would have been a companion for Mrs. Pendennis or a cicerone for Laura
after his own heart. The austere traditions of the Court of George III.
and Queen Charlotte might be expected to survive in the great-niece of
their Lord Chamberlain; and what a tactful concession to the prejudices
of Mrs. Grundy in the statement that, though the accent may be Parisian,
the habits are English! This excellent lady--evidently a near relation
to Mrs. General in _Little Dorrit_--reintroduces us to the genteel
society in which we are most at home; and here I may remark that the
love of aristocracy which is so marked and so amiable a feature of our
national character finds its expression not only in the advertisement
columns, but in the daily notices of deaths and marriages. For example:
"On the 22nd inst., at Lisbon, William Thorold Wood, cousin to the
Bishop of Rochester, to Sir John Thorold of Syston Park, and brother to
the Rector of Widmerpool. He was a man of great mental endowments and
exemplary conduct." I dare say he was, but I fear they would have gone
unrecorded had it not been for the more impressive fact that he was
kinsman to a Bishop and a Baronet.
While we are on the subject of Advertisements a word must be said about
the Medical branch of this fine art; and knowing the enormous fortunes
which have often been made out of a casual prescription for _acne_ or
_alopecia_, I freely place at the disposal of any aspiring young chemist
who reads this paper the following tale of enterprise and success. A few
years ago, according to the information before me, a London doctor had a
lady patient who complained of an incessant neuralgia in her face and
jaw. The doctor could detect nothing amiss, but exhausted his skill, his
patience, and his remedies in trying to comfort the complainant, who,
however, refused to be comforted. At length, being convinced that the
case was one of pure hypochondria, he wrote to the afflicted lady,
saying that he did not feel justified in any longer taking her money for
a case which was evidently beyond his powers, but recommended her to
try change of air, live in the country, and trust to that _edax rerum_
which sooner or later cures all human ills.
The lady departed in sorrow, but in faith; obeyed her doctor's
instructions to the letter, and established herself not a hundred miles
from the good city of Newcastle. Once established there, her first care
was to seek the local chemist and to place her doctor's letter in his
hands. A smart young assistant was presiding at the counter; he read the
doctor's letter, and promptly made up a bottle which he labelled "_Edax
Rerum_. To be taken twice a day before meals," and for which he demanded
7s. 6d. The lady rejoicingly paid, and requested that a similar bottle
might be sent to her every week till further notice. She continued to
use and to pay for this specific for a year and a half, and then,
finding her neuralgia considerably abated, she came up to London for a
week's amusement. Full of gratitude, she called on her former doctor,
and said that, though she had felt a little hurt at the abrupt manner in
which he had dismissed so old a patient, still she could not forbear to
tell him that his last prescription had done her far more good than any
of its predecessors, and that, indeed, she now regarded herself as
practically cured. Explanations followed; inquiries were set on foot;
the chemist's assistant sailed for South Africa; and "_Edax Rerum_" is
now largely in demand among the unlettered heroes who bear the banner of
the Chartered Company.
That combination of pietism with money-making, which critics of our
national character tell us is so peculiarly British, was well
illustrated in the _Christian Million_ of September 22, 1898:--
"BETHESDA, Hest Bank. Beautiful country home, near the sea. Christian
fellowship, 3s. per day. Sickly persons desiring to trust the Lord will
be considered financially. Apply Miss----. Stamped Envelope."
When poetry is forced into the service of advertisements, the result is
peculiarly gratifying. This is an appeal for funds to repair the church
in which Nelson's father officiated:--
"The man who first taught Englishmen their duty,
And fenced with wooden walls his native isle,
Now asks ONE SHILLING to preserve in beauty
The Church that brooded o'er his infant smile."[29]
An electioneering address is, in its essence, an advertisement; and in
this peculiar branch of literature it would be difficult to excel the
following manifesto recently issued by a clergyman when candidate for a
benefice to which the appointment is by popular election:--
"I appeal with the utmost confidence for the full support of the IRISH
AND ROMAN CATHOLICS, because I am a Son of the Emerald Isle; to
FOREIGNERS, because they love Ireland; to HIGH CHURCH, LOW CHURCH, and
BROAD CHURCH, because I am tolerant to all parties; to NONCONFORMISTS,
because I have stated in my pamphlet on Reunion that they are "the salt
of the earth and the light of the world;" to JEWS, because my love for
the Children of Promise is well known; to ATHEISTS, because they have
often heard me in Hyde Park telling them of the Author of Nature in its
endless beauties;--to one and all I appeal with the utmost confidence,
and feel sure that the whole electorate will vote for me and do
themselves honour, when they consider who I am, and when a person of my
social and ecclesiastical standing allowed my name at all to be
mentioned for a popular election."
