LETTERS
FROM
ENGLAND
BY
DON MANUEL ALVAREZ ESPRIELLA.
TRANSLATED FROM THE SPANISH.
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IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
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THIRD EDITION.
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LONDON:
PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, AND
BROWN, PATERNOSTER-ROW.
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1814.
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EDINBURGH:
Printed by James Ballantyne and Co.
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PREFACE
BY THE TRANSLATOR.
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The remarks of Foreign Travellers upon our own country have always been
so well received by the Public, that no apology can be necessary for
offering to it the present Translation, The Author of this work seems to
have enjoyed more advantages than most of his predecessors, and to have
availed himself of them with remarkable diligence. He boasts also of his
impartiality: to this praise, in general, he is entitled; but there are
some things which he has seen with a jaundiced eye. It is manifest that
he is bigotted to the deplorable superstitions of his country; and we
may well suppose that those parts of the work in which this bigotry is
most apparent, have not been improved by the aid for which he thanks his
Father Confessor. The Translator has seldom thought it necessary to
offer any comments upon the palpable errors and mis-statements which
this spirit has sometimes occasioned: the few notes which he has annexed
are distinguished by the letters TR.
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PREFACE.
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A volume of Travels rarely or never, in our days, appears in Spain: in
England, on the contrary, scarcely any works are so numerous. If an
Englishman spends the summer in any of the mountainous provinces, or
runs over to Paris for six weeks, he publishes the history of his
travels; and if a work of this kind be announced in France, so great a
competition is excited among the London booksellers, that they import it
sheet by sheet as it comes from the press, and translate and print it
piece-meal. The greater number of such books must necessarily be of
little value: all, however, find readers, and the worst of them adds
something to the stock of general information.
We seldom travel; and they among us who do, never give their journals to
the public. Is it because literature can hardly be said to have become a
trade among us, or because vanity is no part of our national character?
The present work, therefore, is safe from comparison, and will have the
advantage of novelty. If it subject me to the charge of vanity myself, I
shall be sorry for the imputation, but not conscious of deserving it. I
went to England under circumstances unusually favourable, and remained
there eighteen months, during the greater part of which I was
domesticated in an English family. They knew that it was my intention to
publish an account of what I saw, and aided me in my enquiries with a
kindness which I must ever remember. My remarks were communicated, as
they occurred, in letters to my own family, and to my Father Confessor;
and they from time to time suggested to me such objects of observation
as might otherwise perhaps have been overlooked. I have thought it
better to revise these letters, inserting such matter as further
research and more knowledge enabled me to add, rather than to methodize
the whole; having observed in England, that works of this kind wherein
the subjects are presented in the order wherein they occurred, are
always better received than those of a more systematical arrangement:
indeed, they are less likely to be erroneous, and their errors are more
excusable, in those letters which relate to the state of religion, I
have availed myself of the remarks with which my Father Confessor
instructed me in his correspondence. He has forbidden me to mention his
name; but it is my duty to state, that the most valuable observations
upon this important subject, and, in particular, those passages in which
the Fathers are so successfully quoted, would not have enriched these
volumes, but for his assistance.
In thus delineating to my countrymen the domestic character and habits
of the English, and the real state of England, I have endeavoured to be
strictly impartial; and, if self-judgment may in such a case be trusted,
it is my belief that I have succeeded. Certainly, I am not conscious of
having either exaggerated or extenuated any thing in any the slightest
degree—of heightening the bright or the dark parts of the picture for
the sake of effect—of inventing what is false, nor of concealing what is
true, so as to lie by implication. Mistakes and misrepresentations there
may, and, perhaps, must be: I hope they will neither be found numerous
nor important, as I know they are not wilful; and I trust that whatever
may be the faults and errors of the work, nothing will appear in it
inconsistent with that love of my country, which I feel in common with
every Spaniard; and that submission, which, in common with every
Catholic, I owe to the Holy Church.
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CONTENTS
OF THE
FIRST VOLUME.
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LETTER I.
Page
Arrival at Falmouth.—Custom House.—Food 1
of the English.—Noise and Bustle at
the Inn
LETTER II.
Mode of 8
Travelling.—Penryn.—Truro.—Dreariness
of the Country.—Bodmin.—Earth-Coal the
common Fuel.—Launceston.—Excellence of
the Inns and Roads.—Okehampton.—Exeter
LETTER III.
Exeter Cathedral and public 24
Walk.—Libraries.— Honiton.—Dangers of
English Travelling, and Cruelty with
which it is
attended.—Axminster.—Bridport
LETTER IV.
Dorchester.—Gilbert Wakefield.—Inside of 37
an English Church.—Attempt to rear
Silk-worms.—Down-country.—Blandford.—Salisbury.—Execrable
Alteration of the Cathedral.—Instance
of public Impiety
LETTER V.
Old Sarum.—Country thinly 54
peopled.—Basingstoke.—Ruins of a
Catholic Chapel.—Waste Land near
London.—Staines.—Iron Bridges.—Custom
of exposing the dead Bodies of
Criminals.—Hounslow
Brentford.—Approach to London.—Arrival
LETTER VI.
