with him. With the aid of this
incalculable wealth, Dantes pursues his grand scheme of revenge upon
the persons to whom he is indebted for fourteen years' undeserved
imprisonment in the dungeons of the Chateau d'If. Gold being the
universal key, all doors fly open before him: nothing is impossible
to the man who scatters millions upon the path leading to the goal of
his desires. Take the treasure for granted, and still there is much
exaggeration to get over; but there are also many truthful touches,
many finely-drawn characters. How exquisitely tender are some of the
scenes between the paralytic and his granddaughter; how capital and
characteristic the interview between the old Italian gambler and
the young French thief, when they are paid by the Count to consider
each other as father and son! In this romance there is none of the
make-weight dialogue so lavishly interpolated in most of the same
author's works. In style, too, and description, M. Dumas here rises
above his average. His style, always lively and piquant, is usually
loose, unpolished, and defaced by conventionalisms the Academy would
hardly sanction. In _Monte Christo_ he has evidently taken pains to
do well, and the result is the best written book he has yet produced.