profess their belief in the most holy Sacrament. Originally it was the
second religious establishment in the island; and, since Glastonbury has
been desecrated and destroyed, is now the first. Lucius, the first
Christian king of the Britons, founded it, to be the burial-place of
himself and his successors. During the persecution of Diocletian, it was
converted into a temple of Apollo, which Sebert, king of the East
Saxons, demolished, and built a church to the honour of God and St Peter
in its stead. The place where it stands was then called Thorney, and is
said in a charter of king Edgar’s to have been a dreadful place; not so
much, it is supposed, on account of its rudeness, as because the wicked
spirits who were there worshipped had dominion there. St Augustine, the
apostle of the Saxons, had baptized Sebert and his queen Ethelgoda; and,
being unable to remain with them himself, consigned the care of his
converts to St Mellitus, a Roman abbot, whom pope St Gregory the Great
had sent to his assistance, and whom he consecrated bishop of London.
This holy bishop was to consecrate the new building; but on the night
before the ceremony was to be performed, a fisherman, as he was about to
cast his nets in the river, which runs within a stone’s throw of the
Abbey, was called to by one upon the opposite bank, who desired to cross
in his boat. The fisherman accordingly wafted him over, little knowing,
sinful man, how highly he was favoured, for this was the blessed apostle
St Peter. As soon as the saint landed he entered the church, and
immediately a light brighter than the midday sun illuminated it, and the
fisherman, almost bereft of his senses by fear, saw a multitude of
angels enter, and heard heavenly music within, and perceived odours far
more delicious than any earthly fragrance. In this state of terror St
Peter found him when he came out of the church, and cheered him, and
desired to be taken back in the boat. When they were in the middle of
the river, the saint told him to cast his net. He did so, and the
draught of fish was prodigious. Among them was one large salmon: St
Peter bade him take this to St Mellitus, and keep the rest as his fare,
and added that he and his children after him should always be prosperous
in their employment, provided that they paid scrupulously the tithe of
what they took, and never attempted to fish upon the Sabbath day. He
bade him likewise tell the bishop all that he had seen, and that St
Peter himself had consecrated the church, and promised often to visit
it, and to be present there at the prayers of the faithful. In the
morning, as St Mellitus was going in procession to perform the ceremony,
the fisherman met him, presented the fish, and delivered the message.
The appearance of the church as soon as the doors were opened fully
verified his story. The pavement was marked with Greek and Latin
letters; the walls anointed in twelve places with holy oil; the twelve
tapers upon twelve crosses still burning, and the aspersions not yet
dry. That further testimony might not be wanting, the fisherman
described the person whom he had seen to St Mellitus, and the
description perfectly agreed with the authentic picture of the apostle
at Rome.
I need not tell you that this miracle is suppressed by the heretical
historians who have written concerning this building. It is their custom
either to speak of such things with a sarcasm, or to omit them
altogether, taking it for granted, that whatever they in their wisdom do
not believe, must be false; as if it were not of importance to know what
has been believed, whether it be true or not, and as if individual
opinion was to be the standard of truth.
During the ravages of the Danes the abbey fell to decay. King St Edward
the Confessor rebuilt it upon a singular occasion. This pious prince had
made a vow to God during his exile, that if ever he should be restored
to the kingdom of his forefathers, he would make a pilgrimage to Rome,
and return his thanks at the throne of St Peter. His subjects besought
him not to leave them in performance of this vow, but to beg a
dispensation from it; and this the pope granted on condition that he
should build a new monastery to St Peter’s honour, or rebuild an old
one. At the same time it was revealed to a holy man, that it was God’s
pleasure to have the abbey at Westminster rebuilt. The king obeyed this
divine intimation, and gave the full tithe of all his possessions to the
work. The tomb of this third founder still remains: having been a king,
he escaped some of the insults which were committed against the other
English saints at the time of the schism; and though his shrine was
plundered, his body was suffered to remain in peace. But though the
monument was thus spared from the general destruction, it has been
defaced by that spirit of barbarous curiosity, or wanton mischief, for
which these people are so remarkable.