Watchmen.—Noise in London Night and 65
Morning.—An English Family.—Advice to
Travellers
LETTER VII.
General Description of London.—Walk to 72
the Palace.—Crowd in the
Streets.—Shops.—Cathedral of St
Paul.—Palace of the Prince of
Wales.—Oddities in the Shop Windows
LETTER VIII.
Proclamation of Peace.—The English do 85
not understand
Pageantry.—Illumination.—M. Otto’s
House.—Illuminations better managed at
Rome
LETTER IX.
Execution of Governor Wall 97
LETTER X.
Martial Laws of England.—Limited Service 109
advised.—Hints for Military Reform
LETTER XI.
Shopmen, why preferred to Women in 119
England.—Division of London into the
East and West Ends.—Low State of
domestic
Architecture.—Burlington-House
LETTER XII.
Causes of the Change of Ministry not 127
generally understood.—Catholic
Emancipation.—The Change acceptable to
the Nation.—State of Parties.—Strength
of the new Administration.—Its good
Effects.—Popularity of Mr Addington
LETTER XIII.
Dress of the English without Variety.— 137
Coal-heavers.—Post-men.—Art of
knocking at the Door.—Inscriptions
over the Shops.—Exhibitions in the
Shop-windows.—Chimney-sweepers.—May-day.—These
Sports originally religious
LETTER XIV.
Description of the Inside, and of the 149
Furniture, of an English House
LETTER XV.
English Meals.—Clumsy Method of 164
Butchery.—Lord Somerville.—Cruel
Manner of killing certain
Animals.—Luxuries of the
Table.—Liquors
LETTER XVI.
Informers.—System upon which they 173
act.—Anecdotes of their
Rascality.—Evil of encouraging
them.—English Character a Compound of
Contradictions
LETTER XVII.
The Word _Home_ said to be peculiar to 180
the English.—Propriety of the
Assertion questioned.—Comfort.—Curious
Conveniences.—Pocket-fender.—Hunting-razors
LETTER XVIII.
Drury-Lane Theatre.—The Winter’s 187
Tale.—Kemble.—Mrs Siddons.—Don Juan
LETTER XIX.
English Church Service.—Banns of 200
Marriage.—Inconvenience of having the
Sermon a regular Part.—Sermons an
Article of Trade.—Popular
Preachers.—Private Chapels
LETTER XX.
Irreverence of English towards the 215
Virgin Mary and the Saints.—Want of
Ceremonies in their Church.—Festival
Dainties.—Traces of Catholicism in
their Language and Oaths.—Disbelief of
Purgatory.—Fatal Consequences of this
Error.—Supposed Advantages of the
Schism examined.—Clergy not so
numerous as formerly
LETTER XXI.
Show of Tulips.—Florists.—Passion for 228
Rarities in England Queen Anne’s
Farthings.—Male Tortoise-shell
Cat.—Collectors.—The King of
Collectors
LETTER XXII.
English Coins.—Paper Currency.—Frequent 241
Executions for Forgery.—Doctor
Dodd.—Opinion that Prevention is the
End of Punishment.—This End not
answered by the Frequency of
Executions.—Plan for the Prevention of
Forgery rejected by the Bank
LETTER XXIII.
Westminster Abbey.—Legend of its 256
Consecration.—Its single Altar in bad
Taste.—Gothic or English
Architecture.—Monuments.—Banks the
Sculptor.—Wax-work.—Henry the
Seventh’s Chapel.—Mischievous
Propensity of the People to mutilate
the Monuments
LETTER XXIV.
Complexion of the English contradictory 274
to their historical
Theories.—Christian Names, and their
Diminutives.—System of Surnames.—Names
of the Months and Days.—Friday the
unlucky Day.—St Valentine.—Relics of
Catholicism
LETTER XXV.
Vermin imported from all 285
Parts.—Fox-Hunting.—
Shooting.—Destruction of the
Game.—Rural Sports
LETTER XXVI.
Poor-Laws.—Work-Houses.—Sufferings of 294
the Poor from the Climate.—Dangerous
State of England during the
Scarcity.—The Poor not bettered by the
Progress of Civilization
LETTER XXVII.
Saint Paul’s.—Anecdote of a female 307
Esquimaux.—Defect of Grecian
Architecture in cold
Climates.—Nakedness of the
Church.—Monuments.—Pictures offered by
Sir Joshua Reynolds, &c. and
refused.—Ascent.—View from the Summit
LETTER XXVIII.
State of the English Catholics.—Their 322
prudent Silence in the Days of
Jacobitism.—The Church of England
jealous of the Dissenters.—Riots in
1780.—Effects of the French
Revolution.—The Re-establishment of
the Monastic Orders in England.—Number
of Nunneries and Catholic
Seminaries.—The Poor easily
converted.—Catholic Writers.—Dr Geddes
LETTER XXIX.
Number of Sects in England, all 333
appealing to the
Scriptures.—Puritans.—Nonjurors.—Rise
of Socinianism, and its probable
Downfall
LETTER XXX.
Watering Places.—Taste for the 346
Picturesque.—Encomiendas
LETTER XXXI.