I am thankful to say that this "Son of the Emerald Isle" was left at the
bottom of the poll.
FOOTNOTES:
[29] Kindly communicated by "J.C.C."
XXVI.
PARODIES IN PROSE.
"Parody," wrote Mr. Matthew Arnold in 1882, "is a vile art, but I must
say I read _Poor Matthias_ in the _World_ with an amused pleasure." It
was a generous appreciation, for the original _Poor Matthias_--an elegy
on a canary--is an exquisite poem, and the _World's_ parody of it is a
rather dull imitation. On the whole, I agree with Mr. Arnold that parody
is a vile art; but the dictum is a little too sweeping. A parody of
anything really good, whether in prose or verse, is as odious as a
burlesque of _Hamlet_; but, on the other hand, parody is the appropriate
punishment for certain kinds of literary affectation. There are, and
always have been, some styles of poetry and of prose which no one
endowed with an ear for rhythm and a sense of humour could forbear to
parody. Such, to a generation brought up on Milton and Pope, were the
styles of the various poetasters satirized in _Rejected Addresses_; but
excellent as are the metrical parodies in that famous book, the prose is
even better. Modern parodists, of whom I will speak more particularly in
a future chapter, have, I think, surpassed such poems as _The Baby's
Début_ and _A Tale of Drury Lane_, but in the far more difficult art of
imitating a prose style none that I know of has even approached the
author of the _Hampshire Farmer's Address_ and _Johnson's Ghost_. Does
any one read William Cobbett nowadays? If so, let him compare what
follows with the recorded specimens of Cobbett's public speaking:--
"Most thinking People,--When persons address an audience from the stage,
it is usual, either in words or gesture, to say, 'Ladies and gentlemen,
your servant.' If I were base enough, mean enough, paltry enough, and
_brute beast_ enough to follow that fashion, I should tell two lies in a
breath. In the first place, you are not ladies and gentlemen, but, I
hope, something better--that is to say, honest men and women; and, in
the next place, if you were ever so much ladies, and ever so much
gentlemen, I am not, _nor ever will be_, your humble servant."
With Dr. Johnson's style--supposing we had ever forgotten its masculine
force and its balanced antitheses--we have been made again familiar by
the erudite labours of Dr. Birkbeck Hill and Mr. Augustine Birrell. But
even those learned critics might, I think, have mistaken a copy for an
original if in some collection of old speeches they had lighted on the
ensuing address:--
"That which was organized by the moral ability of one has been executed
by the physical efforts of many, and DRURY LANE THEATRE is now complete.
Of that part behind the curtain, which has not yet been destined to glow
beneath the brush of the varnisher or vibrate to the hammer of the
carpenter, little is thought by the public, and little need be said by
the Committee. Truth, however, is not to be sacrificed to the
accommodation of either, and he who should pronounce that our edifice
has received its final embellishment would be disseminating falsehood
without incurring favour, and risking the disgrace of detection without
participating the advantage of success."
An excellent morsel of Johnsonese prose belongs to a more recent date.
It became current about the time when the scheme of Dr. Murray's
Dictionary of the English Language was first made public. It took the
form of a dialogue between Dr. Johnson and Boswell:--
"_Boswell_. Pray, sir, what would you say if you were told that the next
dictionary of the English language would be written by a Scotsman and a
Presbyterian domiciled at Oxford?
"_Dr. J_. Sir, in order to be facetious it is not necessary to be
indecent."
When Bulwer-Lytton brought out his play _Not so Bad as we Seem_, his
friends pleasantly altered its title to _Not so Good as we Expected_.
And when a lady's newspaper advertised a work called "How to Dress on
Fifteen Pounds a Year, as a Lady. By a Lady," _Punch_ was ready with the
characteristic parody: "How to Dress on Nothing a Year, as a Kaffir. By
a Kaffir."