The high altar is of Grecian architecture. I ought to observe that in
these _reformed_ churches, there is but one altar; and if it had not
been for an archbishop whose head they cut off because they thought him
too superstitious, they would have been without any altar at all. The
mixture of these discordant styles of architecture has the worst effect
imaginable; and what is still more extraordinary, this mark of bad taste
is the production of one of the ablest architects that England ever
produced, the celebrated Sir Christopher Wren. But in his time it was so
much the fashion to speak with contempt of whatever was Gothic, and to
despise the architecture of their forefathers, that, if the nation could
have afforded money enough to have replaced these edifices, there would
not now have been one remaining in the kingdom.—Luckily the national
wealth was at that time employed in preserving the balance of power and
extending commerce, and this evil was avoided. Since that age, however,
the English have learned better than to treat the Gothic with contempt;
they have now discovered in it so much elegance and beauty, that they
are endeavouring to change the barbarous name, and, with feeling
partiality to themselves, claim the invention for their own countrymen:
it is therefore become here an established article of Antiquarian faith
to believe that this architecture is of native growth, and accordingly
it is denominated English architecture in all the publications of the
Antiquarian Society. This point I am neither bound to believe, nor
disposed at present to discuss.
This Abbey is a curious repository of tombs, in which the progress of
sculpture during eight centuries may be traced. Here may be seen the
rude Saxon monument; the Gothic in all its stages, from its first
rudiments to that perfection of florid beauty which it had attained at
the Schism, and the monstrous combinations which prevailed in the time
of Elizabeth, equally a heretic in her heterogeneous taste and her
execrable religion. After the great rebellion, the change which had
taken place in society became as manifest in the number as in the style
of these memorials. In the early ages of Christianity, only saints and
kings, and the founders of churches were thought worthy of interment
within the walls of the house of God; nobles were satisfied with a place
in the Galilee, and the people never thought of monuments: it was enough
for them to rest in consecrated ground; and so their names were written
in the Book of Life, it mattered not how soon they were forgotten upon
earth. The privilege of burial within the church was gradually conceded
to rank and to literature; still, however, they who had no pretensions
to be remembered by posterity were content to be forgotten. The process
may satisfactorily be traced in the church whereof I am now writing, and
thus far it had reached at the time of the Great Rebellion; during that
struggle, few monuments were erected; they who would have been entitled
to them were mostly on the unsuccessful side, and the conquerors had no
respect for churches; instead of erecting new tombs, their delight was
to deface the old. After the Restoration the triumph of wealth began.
The iron age of England was over, and the golden one commenced. An
English author has written an ingenious book, to show that the true
order of the four ages is precisely the reverse of that in which the
poets have arranged them: the age in which riches are paramount to every
thing may well be denominated the golden, but it remains to be proved
whether such an age of gold be the best in the series. With the
Restoration, however, that golden age began. Money was the passport to
distinction during life, and they who enjoyed this distinction were
determined to be remembered after death, as long as inscriptions in
marble could secure remembrance. The church walls were then lined with
tablets; and vain as the hope of thus perpetuating an ignoble name may
appear, it has succeeded better than you would imagine; for every
county, city, and almost every town in England has its particular
history, and the epitaphs in the churches and church-yards form no
inconsiderable part of their contents.
The numerous piles of marble which deface the Abbey are crowded
together, without any reference to the style of the building or the
situation in which they are placed; except two which flank the entrance
of the choir, and are made ornamental by a similarity of form and size,
which has not confined the artist in varying the design of each. One
bears the great name of Newton: he is represented reclining upon a
sarcophagus; above him is Astronomy seated in an attitude of meditation
on a celestial globe. This globe, which certainly occupies so large a
space as to give an idea of weight in the upper part of the monument,
seems principally placed there to show the track of the comet which
appeared, according to Newton’s calculation, in the year 1680. On a
tablet in the side of the sarcophagus is an emblematic representation,
in relief, of some of the purposes to which he applied his philosophy.
The inscription concludes curiously thus,
Sibi gratulentur mortales
Talem tantumque extitisse
Humani Generis Decus.
The corresponding monument is in memory of the Earl of Stanhope, as
eminent a warrior and statesman as Newton had been a philosopher. He is
represented in Roman armour, reposing on a sarcophagus also, and under a
tent; on the top of which a figure of Pallas seems at once to protect
him, and point him out as worthy of admiration. Both these were designed
by an English artist, and executed by Michael Rysbrack.