Journey to Oxford.—Stage-Coach 354
Travelling and Company
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ESPRIELLA’S
LETTERS FROM ENGLAND.
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LETTER I.
_Arrival at Falmouth.—Custom House.—Food of the English.—Noise and
Bustle at the Inn._
Wednesday, April 21, 1802.
I write to you from English ground. On the twelfth morning after our
departure from Lisbon we came in sight of the Lizard, two light-houses
on the rocks near the Land’s End, which mark a dangerous shore. The day
was clear, and showed us the whole coast to advantage; but if these be
the white cliffs of England, they have been strangely magnified by
report: their forms are uninteresting, and their heights diminutive; if
a score such were piled under Cape Finisterre, they would look like a
flight of stairs to the Spanish mountains. I made this observation to
J—, who could not help acknowledging the truth, but he bade me look at
the green fields. The verdure was certainly very delightful, and that
not merely because our eyes were wearied with the gray sea: the
appearance was like green corn, though approaching nearer I perceived
that the colour never changed; for the herb, being kept short by cattle,
does not move with the wind.
We passed in sight of St Maurs, a little fishing-town on the east of the
bay, and anchored about noon at Falmouth. There is a man always on the
look-out for the packets; he makes a signal as soon as one is seen, and
every woman who has a husband on board gives him a shilling for the
intelligence. I went through some troublesome forms upon landing, in
consequence of the inhospitable laws enacted at the beginning of the
war. There were then the vexatious ceremonies of the custom-house to be
performed, where double fees were exacted for passing our baggage at
extraordinary hours. J— bade me not judge of his countrymen by their
sea-ports: it is a proverb, said he, “that the people at these places
are all either birds of passage, or birds of prey”; it is their business
to fleece us, and ours to be silent.—Patience where there is no
remedy!—our own aphorism, I find, is as needful abroad as at home. But
if ever some new Cervantes should arise to write a mock heroic, let him
make his hero pass through a custom-house on his descent to the infernal
regions.
The inn appeared magnificent to me; my friend complained that it was
dirty and uncomfortable. I cannot relish their food: they eat their meat
half raw; the vegetables are never boiled enough to be soft; and every
thing is insipid except the bread, which is salt, bitter, and
disagreeable. Their beer is far better in Spain, the voyage and the
climate ripen it. The cheese and butter were more to my taste; _manteca_
indeed is not butter, and the Englishman[1] who wanted to call it so at
Cadiz was as inaccurate in his palate as in his ideas. Generous wines
are inordinately dear, and no others are to be procured; about a dollar
a bottle is the price. What you find at the inns is in general miserably
bad; they know this, and yet drink that the host may be satisfied with
their expences: our custom of paying for the house-room is more
economical, and better.
Footnote 1:
This blunder has been applied to the French word _eau_. Which ever may
be original, it certainly ought not to be palmed upon an
Englishman.—TR.
Falmouth stands on the western side of the bay, and consists of one long
narrow street which exhibits no favourable specimen either of the
boasted cleanliness or wealth of the English towns. The wealthier
merchants dwell a little out of the town upon the shore, or on the
opposite side of the bay at a little place called Flushing. The harbour,
which is very fine, is commanded by the castle of Pendennis; near its
mouth there is a single rock, on which a pole is erected because it is
covered at high tide. A madman not many years ago carried his wife here
at low water, landed her on the rock, and rowed away in sport; nor did
he return till her danger as well as fear had become extreme.
Some time since the priest of this place was applied to to bury a
certain person from the adjoining country. “Why, John,” said he to the
sexton, “we buried this man a dozen years ago:” and in fact it appeared
on referring to the books of the church that his funeral had been
registered ten years back. He had been bed-ridden and in a state of
dotage during all that time; and his heirs had made a mock burial, to
avoid certain legal forms and expenses which would else have been
necessary to enable them to receive and dispose of his rents. I was also
told another anecdote of an inhabitant of this town, not unworthy of a
stoic:—His house was on fire; it contained his whole property; and when
he found it was in vain to attempt saving any thing, he went upon the
nearest hill and made a drawing of the conflagration:—an admirable
instance of English phlegm!
The perpetual stir and bustle in this inn is as surprising as it is
wearisome. Doors opening and shutting, bells ringing, voices calling to
the waiter from every quarter, while he cries “Coming,” to one room, and
hurries away to another. Every body is in a hurry here; either they are
going off in the packets, and are hastening their preparations to
embark; or they have just arrived, and are impatient to be on the road
homeward. Every now-and-then a carriage rattles up to the door with a
rapidity which makes the very house shake. The man who cleans the boots
is running in one direction, the barber with his powder-bag in another;
here goes the barber’s boy with his hot water and razors; there comes
the clean linen from the washer-woman; and the hall is full of porters
and sailors bringing in luggage, or bearing it away;—now you hear a horn
blow because the post is coming in, and in the middle of the night you
are awakened by another because it is going out. Nothing is done in
England without a noise, and yet noise is the only thing they forget in
the bill!
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LETTER II.