Mr. Gladstone's authority compels me to submit the ensuing imitation of
Macaulay--the most easily parodied of all prose writers--to the judgment
of my readers. It was written by the late Abraham Hayward. Macaulay is
contrasting, in his customary vein of overwrought and over-coloured
detail, the evils of arbitrary government with those of a debased
currency:--
"The misgovernment of Charles and James, gross as it had been, had not
prevented the common business of life from going steadily and
prosperously on.
"While the honour and independence of the State were sold to a foreign
Power, while chartered rights were invaded, while fundamental laws were
violated, hundreds of thousands of quiet, honest, and industrious
families laboured and traded, ate their meals, and lay down to rest in
comfort and security. Whether Whig or Tories, Protestants or Jesuits
were uppermost, the grazier drove his beasts to market; the grocer
weighed out his currants; the draper measured out his broadcloth; the
hum of buyers and sellers was as loud as ever in the towns; the
harvest-home was celebrated as joyously as ever in the hamlets; the
cream overflowed the pails of Cheshire; the apple juice foamed in the
presses of Herefordshire: the piles of crockery glowed in the furnaces
of the Trent; and the barrows of coal rolled fast along the timber
railways of the Tyne."
This reads like a parody, but it is a literal transcript of the
original; and Hayward justly observes that there is no reason why this
rigmarole should ever stop, as long as there is a trade, calling, or
occupation to be particularized. The pith of the proposition (which
needed no proof) is contained in the first sentence. Why not continue
thus?--
"The apothecary vended his drugs as usual; the poulterer crammed his
turkeys; the fishmonger skinned his eels; the wine merchant adulterated
his port; as many hot-cross buns as ever were eaten on Good Friday, as
many pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, as many Christmas pies on Christmas
Day; on area steps the domestic drudge took in her daily pennyworth of
the chalky mixture which Londoners call milk; through area bars the
feline tribe, vigilant as ever, watched the arrival of the cat's-meat
man; the courtesan flaunted in the Haymarket; the cab rattled through
the Strand; and, from the suburban regions of Fulham and Putney, the
cart of the market gardener wended its slow and midnight way along
Piccadilly to deposit its load of cabbages and turnips in Covent
Garden."
Twice has Mr. Gladstone publicly called attention to the merits of this
"effective morsel of parody," as he styles it; and he judiciously adds
that what follows (by the late Dean Hook) is "a like attempt, but less
happy." Most people remember the attack on the constitution of the Court
of Chancery in the preface to _Bleak House_. Dean Hook, in a laudable
attempt to soothe the ruffled feelings of his old friend Vice-Chancellor
Page Wood, of whom Dickens in that preface had made fun, thus endeavours
to translate the accusation into Macaulayese:--
"REIGN OF VICTORIA--1856.
"THE COURTS OF JUSTICE.
"The Court of Chancery was corrupt. The guardian of lunatics was the
cause of insanity to the suitors in his court. An attempt at reform was
made when Wood was Solicitor-General. It consisted chiefly in increasing
the number of judges in the Equity Court. Government was pleased by an
increase of patronage; the lawyers approved of the new professional
prizes. The Government papers applauded. Wood became Vice-Chancellor. At
the close of 1855 the Equity Courts were without business. People had
become weary of seeking justice where justice was not to be found. The
state of the Bench was unsatisfactory. Cranworth was feeble; Knight
Bruce, though powerful, sacrificed justice to a joke; Turner was heavy;
Romilly was scientific; Kindersley was slow; Stuart was pompous; Wood
was at Bealings."
If I were to indulge in quotations from well-known parodies of prose,
this chapter would soon overflow all proper limits. I forbear,
therefore, to do more than remind my readers of Thackeray's _Novels by
Eminent Hands_ and Bret Harte's _Sensation Novels_, only remarking, with
reference to the latter book, that "Miss Mix" is in places really
indistinguishable from _Jane Eyre_. The sermon by Mr. Jowett in Mr.
Mallock's _New Republic_ is so perfect an imitation, both in substance
and in style, that it suggested to some readers the idea that it had
been reproduced from notes of an actual discourse. On spoken as
distinguished from written eloquence there are some capital skits in the
_Anti-Jacobin_, where (under the name of Macfungus) excellent fun is
made of the too mellifluous eloquence of Sir James Mackintosh.