England has produced few good sculptors; it would not be incorrect if I
should say none, with the exception of Mr Banks, a living artist, whose
best works are not by any means estimated according to their merit. I
saw at his house a female figure of Victory designed for the tomb of a
naval officer who fell in battle, as admirably executed as any thing
which has been produced since the revival of the art. There were also
two busts there, the one of Mr Hastings, late viceroy of India, the
other of the celebrated usurper Oliver Cromwell, which would have done
honour to the best age of sculpture. Most of the monuments in this
church are wholly worthless in design and execution, and the few which
have any merit are the work of foreigners.
One of the vergers went round with us; a man whose lank stature and
solemn deportment would have suited the church in its best days. When
first I saw him in the shadow he looked like one of the Gothic figures
affixed to a pillar; and when he began to move, I could have fancied
that an embalmed corpse had risen from its cemetery to say mass in one
of the chauntries. He led us with much civility and solemnity to Edward
the Confessor’s chapel, and showed us there the tomb of that holy king;
the chairs in which the king and queen are crowned; the famous
coronation stone, brought hither from Scotland, and once regarded as the
Palladium of the royal line; and in the same chapel certain waxen
figures as large as life, and in full dress. You have heard J— mention
the representation of the Nativity at Belem; and exclaim against the
degenerate taste of the Portuguese, in erecting a puppet-show among the
tombs of their kings. It was not without satisfaction that I reminded
him of this on my return from Westminster Abbey, and told him I had seen
the wax-work.
The most interesting part of the edifice is the chapel built by Henry
VII. and called by his name. At the upper end is the bronze tomb of the
founder, surrounded by a Gothic screen, which was once richly ornamented
with statues in its various niches and recesses, but most of these have
been destroyed. The whole is the work of Torregiano, an Italian artist,
who broke Michel Angelo’s nose, and died in Spain under a charge of
heresy. Since the reign of Elizabeth, no monument has been erected to
any of the English sovereigns: a proof of the coldness which their
baneful heresy has produced in the national feeling. A plain marble
pavement covers the royal dead in this splendid chapel, erected by one
of their ancestors. No one was here to be interred who was not of the
royal family: Cromwell, however, the great usurper, whose name is held
in higher estimation abroad than it seems to be in his own country, was
deposited here with more than royal pomp. It was easier to dispossess
him from the grave than from the throne; his bones were dug up by order
of Charles II. and gibbeted: poor vengeance for a father dethroned and
decapitated, for his own defeat at Worcester, and for twelve years of
exile! The body of Blake, which had been laid with merited honours in
the same vault, was also removed, and turned into the church-yard: if
the removal was thought necessary, English gratitude should at least
have raised a monument over the man who had raised the English name
higher than ever admiral before him.
One thing struck me, in viewing this church, as very remarkable. The
monuments which are within reach of a walking-stick are all more or less
injured, by that barbarous habit which Englishmen have of seeing by the
sense of touch, if I may so express myself. They can never look at any
thing without having it in the hand, nor show it to another person
without touching it with a stick, if it is within reach; I have even
noticed in several collections of pictures exposed for sale, a large
printed inscription requesting the connoisseurs not to touch them.
Besides this odd habit, which is universal, there is prevalent among
these people a sort of mischievous manual wit, by which mile-stones are
commonly defaced, directing-posts broken, and the parapets of bridges
thrown into the river. Their dislike to a passage in a book is often
shewn by tearing the leaf, or scrawling over the page, which differs
from them in political opinion. Here is a monument to a Major André, who
was hanged by Washington as a spy: the story was related in relief: it
had not been erected a month before some person struck off Washington’s
head by way of retaliation; somebody of different sentiments requited
this by knocking off the head of the major: so the two principal figures
in the composition are both headless! From such depredations you might
naturally suppose that no care is taken of the church, that stalls are
set up in it, that old women sell gingerbread nuts there, and porters
make it a thoroughfare, as is done in Hamburgh. On the contrary, no
person is admitted to see the Abbey for less than two shillings; and
this money, which is collected by twopences and sixpences, makes part of
the revenue of the subordinate priests in this reformed church. There is
a strange mixture of greatness and littleness in every thing in this
country: for this, however, there is some excuse to be offered; from the
mischief which is even now committed, it is evident that, were the
public indiscriminately admitted, every thing valuable in the church
would soon be destroyed.