_Mode of Travelling.—Penryn.—Truro.—Dreariness of the
Country.—Bodmin.—Earth-Coal the common Fuel.—Launceston.—Excellence
of the Inns and Roads.—Okehampton.—Exeter._
Thursday, April 22.
Early in the morning our chaise was at the door, a four-wheeled carriage
which conveniently carries three persons. It has glass in front and at
the sides, instead of being closed with curtains, so that you at once
see the country and are sheltered from the weather. Two horses drew us
at the rate of a league and a half in the hour;—such is the rapidity
with which the English travel. Half a league from Falmouth is the little
town of Penryn, whose ill-built and narrow streets seem to have been
contrived to make as many acute angles in the road, and take the
traveller up and down as many steep declivities as possible in a given
distance. In two hours we reached Truro, where we breakfasted: this meal
is completely spoilt by the abominable bitterness of the bread, to which
I shall not soon be able to reconcile myself. The town is clean and
opulent; its main street broad, with superb shops, and a little gutter
stream running through it. All the shops have windows to them; the
climate is so inclement that it would be impossible to live without
them. J— showed me where some traveller had left the expression of his
impatience written upon the wainscot with a pencil—“Thanks to the Gods
another stage is past”—for all travellers are in haste here, either on
their way home, or to be in time for the packet. When we proceeded the
day had become dark and overclouded;—quite English weather:—I could
scarcely keep myself warm in my cloak: the trees have hardly a tinge of
green, though it is now so late in April. Every thing has a coarse and
cold appearance: the heath looks nipt in its growth, and the
hedge-plants are all mean and insignificant: nettles, and thistles, and
thorns, instead of the aloe, and the acanthus, and the arbutus, and the
vine. We soon entered upon a track as dreary as any in Estremadura; mile
after mile the road lay straight before us; up and down long hills,
whose heights only served to show how extensive was the waste.
Mitchel-Dean, the next place to which we came, is as miserable as any of
our most decayed towns; it is what they call a rotten borough: that is,
it has the privilege of returning two members to parliament, who
purchase the votes of their constituents, and the place has no other
trade:—it has indeed a very rotten appearance. Even the poorest houses
in this country are glazed: this, however, proves rather the inclemency
of the climate than the wealth of the people. Our second stage was to a
single house called the Indian Queens, which is rather a post-house than
an inn. These places are not distinguished by a bush, though that was
once the custom here also, but by a large painting swung from a sort of
gallows before the door, or nailed above it, and the house takes its
name from the sign. Lambs, horses, bulls, and stags, are common;
sometimes they have red lions, green dragons, or blue boars, or the head
of the king or queen, or the arms of the nearest nobleman. One
inconvenience attends their mode of travelling, which is, that at every
stage the chaise is changed, and of course there is the trouble of
removing all the baggage.
The same dreary country still lay before us; on the right there was a
wild rock rising at once from the plain, with a ruin upon its summit.
Nothing can be more desolate than the appearance of this province, where
most part of the inhabitants live in the mines. “I never see the greater
part of my parishioners,” said a clergyman here, “till they come up to
be buried.” We dined at Bodmin, an old town which was once the chief
seat of religion in the district, but has materially suffered since the
schism; ill-built, yet not worse built than situated, being shadowed by
a hill to the south; and to complete the list of ill contrivances, their
water is brought through the common burial-place. They burn earth-coal
every where; it is a black shining stone, very brittle, which kindles
slowly, making much smoke, and much ashes: but as all the houses are
built with chimneys, it is neither unwholesome nor disagreeable. An
Englishman’s delight is to stir the fire; and I believe I shall soon
acquire this part of their manners, as a means of self-defence against
their raw and chilly atmosphere. The hearth is furnished with a round
bar to move the coals, a sort of forceps to arrange them, and a small
shovel for the cinders; all of iron, and so shaped and polished as to be
ornamental. Besides these, there is what they call the fender, which is
a little moveable barrier, either of brass or polished steel, or
sometimes of wire painted green and capt with brass, to prevent the live
embers from falling upon the floor. The grates which confine the fire
are often very costly and beautiful, every thing being designed to
display the wealth of the people; even the bars, though they are
necessarily blackened every day by the smoke, are regularly brightened
in the morning, and this work is performed by women. In good houses the
chimneys have a marble frontal, upon the top of which vases of alabaster
or spar, mandarins from China, flower-stands, or other ornaments, are
arranged.
After dinner we proceeded to Launceston; the country improved upon us,
and the situation of the place as we approached, standing upon a hill,
with the ruins of the castle which had once commanded it, reminded me of
our Moorish towns. We arrived just as the evening was closing; our
chaise wheeled under the gateway with a clangor that made the roof ring;
the waiter was at the door in an instant; by the time we could let down
the glass, he had opened the door and let the steps down. We were shown
into a comfortable room; lights were brought, the twilight shut out, the
curtains let down, the fire replenished. Instead of oil, they burn
candles made of tallow, which in this climate is not offensive; wax is
so dear that it is used by only the highest ranks.
