_Mr. Hippy._ And there is a very pretty concert waiting for you at the

inn—the tinkling of cups and spoons, and the divine song of the tea-urn.

CHAPTER XXI

THE CITY OF NOVOTE

On the evening of the tenth day the barouche rattled triumphantly into

the large and populous city of Novote, which was situated at a short

distance from the ancient and honourable borough of Onevote. The city

contained fifty thousand inhabitants, and had no representative in the

Honourable House, the deficiency being virtually supplied by the two

members for Onevote; who, having no affairs to attend to for the

borough, or rather the burgess, that did return them, were supposed to

have more leisure for those of the city which did not; a system somewhat

analogous to that which the learned author of _Hermes_ calls _a method

of supply by negation_.

Sir Oran signalised his own entrance by playing on his French horn, _See

the conquering hero comes!_ Bells were ringing, ale was flowing, mobs

were huzzaing, and it seemed as if the inhabitants of the large and

populous city were satisfied of the truth of the admirable doctrine,

that the positive representation of one individual is a virtual

representation of fifty thousand. They found afterwards that all this

festivity had been set in motion by Sir Oran’s brother candidate, Simon

Sarcastic, Esq., to whom we shall shortly introduce our readers.

The barouche stopped at the door of a magnificent inn, and the party was

welcomed with some scores of bows from the whole _corps d’hôtel_, with

the fat landlady in the van, and Boots in the rear. They were shown into

a splendid apartment, a glorious fire was kindled in a minute, and while

Mr. Hippy looked over the bill of fare, and followed mine hostess to

inspect the state of the larder, Sir Telegraph proceeded to _peel_, and

emerged from his four _benjamins_, like a butterfly from its chrysalis.

After dinner they formed, as usual, a semicircle round the fire, with

the table in front supported by Mr. Hippy and Sir Telegraph Paxarett.

‘Now this,’ said Sir Telegraph, rubbing his hands, ‘is what I call

devilish comfortable after a cold day’s drive—an excellent inn, a superb

fire, charming company, and better wine than has fallen to our lot since

we left Melincourt Castle.’

The waiter had picked up from the conversation at dinner that one of the

destined members for Onevote was in the company; and communicated this

intelligence to Mr. Sarcastic, who was taking his solitary bottle in

another apartment. Mr. Sarcastic sent his compliments to Sir Oran

Haut-ton, and hoped he would allow his future colleague the honour of

being admitted to join his party. Mr. Hippy, Mr. Forester, and Sir

Telegraph, undertook to answer for Sir Oran, who was silent on the

occasion: Mr. Sarcastic was introduced, and took his seat in the

semicircle.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Your future colleague, Mr. Sarcastic, is _a

man of few words_; but he will join in a bumper to your better

acquaintance. (_The collision of glasses ensued between Sir Oran and Mr.

Sarcastic._)

_Mr. Sarcastic._ I am proud of the opportunity of this introduction. The

day after to-morrow is fixed for the election. I have made some

preparations to give a little _éclat_ to the affair, and have begun by

intoxicating half the city of Novote, so that we shall have a great

crowd at the scene of election, whom I intend to harangue from the

hustings, on the great benefits and blessings of virtual representation.

_Mr. Forester._ I shall, perhaps, take the opportunity of addressing

them also, but with a different view of the subject.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ Perhaps our views of the subject are not radically

different, and the variety is in the mode of treatment. In my ordinary

intercourse with the world I reduce practice to theory; it is a habit, I

believe, peculiar to myself, and a source of inexhaustible amusement.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Fill and explain.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ Nothing, you well know, is so rare as the coincidence

of theory and practice. A man who ‘will go through fire and water to

serve a friend’ in words, will not give five guineas to save him from

famine. A poet will write Odes to Independence, and become the

obsequious parasite of any great man who will hire him. A burgess will

hold up one hand for purity of election, while the price of his own vote

is slily dropped into the other. I need not accumulate instances.

_Mr. Forester._ You would find it difficult, I fear, to adduce many to

the contrary.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ This then is my system. I ascertain the practice of

those I talk to, and present it to them as from myself, in the shape of

theory; the consequence of which is, that I am universally stigmatised

as a promulgator of rascally doctrines. Thus I said to Sir Oliver

Oilcake, ‘When I get into Parliament I intend to make the sale of my

vote as notorious as the sun at noonday. I will have no rule of right,

but my own pocket. I will support every measure of every administration,

even if they ruin half the nation for the purpose of restoring the Great

Lama, or of subjecting twenty millions of people to be hanged, drawn,

and quartered at the pleasure of the man-milliner of Mahomet’s mother. I

will have shiploads of turtle and rivers of Madeira for myself, if I

send the whole swinish multitude to draff and husks.’ Sir Oliver flew

into a rage, and swore he would hold no further intercourse with a man

who maintained such infamous principles.