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LETTER XXIV.
_Complexion of the English contradictory 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._
The prevalence of dark hair and dark complexions among the English is a
remarkable fact in opposition to all established theories respecting the
peoplers of the Island. We know that the Celts were light or red-haired,
with blue eyes, by the evidence of history; and their descendants in
Wales, and Ireland, and Scotland, still continue so. The Saxons, and
Angles, and Danes, were of the same complexion. How is it then that the
dark eyes and dark hair of the south should predominate? Could the Roman
breed have been so generally extended, or, did the Spanish colony spread
further than has been supposed? Climate will not account for the fact;
there is not sun enough to ripen a grape; and if the climate could have
darkened the Danes and Saxons, it would also have affected the Welsh;
but they retain the marked character of their ancestors.
The proper names afford no clue; they are mostly indigenous, and the
greater number of local derivation. Of the baptismal names the main
proportion are Saxon and Norman; John, Thomas, and James, are the only
common apostolical ones; others indeed occur, but it is rather unusual
to meet with them. The Old Testament has furnished a few; Hagiology
still fewer. Among the men, William and John predominate; Mary and Anne,
among the women. In the northern provinces I am told that the Catholic
names Agnes and Agatha are still frequent; and, what is more
extraordinary, our Spanish Isabel, instead of Elizabeth.
Even these little things are affected by revolutions of state and the
change of manners, as the storm which wrecks an Armada turns the village
weathercock. Thus the partisans of the Stuarts preferred the names of
James and Charles for their sons; and in the democratic families you now
find young Alfreds and Hampdens, Algernons and Washingtons, growing up.
Grace and Prudence were common in old times among the English ladies; I
would not be taken literally when I say that they are no longer to be
found among them, and that Honour and Faith, Hope and Charity, have
disappeared as well. The continental wars introduced Eugene, and
Ferdinand, and Frederick, into the parish registers; and since the
accession of the present family you meet with Georges, Carolines, and
Charlottes, Augustuses and Augustas. The prevailing appetite for novels
has had a very general effect. The manufacturers of these precious
commodities, as their delicate ears could bear none but vocal
terminations, either rejected the plain names of their aunts and
grandmothers, or clipped or stretched them till they were shaped into
something like sentimental euphony. Under their improving hands, Lucy
was extended to Louisa, Mary to Marianne, Harriet to Henrietta, and
Elizabeth cut shorter into Eliza. Their readers followed their example
when they signed their names, and christened their children. Bridget and
Joan, and Dorothy and Alice, have been discarded; and while the more
fantastic went abroad for Cecilia, Amelia, and Wilhelmina, they of a
better taste recurred to their own history for such sweet names as Emma
and Emmeline.
The manner in which the English abbreviate their baptismal names is
unaccountably irregular. If a boy be christened John, his mother calls
him Jacky, and his father Jack; William in like manner becomes Billy or
Bill; and Edward, Neddy or Ned, Teddy or Ted, according to the gender of
the person speaking: a whimsical rule not to be paralleled in any other
language. Mary is changed into Molly and Polly; Elizabeth into Bessy,
Bess, Betty, Tetty, Betsy, and Tetsy; Margaret into Madge, Peggy, and
Meggy; all which in vulgar language are clipt of their final vowel, and
shortened into monosyllables. Perhaps these last instances explain the
origin of these anomalous mutations. Pega and Tetta are old English
names long since disused, and only to be found in hagiological history;
it is evident that these must have been the originals of the diminutives
Peggy, and Tetty or Tetsy, which never by any process of capricious
alteration can be formed from Margaret and Elizabeth. The probable
solution is, in each case, that some person formerly bore both names,
who signed with the first, and was called at home by the second,—thus
the diminutive of one became associated with the other: in the next
generation one may have been dropt, yet the familiar diminutive
preserved; and this would go on like other family names, in all the
subsequent branchings from the original stock. In like manner, Jacques
would be the root of Jack; Theodore or Thaddeus, of Teddy; Apollonia of
Polly; and Beatrice of Betty. A copious nomenclature might explain the
whole.