Here we have taken our tea; and in the interval between that and supper,
J— is reading the newspaper, and I am minuting down the recollections of
the day. What a country for travelling is this! such rapidity on the
road! such accommodations at the resting-places! We have advanced
fourteen leagues to-day without fatigue or exertion. When we arrive at
the inn there is no apprehension lest the apartments should be
pre-occupied; we are not liable to any unpleasant company; we have not
to send abroad to purchase wine and seek for provisions; every thing is
ready; the larder stored, the fire burning, the beds prepared; and the
people of the house, instead of idly looking on, or altogether
neglecting us, are asking our orders and solicitous to please. I no
longer wonder at the ill-humour and fastidiousness of Englishmen in
Spain.
* * * * *
Friday, April 23.
Launceston castle was formerly used as a state prison. There were
lazar-houses here and at Bodmin when leprosy was common in England. They
attributed this disease to the habit of eating fish, and especially the
livers; the fresher they were the more unwholesome they were thought.
Whatever has been the cause, whether change of diet, or change of dress,
it has totally disappeared.
The Tamar, a clear shallow and rapid stream, flows by Launceston, and
divides Cornwall from Devonshire. The mountainous character of the
river, the situation of the town rising behind it, its ancient
appearance, and its castle towering above all, made so Spanish a scene,
that perhaps it pleased me the more for the resemblance; and I would
willingly for a while have exchanged the chaise for a mule, that I might
have loitered to enjoy it at leisure. The English mode of travelling is
excellently adapted for every thing, except for seeing the country.
We met a stage-waggon, the vehicle in which baggage is transported, for
sumpter-beasts are not in use. I could not imagine what this could be; a
huge carriage upon four wheels of prodigious breadth, very wide and very
long, and arched over with cloth, like a bower, at a considerable
height: this monstrous machine was drawn by eight large horses, whose
neck-bells were heard far off as they approached; the carrier walked
beside them, with a long whip upon his shoulder, as tall again as
himself, which he sometimes cracked in the air, seeming to have no
occasion to exercise it in any other manner; his dress was different
from any that I had yet seen, it was a sort of tunic of coarse linen,
and is peculiar to this class of men. Here would have been an adventure
for Don Quixote! Carrying is here a very considerable trade: these
waggons are day and night upon their way, and are oddly enough called
flying waggons, though of all machines they travel the slowest, slower
than even a travelling funeral. The breadth of the wheels is regulated
by law, on account of the roads, to which great attention is paid, and
which are deservedly esteemed objects of national importance. At certain
distances gates are erected and toll-houses beside them, where a regular
tax is paid for every kind of conveyance in proportion to the number of
horses and wheels; horsemen and cattle also are subject to this duty.
These gates are rented by auction; they are few or frequent, as the
nature of the soil occasions more or less expense in repairs: no tax can
be levied more fairly, and no public money is more fairly applied.
Another useful peculiarity here is, that where the roads cross or branch
off a directing post is set up, which might sometimes be mistaken for a
cross, were it in a Catholic country. The distances are measured by the
mile, which is the fourth of a league, and stones to mark them are set
by the way-side, though they are often too much defaced by time or by
mischievous travellers to be of any use.
The dresses of the peasantry are far less interesting than they are in
our own land; they are neither gay in colour, nor graceful in shape;
that of the men differs little in make from what the higher orders wear.
I have seen no goats; they are not common, for neither their flesh nor
their milk is in use; the people seem not to know how excellent the milk
is, and how excellent a cheese may be made from it. All the sheep are
white, and these also are never milked. Here are no aqueducts, no
fountains by the way-side.
Okehampton, which we next came to, stands in the county of Devonshire;
here also is a ruined castle on its hill, beautifully ivyed, and
standing above a delightful stream. There was in our room a series of
prints, which, as they represented a sport peculiar to England,
interested me much: it was the hunting the hare. The first displayed the
sportsmen assembled on horseback, and the dogs searching the cover: in
the second they were in chace, men and dogs full speed, horse and
horseman together leaping over a high gate,—a thing which I thought
impossible, but J— assured me that it was commonly practised in this
perilous amusement: in the third they were at fault, while the poor hare
was stealing away at a distance: the last was the death of the hare, the
huntsman holding her up and winding his horn, while the dogs are leaping
round him.
This province appears far more fertile than the one we have quitted; the
wealth of which lies under ground. The beauty of the country is much
injured by inclosures, which intercept the view, or cut it into patches;
it is not, however, quite fair to judge of them in their present
leafless state. The road was very hilly, a thick small rain came on, and
prevented us from seeing any thing. Wet as is the climate of the whole
island, these two western provinces are particularly subject to rain;
for they run out between the English and Bristol channels, like a
peninsula; in other respects their climate is better, the temperature
being considerably warmer; so that sickly persons are sent to winter
here upon the south coast. Much cyder is made here: it is a far
pleasanter liquor than their beer, and may indeed be considered as an
excellent beverage by a people to whom nature has denied the grape. I
ought, perhaps, to say, that it is even better than our country wines;
but what we drank was generous cyder, and at a price exceeding that
which generous wine bears with us; so that the advantage is still ours.