_Mr. Hippy._ Pleasant enough, to show a man his own picture, and make

him damn the ugly rascal.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ I said to Miss Pennylove, whom I knew to be _laying

herself out for a good match_, ‘When my daughter becomes of marriageable

age, I shall commission Christie to put her up to auction, “the highest

bidder to be the buyer; and if any dispute arise between two or more

bidders, the lot to be put up again and resold.”’ Miss Pennylove

professed herself utterly amazed and indignant that any man, and a

father especially, should imagine a scheme so outrageous to the dignity

and delicacy of the female mind.

_The Honourable Mrs. Pinmoney and Miss Danaretta._ A most horrid idea

certainly.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ The fact, my dear ladies, the fact; how stands the

fact? Miss Pennylove afterwards married a man old enough to be her

grandfather, for no other reason but because he was rich; and broke the

heart of a very worthy friend of mine, to whom she had been previously

engaged, who had no fault but the folly of loving her, and was quite

rich enough for all purposes of matrimonial happiness. How the dignity

and delicacy of such a person could have been affected, if the

preliminary negotiation with her hobbling Strephon had been conducted

through the instrumentality of honest Christie’s hammer, I cannot

possibly imagine.

_Mr. Hippy._ Nor I, I must say. All the difference is in the form, and

not in the fact. It is a pity that form does not come into fashion; it

would save a world of trouble.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ I irreparably offended the Reverend Doctor Vorax by

telling him, that having a nephew, whom I wished to shine in the church,

I was on the look-out for a luminous butler, and a cook of solid

capacity, under whose joint tuition he might graduate. ‘Who knows,’ said

I, ‘but he may immortalise himself at the University, by giving his name

to a pudding?’—I lost the acquaintance of Mrs. Cullender, by saying to

her, when she had told me a piece of gossip as a very particular secret,

that there was nothing so agreeable to me as to be in possession of a

secret, for I made a point of telling it to all my acquaintance;

Intrusted under solemn vows,

Of Mum, and Silence, and the Rose,

To be retailed again in whispers,

For the easy credulous to disperse.[56]

Mrs. Cullender left me in great wrath, protesting she would never again

throw away _her_ confidence on so leaky a vessel.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Ha! ha! ha! Bravo! Come, a bumper to Mrs.

Cullender.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ With all my heart; and another if you please to Mr.

Christopher Corporate, the free, fat, and dependent burgess of Onevote,

of which ‘plural unit’ the Honourable Baronet and myself are to be the

joint representatives. (_Sir Oran Haut-ton bowed._)

_Mr. Hippy._ And a third, by all means, to his Grace the Duke of

Rottenburgh.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ And a fourth, to crown all, to _the blessings of

virtual representation_, which I shall endeavour to impress on as many

of the worthy citizens of Novote as shall think fit to be present, the

day after to-morrow, at the proceedings of the borough of Onevote.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ And now for tea and coffee. Touch the bell for

the waiter.

The bottles and glasses vanished, and the beautiful array of urns and

cups succeeded. Sir Telegraph and Mr. Hippy seceded from the table, and

resigned their stations to Mrs. and Miss Pinmoney.

_Mr. Forester._ Your system is sufficiently amusing, but I much question

its utility. The object of moral censure is reformation, and its proper

vehicle is plain and fearless sincerity: VERBA ANIMI PROFERRE, ET VITAM

IMPENDERE VERO.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ I tried that in my youth, when I was troubled with the

_passion for reforming the world_;[57] of which I have been long cured

by the conviction of the inefficacy of moral theory with respect to

producing a practical change in the mass of mankind. Custom is the

pillar round which opinion twines, and interest is the tie that binds

it. It is not by reason that practical change can be effected, but by

making a puncture to the quick in the feelings of personal hope and

personal fear. The Reformation in England is one of the supposed

triumphs of reason. But if the passions of Henry the Eighth had not been

interested in that measure, he would as soon have built mosques as

pulled down abbeys; and you will observe that, in all cases, reformation

never goes as far as reason requires, but just as far as suits the

personal interest of those who conduct it. Place Temperance and Bacchus

side by side, in an assembly of jolly fellows, and endow the first with

the most powerful eloquence that mere reason can give, with the absolute

moral force of mathematical demonstration, Bacchus need not take the

trouble of refuting one of her arguments; he will only have to say,

‘Come, my boys, here’s _Damn Temperance_ in a bumper,’ and you may rely

on the toast being drunk with an unanimous three times three.

