[Footnote 1: The lady to whom this letter is addressed was the elder of
two sisters who in 1787 came to reside with their father in Walpole's
neighbourhood. Both the sisters, according to his description of them,
were very accomplished and sufficiently good-looking. He gradually
became so enthusiastic in his regard for her, that he proposed to marry
her, old as he was, in order that he might have an excuse for leaving
her all his fortune; and he wrote the "Reminiscences of the Courts of
George I. and II.," which are among his published works, for the
amusement of the two sisters.]
STRAWBERRY HILL, _June_ 30, 1789.
Were there any such thing as sympathy at the distance of two hundred
miles, you would have been in a mightier panic than I was; for, on
Saturday se'nnight, going to open the glass case in the Tribune, my foot
caught in the carpet, and I fell with my whole weight (_si_ weight _y
a_) against the corner of the marble altar, on my side, and bruised the
muscles so badly, that for two days I could not move without screaming.
I am convinced I should have broken a rib, but that I fell on the cavity
whence two of my ribs were removed, that are gone to Yorkshire. I am
much better both of my bruise and of my lameness, and shall be ready to
dance at my own wedding when my wives return. And now to answer your
letter.
If you grow tired of the "Arabian Nights," you have no more taste than
Bishop Atterbury,[1] who huffed Pope for sending him them (or the
"Persian Tales"), and fancied he liked Virgil better, who had no more
imagination than Dr. Akenside. Read "Sinbad the Sailor's Voyages," and
you will be sick of Aeneas's. What woful invention were the nasty
poultry that dunged on his dinner, and ships on fire turned into
Nereids! A barn metamorphosed into a cascade in a pantomime is full as
sublime an effort of genius. I do not know whether the "Arabian Nights"
are of Oriental origin or not: I should think not, because I never saw
any other Oriental composition that was not bombast without genius, and
figurative without nature; like an Indian screen, where you see little
men on the foreground, and larger men hunting tigers above in the air,
which they take for perspective. I do not think the Sultaness's
narratives very natural or very probable, but there is a wildness in
them that captivates. However, if you could wade through two octavos of
Dame Piozzi's _though's_ and _so's_ and _I trow's_, and cannot listen to
seven volumes of Scheherezade's narrations, I will sue for a divorce _in
foro Parnassi_, and Boccalini shall be my proctor. The cause will be a
counterpart to the sentence of the Lacedaemonian, who was condemned for
breach of the peace, by saying in three words what he might have said in
two.
[Footnote 1: Atterbury (Pope's "mitred Rochester") was Bishop of
Rochester in the reigns of Anne and George I. He was so violent in his
Jacobitism, that on the death of Queen Anne he offered to head a
procession to proclaim James III. as king at Charing Cross. Afterwards
Sir R. Walpole had evidence of his maintaining a treasonable
correspondence with the Court of St. Germains, sufficient to have
ensured his conviction, but, being always of a merciful disposition, and
naturally unwilling to bring a Bishop to the block, he contented himself
with passing a Bill of Pains and Penalties to deprive him of his
bishopric and banish him for life.]
You are not the first Eurydice[1] that has sent her husband to the
devil, as you have kindly proposed to me; but I will not undertake the
jaunt, for if old Nicholas Pluto should enjoin me not to look back to
you, I should certainly forget the prohibition like my predecessor.
Besides, I am a little too close to take a voyage twice which I am so
soon to repeat; and should be laughed at by the good folks on the other
side of the water, if I proposed coming back for a twinkling only. No; I
choose as long as I can
Still with my fav'rite Berrys to remain.
So, you was not quite satisfied, though you ought to have been
transported, with King's College Chapel, because it has no aisles, like
every common cathedral. I suppose you would object to a bird of
paradise, because it has no legs, but shoots to heaven in a trail, and
does not rest on earth. Criticism and comparison spoil many tastes. You
should admire all bold and unique essays that resemble nothing else; the
"Botanic Garden,"[2] the "Arabian Nights," and King's Chapel are above
all rules: and how preferable is what no one can imitate, to all that is
imitated even from the best models! Your partiality to the pageantry of
popery I do approve, and I doubt whether the world would not be a loser
(in its visionary enjoyments) by the extinction of that religion, as it
was by the decay of chivalry and the proscription of the heathen
deities. Reason has no invention; and as plain sense will never be the
legislator of human affairs, it is fortunate when taste happens to be
regent.
[Footnote 1: The story of Eurydice's death and the descent of Orpheus,
her husband, to hell for her recovery, with which Virgil closes the
fourth Georgic, is among the most exquisite passages in all Latin
poetry. Pope made it the subject of his Ode on St. Cecilia's Day; but if
Pluto and Proserpine really relented at the doggerel that the English
poet puts into the mouth of the half-divine minstrel, they cannot
deserve the title of _illacrymabiles_ which Horace gives them. Some of
the pedantic scientists (to borrow a new word) have discovered in this
tale of true love an allegory about the alternations of Day and Night,
Sun and Moon, and what not, for which they deserve the anathema of every
scholar and lover of true poetry.]
[Footnote 2: "The Botanic Garden," a poem by Dr. Darwin; chiefly
remembered for Mr. Gladstone's favourite "Upas-tree," a plant which has
not, and never had, any existence except in the fancy of some traveller,
who hoaxed the too-scientific poet with the story, which, years
afterwards, hoaxed the orator also.]
_DISMISSAL OF NECKER--BARON DE BRETEUIL--THE DUC D'ORLÉANS--MIRABEAU._