We only stopped to change chaises at our next stage; the inn was not
inviting in its appearance, and we had resolved to reach Exeter to a
late dinner. There were two busts in porcelain upon the chimney-piece,
one of Buonaparte, the other of John Wesley, the founder of a numerous
sect in this land of schismatics; and between them a whole-length figure
of Shakespeare, their famous dramatist. When J— had explained them to
me, I asked him which of the three worthies was the most popular.
“Perhaps,” said he, “the Corsican just at present; but his is a
transient popularity; he is only the first political actor of the day,
and, like all other stage-players, must one day give way to his
successors, as his predecessors have given way to him. Moreover, he is
rather notorious than popular; the king of Prussia was a favourite with
the people, and they hung up his picture as an alehouse sign, as they
had done prince Eugene before him, and many a fellow gets drunk under
them still; but no one will set up Buonaparte’s head as an invitation.
Wesley, on the contrary, is a saint with his followers, and indeed with
almost all the lower classes. As for Shakespeare, these people know
nothing of him but his name; he is famous in the strictest sense of the
word, and his fame will last as long as the English language; which by
God’s blessing will be as long as the habitable world itself.” “He is
your saint!” said I, smiling at the warmth with which he spake.
At length we crossed the river Exe by a respectable bridge, and
immediately entered the city of Exeter, and drove up a long street to an
inn as large as a large convent. Is it possible, I asked, that this
immense house can ever be filled by travellers? He told me in reply,
that there were two other inns in the city nearly as large, besides many
smaller ones; and yet, that the last time he passed through Exeter, they
were obliged to procure a bed for him in a private dwelling, not having
one unoccupied in the house.
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LETTER III.
_Exeter Cathedral and Public Walk.—Libraries.—Honiton.—Dangers
of English Travelling, and Cruelty with which it is
attended.—Axminster.—Bridport._
Saturday, April 24.
If the outside of this New London Inn, as it is called, surprised me, I
was far more surprised at the interior. Excellent as the houses appeared
at which we had already halted, they were mean and insignificant
compared with this. There was a sofa in our apartment, and the sideboard
was set forth with china and plate. Surely, however, these articles of
luxury are misplaced, as they are not in the slightest degree necessary
to the accommodation of a traveller, and must be considered in his bill.
Exeter is an ancient city, and has been so slow in adopting modern
improvements that it has the unsavoury odour of Lisbon. One great street
runs through the city from east to west; the rest consists of dirty
lanes. As you cross the bridge, you look down upon a part of the town
below, intersected by little channels of water. The cathedral is a fine
object from those situations where both towers are seen, and only half
the body of the building, rising above the city. It cannot be compared
with Seville, or Cordova, or Burgos; yet certainly it is a noble pile.
Even the heretics confess that the arches, and arched windows, and
avenues of columns, the old monuments, the painted altar, and the
coloured glass, impress them with a feeling favourable to religion. For
myself, I felt that I stood upon ground, which, desecrated as it was,
had once been holy.
Close to our inn is the entrance of the Norney or public walk. The trees
are elms, and have attained their full growth: indeed I have never seen
a finer walk; but every town has not its Norney[2] as with us its
_alameda_. I was shown a garden, unique in its kind, which has been made
in the old castle ditch. The banks rise steeply on each side; one of the
finest poplars in the country grows in the bottom, and scarcely overtops
the ruined wall. Jackson, one of the most accomplished men of his age,
directed these improvements; and never was accident more happily
improved. He was chiefly celebrated as a musician; but as a man of
letters, his reputation is considerable; and he was also a painter: few
men, if any, have succeeded so well in so many of the fine arts. Of the
castle itself there are but few remains; it was named Rougemont, from
the colour of the red sandy eminence on which it stands, and for the
same reason the city itself was called by the Britons The Red City.
Footnote 2:
The author seems to have mistaken this for a general name.—TR.
In most of the English towns they have what they call circulating
libraries: the subscribers, for an annual or quarterly payment, have two
or more volumes at a time, according to the terms; and strangers may be
accommodated on depositing the value of the book they choose. There are
several of these in Exeter, one of which, I was told, was considered as
remarkably good, the bookseller being himself a man of considerable
learning and ability. Here was also a literary society of some
celebrity, till the French revolution, which seems to have disturbed
every town, village, and almost every family in the kingdom, broke it
up. The inhabitants in general are behindhand with their countrymen in
information and in refinement. The streets are not flagged, neither are
they regularly cleaned, as in other parts of the kingdom; the
corporation used to compel the townspeople to keep their doors clean, as
is usual in every English town; but some little while ago it was
discovered, that, by the laws of the city, they had no authority to
insist upon this; and now the people will not remove the dirt from their
own doors, because they say they cannot be forced to do it. Their
politics are as little progressive as their police: to this day, when
they speak of the Americans, they call them the rebels. Everywhere else,
this feeling is extinguished among the people, though it still remains
in another quarter. When Washington died, his will was published in the
newspapers; but in those which are immediately under ministerial
influence, it was suppressed by high authority. It was not thought
fitting that any respect should be paid to the memory of a man whom the
Sovereign considered as a rebel and a traitor.