During the late war it became a fashion to call infants after the
successful admirals,—though it would have been more in character to have
named ships after them: the next generation will have Hoods and Nelsons
in abundance, who will never set foot in the navy. Sometimes an
irreverent species of wit, if wit it may be called, has been indulged
upon this subject; a man whose name is Ball has christened his three
sons, Pistol, Musket, and Cannon. I have heard of another, who, having
an illegitimate boy, baptized him Nebuchadnezzar, because, according to
a mode of speaking here, he was to be sent to grass, that is, nursed by
a poor woman in the country.
The system of proper names is simple and convenient. There are no
patronymics, the surname never changes, and the wife loses hers for that
of her husband. This custom has but lately established itself in Wales,
where the people are still in a state of comparative barbarism. There
the son of John Thomas used to be Thomas Johns, and his son again John
Thomas; but this has given way to the English mode, which renders it
easy to trace a descent. The names in general, like the language, though
infinitely less barbarous than the German, are sufficiently uncouth to a
southern eye, and sufficiently cacophonous to a southern ear.
The months are called after the Latin as with us, and differ rather less
from the original, as only the terminations are altered. But the days of
the week keep the names given them by the Saxon Pagans: _Lunes_ is
Monday or the day of the Moon; _Martes_, Tuesday or Tuisco’s day;
_Miércoles_, Wednesday or Woden’s day; _Jueves_, Thursday or Thor’s day;
_Viernes_, Friday or Frea’s day; _Sábado_, Saturday or Surtur’s day;
_Domingo_, Sunday or the day of the Sun. Saturday indeed is usually
deduced from _Dies Saturni_; but it is not likely that this Roman deity
should have maintained his post singly, when all the rest of his fellows
were displaced.
Friday, instead of Tuesday, is the unlucky day of the English, who are
just as superstitious as we are, though in a different way. It is the
common day of execution, except in cases of murder; when, as the
sentence is by law to be executed the day after it is pronounced, it is
always passed on Saturday, that the criminal may have the Sabbath to
make his peace with Heaven. I could remark more freely upon the
inhumanity of allowing so short a respite, did I not remember the worse
inhumanity of withholding the sacrament from wretches in this dreadful
situation. No person here is ever married on a Friday; nor will the
sailors, if they can possibly avoid it, put to sea upon that day: these
follies are contagious; and the captains, as well as the crew, will
rather lose a fair wind than begin the voyage so unluckily. Sailors, we
know, are every where superstitious, and well may they be so.
If it rains on St Swithin’s, they fancy it will rain every day for the
next forty days. On St Valentine’s it is believed that the birds choose
their mates; and the first person you see in the morning is to be your
lover, whom they call a Valentine, after the saint. Among the many odd
things which I shall take home, is one of the pieces of cut paper which
they send about on this day, with verses in the middle, usually
acrostics, to accord with the hearts, and darts, and billing doves
represented all round, either in colours or by the scissars. How a saint
and a bishop came to be the national Cupid, Heaven knows! Even one of
their own poets has thought it extraordinary.
Bishop Valentine
Left us examples to do deeds of charity;
To feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit
The weak and sick, to entertain the poor,
And give the dead a Christian funeral.
These were the works of piety he did practise,
And bade us imitate; not look for lovers
Or handsome images to please our senses.
The heretics, you see, need not ridicule us for bleeding our horses on
St Stephen’s, and grafting our trees on the day of the Annunciation.
Many other traces of the old religion remain in the calendar, and indeed
every where, but all to as little purpose. Christ_mas_, Candle_mas_,
Lady-day, Michael_mas_; they are become mere words, and the primary
signification utterly out of mind. In the map you see St Alban’s, St
Neot’s, St Columb’s, &c. The churches all over the country are dedicated
to saints whose legends are quite forgotten, even upon the spot. You
find a statue of King Charles in the place of Charing-Cross, one of the
bridges is called Black-Friars, one of the streets the Minories. There
is a place called the Sanctuary, a Pater-Noster-Row, and an
Ave-Maria-Lane. Every where I find these vestiges of Catholicism, which
give to a Catholic a feeling of deeper melancholy, than the scholar
feels amid the ruins of Rome or Athens.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
LETTER XXV.
_Vermin imported from all Parts.—Fox-Hunting.—Shooting.—Destruction of
the Game.—Rural Sports._