The differentiating absurdities of after-dinner oratory are photographed
in Thackeray's _Dinner in the City_, where the speech of the American
Minister seems to have formed a model for a long series of similar
performances. Dickens's experience as a reporter in the gallery of the
House of Commons had given him a perfect command of that peculiar style
of speaking which is called Parliamentary, and he used it with great
effect in his accounts of the inaugural meeting of the "United
Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual
Delivery Company" in _Nicholas Nickleby_ (where he introduces a capital
sketch of Tom Duncombe, Radical Member for Finsbury); and in the
interview between Mr. Gregsbury, M.P., and his constituents in a later
chapter of the same immortal book.
The parliamentary eloquence of a later day was admirably reproduced in
Mr. Edward Jenkins's prophetic squib (published in 1872) _Barney
Geoghegan, M.P., and Home Rule at St. Stephen's_. As this clever little
book has, I fear, lapsed into complete oblivion, I venture to cite a
passage. It will vividly recall to the memory of middle-aged politicians
the style and tone of the verbal duels which, towards the end of Mr.
Gladstone's first Administration, took place so frequently between the
Leader of the House and the Leader of the Opposition. Mr. Geoghegan has
been returned, a very early Home Ruler, for the Borough of Rashkillen,
and for some violent breaches of order is committed to the custody of
the Sergeant-at-Arms. On this the leader of the House rises and
addresses the Speaker:--
"Sir,--The House cannot but sympathize with you in the eloquent and
indignant denunciation you have uttered against the painful invasion of
the decorum of the House which we have just witnessed. There can be no
doubt in any mind, even in the minds of those with whom the hon. member
now at the bar usually acts, that of all methods of argument which could
be employed in this House, he has selected the least politic. Sir, may I
be permitted, with great deference, to say a word upon a remark that
fell from the Chair, and which might be misunderstood? Solitary and
anomalous instances of this kind could never be legitimately used as
arguments against general systems of representation or the course of a
recent policy. I do not, at this moment, venture to pronounce an opinion
upon the degree of criminality that attaches to the hon. member now
unhappily in the custody of the Officer of the House. It is possible--I
do not say it is probable, I do not now say whether I shall be prepared
to commit myself to that hypothesis or not--but it is not impossible
that the hon. member or some of his friends may be able to urge some
extenuating circumstances--(Oh! oh!)--I mean circumstances that, when
duly weighed, may have a tendency in a greater or less degree to modify
the judgment of the House upon the extraordinary event that has
occurred. Sir, it becomes a great people and a great assembly like this
to be patient, dignified, and generous. The honourable member, whom we
regret to see in his present position, no doubt represents a phase of
Irish opinion unfamiliar to this House. (Cheers and laughter.) ... The
House is naturally in a rather excited state after an event so unusual,
and I venture to urge that it should not hastily proceed to action. We
must be careful of the feelings of the Irish people. (Oh! oh!) If we are
to govern Ireland according to Irish ideas, we must make allowance for
personal, local, and transitory ebullitions of Irish feeling, having no
general or universal consequence or bearing.... The course, therefore,
which I propose to take is this--to move that the hon. member shall
remain in the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms, that a Committee be
appointed to take evidence, and that their report be discussed this day
month."
To this replies the Leader of the Opposition:--
"The right hon. gentleman is to be congratulated on the results of his
Irish policy. (Cheers and laughter.) ... Sir, this, I presume, is one of
the right hon. gentleman's contented and pacified people! I deeply
sympathize with the right hon. gentleman. His policy produces strange
and portentous results. A policy of concession, of confiscation, of
truckling to ecclesiastical arrogance, to popular passions and ignorant
prejudices, of lenity to Fenian revolutionists, has at length brought us
to this, that the outrages of Galway and Tipperary, no longer restricted
to those charming counties, no longer restrained to even Her Majesty's
judges, are to reach the interior of this House and the august person of
its Speaker. (Cheers.) Sir, I wash my hands of all responsibility for
this absurd and anomalous state of things. Whenever it has fallen to the
Tory party to conduct the affairs of Ireland, they have consistently
pursued a policy of mingled firmness and conciliation with the most
distinguished success. All the great measures of reform in Ireland may
be said to have had their root in the action of the Tory party, though,
as usual, the praise has been appropriated by the right hon. gentleman
and his allies. We have preferred, instead of truckling to prejudice or
passion, to appeal, and we still appeal, to the sublime instincts of an
ancient people!"