The celebrated Priestley met with a singular instance of popular hatred
in this place. A barber who was shaving him heard his name in the midst
of the operation;—he dropt his razor immediately, and ran out of the
room exclaiming, “that he had seen his cloven foot.”
I bought here a map of England, folded for the pocket, with the roads
and distances all marked upon it. I purchased also a book of the roads,
in which not only the distance of every place in the kingdom from
London, and from each other, is set down, but also the best inn at each
place is pointed out, the name mentioned of every gentleman’s seat near
the road, and the objects which are most worthy a traveller’s notice.
Every thing that can possibly facilitate travelling seems to have been
produced by the commercial spirit of this people.
As the chief trade of Exeter lies with Spain, few places have suffered
so much by the late war. We departed about noon the next day; and as we
ascended the first hill, looked down upon the city and its cathedral
towers to great advantage. Our stage was four leagues, along a road
which, a century ago, when there was little travelling, and no care
taken of the public ways, was remarkable as the best in the West of
England. The vale of Honiton, which we overlooked on the way, is
considered as one of the richest landscapes in the kingdom: it is indeed
a prodigious extent of highly cultivated country, set thickly with
hedges and hedge-row trees; and had we seen it either in its full summer
green, or with the richer colouring of autumn, perhaps I might not have
been disappointed. Yet I should think the English landscape can never
appear rich to a southern eye: the verdure is indeed beautiful and
refreshing, but green fields and timber trees have neither the variety
nor the luxuriance of happier climates. England seems to be the paradise
of sheep and cattle; Valencia of the human race.
Honiton, the town where we changed chaises, has nothing either
interesting or remarkable in its appearance, except that here, as at
Truro, a little stream flows along the street, and little cisterns or
basons, for dipping places, are made before every door. Lace is
manufactured here in imitation of the Flanders lace, to which it is
inferior because it thickens in washing; the fault is in the thread. I
have reason to remember this town, as our lives were endangered here by
the misconduct of the innkeeper. There was a demur about procuring
horses for us; a pair were fetched from the field, as we afterwards
discovered, who had either never been in harness before, or so long out
of it as to have become completely unmanageable. As soon as we were shut
in, and the driver shook the reins, they ran off—a danger which had been
apprehended; for a number of persons had collected round the inn door to
see what would be the issue. The driver, who deserved whatever harm
could happen to him, for having exposed himself and us to so much
danger, had no command whatever over the frightened beasts; he lost his
seat presently, and was thrown upon the pole between the horses; still
he kept the reins, and almost miraculously prevented himself from
falling under the wheels, till the horses were stopped at a time when we
momently expected that he would be run over and the chaise overturned.
As I saw nothing but ill at this place, so have I heard nothing that is
good of it: the borough is notoriously venal; and since it has become so
the manners of the people have undergone a marked and correspondent
alteration.
This adventure occasioned considerable delay. At length a chaise
arrived; and the poor horses, instead of being suffered to rest, weary
as they were, for they had just returned from Exeter, were immediately
put-to for another journey. One of them had been rubbed raw by the
harness. I was in pain the whole way, and could not but consider myself
as accessory to an act of cruelty: at every stroke of the whip my
conscience upbraided me, and the driver was not sparing of it. It was
luckily a short stage of only two leagues and a quarter. English
travelling, you see, has its evils and its dangers. The life of a
post-horse is truly wretched:—there will be cruel individuals in all
countries, but cruelty here is a matter of calculation: the post-masters
find it more profitable to overwork their beasts and kill them by hard
labour in two or three years, than to let them do half the work and live
out their natural length of life. In commerce, even more than in war,
both men and beasts are considered merely as machines, and sacrificed
with even less compunction.
There is a great fabric of carpets at Axminster, which are woven in one
entire piece. We were not detained here many minutes, and here we left
the county of Devonshire, which in climate and fertility and beauty is
said to exceed most parts of England: if it be indeed so, England has
little to boast of. Both their famous pirates, the Drake and the
Raleigh, were natives of this province; so also was Oxenham, another of
these early Buccaneers, of whose family it is still reported, that
before any one dies a bird with a white breast flutters about the bed of
the sick person, and vanishes when he expires.
We now entered upon Dorsetshire, a dreary country. Hitherto I had been
disposed to think that the English inclosures rather deformed than
beautified the landscape, but I now perceived how cheerless and naked
the cultivated country appears without them. The hills here are ribbed
with furrows, just as it is their fashion to score the skin of roast
pork. The soil is chalky and full of flints: night was setting-in, and
our horses struck fire at almost every step. This is one of the most
salubrious parts of the whole island: it has been ascertained by the
late census, that the proportion of deaths in the down-countries to the
other parts is as 65 to 80,—a certain proof that inclosures are
prejudicial to health.[3] After having travelled three leagues we
reached Bridport, a well-built and flourishing town. At one time all the
cordage for the English navy was manufactured here; and the
neighbourhood is so proverbially productive of hemp, that when a man is
hanged, they have a vulgar saying, that he has been stabbed with a
Bridport dagger. It is probable that both hemp and flax degenerate in
England, as seed is annually imported from Riga.
Footnote 3:
The dryness of soil is a more probable cause.—TR.
Here ends our third day’s journey. The roads are better, the towns
nearer each other, more busy and more opulent as we advance into the
country; the inns more modern though perhaps not better, and travelling
more frequent. We are now in the track of the stage-coaches; one passed
us this morning, shaped like a trunk with a rounded lid placed
topsy-turvy. The passengers sit sideways; it carries sixteen persons
withinside, and as many on the roof as can find room; yet this
unmerciful weight, with the proportionate luggage of each person, is
dragged by four horses, at the rate of a league and a half within the
hour. The skill with which the driver guides them with long reins, and
directs these huge machines round the corners of the streets, where they
always go with increased velocity, and through the sharp turns of the
inn gateways, is truly surprising. Accidents, nevertheless, frequently
happen; and considering how little time this rapidity allows for
observing the country, and how cruelly it is purchased, I prefer the
slow and safe movements of the calessa.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
LETTER IV.
_Dorchester.—Gilbert Wakefield.—Inside of an English Church.—Attempt to
rear Silkworms.—Down-country.—Blandford.—Salisbury.—Execrable
Alteration of the Cathedral.—Instance of public Impiety._
Sunday, April 25.
We started early, and hurried over four leagues of the same open and
uninteresting country, which brought us to Dorchester, the capital of
the province, or county town, as it is called, because the provincial
prison is here, and here the judges come twice a-year to decide all
causes civil and criminal. The prison is a modern building: the height
and strength of its walls, its iron-grated windows, and its strong
gateway, with fetters hanging over the entrance, sufficiently
characterise it as a place of punishment, and render it a good
representation of a giant’s castle in romance.
When J— passed through this town on his way to Spain, he visited Gilbert
Wakefield, a celebrated scholar, who was confined here as a favourer of
the French Revolution. One of the bishops had written a book upon the
state of public affairs, just at the time when the minister proposed to
take from every man the tithe of his income: this the bishop did not
think sufficient; so he suggested instead, that a tenth should be levied
of all the capital in the kingdom; arguing, that as every person would
be affected in the same proportion, all would remain relatively as
before, and in fact no person be affected at all. This curious argument
he enforced by as curious an illustration; he said, “That if the
foundation of a great building were to sink equally in every part at the
same time, the whole pile, instead of suffering any injury, would become
the firmer.”—“True,” said Wakefield in his reply, “and you, my lord
bishop, who dwell in the upper apartments, might still enjoy the
prospect from your window;—but what would become of me and the good
people who live upon the ground floor?”
Wakefield was particularly obnoxious to the government, because his
character stood very high among the Dissenters for learning and
integrity, and his opinions were proportionately of weight. They brought
him to trial for having in his answer to the bishop’s pamphlet applied
the fable of the Ass and his Panniers to existing circumstances. Had it
indeed been circulated among the poor, its tendency would certainly have
been mischievous; but in the form in which it appeared it was evidently
designed as a warning to the rulers, not as an address to the mob. He
was, however, condemned to two years confinement in this prison, this
place being chosen as out of reach of his friends, to make imprisonment
more painful. The public feeling upon this rigorous treatment of so
eminent a man was strongly expressed, and a subscription was publicly
raised for him which amounted to above fifteen hundred pieces-of-eight,
and which enabled his family to remove to Dorchester and settle there.
But the magistrates, whose business it was to oversee the prison, would
neither permit them to lodge with him in his confinement, nor even to
visit him daily. He was thus prevented from proceeding with the
education of his children, an occupation which he had ever regarded as a
duty, and which had been one of his highest enjoyments. But, in the
midst of vexations and insults, he steadily continued to pursue both his
literary and christian labours; affording to his fellow prisoners what
assistance was in his power, endeavouring to reclaim the vicious, and
preparing the condemned for death. His imprisonment eventually proved
fatal. He had been warned on its expiration to accustom himself slowly
to his former habits of exercise, or a fever would inevitably be the
consequence; a fact known by experience. In spite of all his precautions
it took place; and while his friends were rejoicing at his deliverance
he was cut off. As a polemical and political writer he indulged an
asperity of language which he had learnt from his favourite
philologists, but in private life no man was more generally or more
deservedly beloved, and he had a fearless and inflexible honesty which
made him utterly regardless of all danger, and would have enabled him to
exult in martyrdom. When J— had related this history to me, I could not
but observe how far more humane it was to prevent the publication of
obnoxious books than to permit them to be printed and then punish the
persons concerned. “This,” he said, “would be too open a violation of
the liberty of the press.”
By the time we had breakfasted the bells for divine service were
ringing, and I took the opportunity to step into one of their churches.
The office is performed in a desk immediately under the pulpit, not at
the altar: there were no lights burning, nor any church vessels, nor
ornaments to be seen. Monuments are fixed against the walls and pillars,
and I thought there was a damp and unwholesome smell, perhaps because I
involuntarily expected the frankincense. They have an abominable custom
of partitioning their churches into divisions which they call pews, and
which are private property; so that the wealthy sit at their ease, or
kneel upon cushions, while the poor stand during the whole service in
the aisle.