I hope that an unknown author, whose skill in reproducing an archaic
style I heartily admire, will forgive me for quoting the following
narrative of certain doings decreed by the General Post Office on the
occasion of the Jubilee of the Penny Post. Like all that is truly good
in literature, it will be seen that this narrative was not for its own
time alone, but for the future, and has its relevancy to events of the
present day:[30]
"1. Now it came to pass in the month June of the Post-office Jubilee,
that Raikes, the Postmaster-General, said to himself, Lo! an opening
whereby I may find grace in the sight of the Queen!
"2. And Raikes appointed an Executive Committee; and Baines, the
Inspector-General of Mails, made he Chairman.
"3. He called also Cardin, the Receiver and Accountant-General; Preece,
Lord of Lightning; Thompson, the Secretarial Officer; and Tombs; the
Controller.
"4. Then did these four send to the Heads of Departments, the
Postmasters and Sub-Postmasters, the Letter-Receivers, the
Clerks-in-Charge, the Postal Officers, the Telegraphists, She Sorters,
the Postmen; yea from the lowest even unto the highest sent they out.
"5. And the word of Baines and of them that were with him went forth
that the Jubilee should be kept by a conversazione at the South
Kensington Museum on Wednesday the second day of the month July in the
year 1890.
"6. And Victoria the Queen became a patron of the Jubilee Celebration;
and her heart was stirred within her; for she said, For three whole
years have I not had a Jubilee.
"7. And the word of Baines and of them that were with him went forth
again to the Heads of Departments; the Postmasters and Sub-Postmasters,
the Letter-Receivers, the Clerks-in-Charge, the Postal Officers and
Telegraphists, the Sorters and the Postmen.
"8. Saying unto them, Lo! the Queen is become Patron of the Rowland Hill
Memorial and Benevolent Fund, and of the conversazione in the museum;
and we the Executive Committee bid you, from the lowest even to the
highest, to join with us at the tenth hour of the conversazione in a
great shouting to praise the name of the Queen our patron.
"9. Each man in his Post Office at the tenth hour shall shout upon her
name; and a record thereof shall be sent to us that we may cause its
memory to endure for ever.
"10. Then a great fear came upon the Postmasters, the Sub-Postmasters,
and the Letter-Receivers, which were bidden to make the record.
"11. For they said, If those over whom we are set in authority shout not
at the tenth hour, and we send an evil report, we shall surely perish.
"12. And they besought their men to shout, aloud at the tenth hour,
lest a worse thing should befall.
"13. And they that were of the tribes of Nob and of Snob rejoiced with
an exceeding great joy, and did shout with their whole might; so that
their voices became as the voices of them that sell tidings in the
street at nightfall.
"14. But the Telegraphists and the Sorters and the Postmen, and them
that were of the tribes of Rag and of Tag, hardened their hearts, and
were silent at the tenth hour; for they said among themselves, 'Shall
the poor man shout in his poverty, and the hungry celebrate his lack of
bread?'
"15. Now Preece, Lord of Lightning, had wrought with a cord of metal
that they who were at the conversazione might hear the shouting from the
Post Offices.
"16. And the tenth hour came; and lo! there was no great shout; and the
tribes of Nob and Snob were as the voice of men calling in the
wilderness.
"17. Then was the wrath of Baines kindled against the tribes of Rag and
Tag for that they had not shouted according to his word; and he
commanded that their chief men and counsellors should be cast out of the
Queen's Post Office.
"18. And Raikes, the Postmaster-General; told the Queen all the travail
of Baines, the Inspector-General, and of them that were with him, and
how they had wrought all for the greater glory of the Queen's name.
"19. And the Queen hearkened to the word of Raikes, and lifted up Baines
to be a Centurion of the Bath; also she placed honours upon Cardin, the
Receiver-General and Accountant-General; upon Preece, Lord of Lightning;
upon Thompson, the Secretarial Officer; and upon Tombs, the Controller,
so that they dazzled the eyes of the tribe of Snob, and were favourably
entreated of the sons of Nob.
"20. And they lived long in the land; and all men said pleasant things
unto them.
"21. But they of Tag and of Rag that had been cast out were utterly
forgotten; so that they were fain to cry aloud, saying, 'How long, O ye
honest and upright in heart, shall Snobs and Nobs be rulers over us,
seeing that they are but men like unto us, though they imagine us in
their hearts to be otherwise?'
"22. And the answer is not yet."
FOOTNOTES:
[30] June 1897.
XXVII.
PARODIES IN VERSE.