(_At the sound of the word_ bumper, _with which Captain Hawltaught had

made him very familiar, Sir Oran Haut-ton looked round for his glass,

but, finding it vanished, comforted himself with a dish of tea from the

fair hand of Miss Danaretta, which, as his friend Mr. Forester had

interdicted him from the use of sugar, he sweetened as well as he could

with a copious infusion of cream_.)[58]

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ As an Opposition orator in the Honourable

House will bring forward a long detail of unanswerable arguments,

without even expecting that they will have the slightest influence on

the vote of the majority.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ A reform of that honourable body, if ever it should

take place, will be one of the ‘_triumphs of reason_.’ But reason will

have little to do with it. All that reason can say on the subject has

been said for years, by men of all parties—while they were _out_; but

the moment they were _in_, the moment their own interest came in contact

with their own reason, the victory of interest was never for a moment

doubtful. While the great fountain of interest, rising in the caverns of

borough patronage and ministerial influence, flowed through the whole

body of the kingdom in channels of paper-money, and loans, and

contracts, and jobs, and places either found or made for the useful

dealers in secret services, so long the predominant interests of

corruption overpowered the true and permanent interests of the country;

but as those channels become dry, and they are becoming so with fearful

rapidity, the crew of every boat that is left aground are convinced, not

by reason—that they had long heard and despised—but by the unexpected

pressure of personal suffering, that they had been going on in the wrong

way. Thus the reaction of interest takes place; and when the

concentrated interests of thousands, combined by the same pressure of

personal suffering, shall have created an independent power, greater

than the power of the interest of corruption, then, and not till then,

the latter will give way, and this will be called the triumph of reason;

though, in truth, like all the changes in human society that have ever

taken place from the birthday of the world, it will be only the triumph

of one mode of interest over another; but as the triumph in this case

will be of the interest of the many over that of the few, it is

certainly a consummation devoutly to be wished.

_Mr. Forester._ If I should admit that ‘the hope of personal advantage,

and the dread of personal punishment,’ are the only springs that set the

mass of mankind in action, the inefficacy of reason, and the inutility

of moral theory, will by no means follow from the admission. The

progress of truth is slow, but its ultimate triumph is secure; though

its immediate effects may be rendered almost imperceptible by the power

of habit and interest. If the philosopher cannot reform his own times,

he may lay the foundation of amendment in those that follow. Give

currency to reason, improve the moral code of society, and the theory of

one generation will be the practice of the next. After a certain period

of life, and that no very advanced one, men in general become perfectly

unpersuadable to all practical purposes. Few philosophers, therefore, I

believe, expect to produce much change in the habits of their

contemporaries, as Plato proposed to banish from his republic all above

the age of ten, and give a good education to the rest.

_Mr. Sarcastic._ Or, as Heraclitus the Ephesian proposed to his

countrymen, that all above the age of fourteen should hang themselves,

before he would consent to give laws to the remainder.

CHAPTER XXII

THE BOROUGH OF ONEVOTE

The day of election arrived. Mr. Sarcastic’s rumoured preparations, and

the excellence of the ale which he had broached in the city of Novote,

had given a degree of _éclat_ to the election for the borough of

Onevote, which it had never before possessed; the representatives

usually sliding into their nomination with the same silence and decorum

with which a solitary spinster slides into her pew at Wednesday’s or

Friday’s prayers in a country church. The resemblance holds good also in

this respect, that, as the curate addresses the solitary maiden with the

appellation of _dearly beloved brethren_, so the representatives always

pluralised their solitary elector, by conferring on him the appellation

of _a respectable body of constituents_. Mr. Sarcastic, however, being

determined to amuse himself at the expense of this most ‘venerable

_feature_’ in our old constitution, as Lord C. calls a rotten borough,

had brought Mr. Christopher Corporate into his views by the adhibition

of _persuasion in a tangible shape_. It was generally known in Novote

that something would be going forward at Onevote, though nobody could

tell precisely what, except that a long train of brewer’s drays had left

the city for the borough, in grand procession, on the preceding day,

under the escort of a sworn band of special constables, who were to keep

guard over the ale all night. This detachment was soon followed by

another, under a similar escort, and with similar injunctions; and it

was understood that this second expedition of _frothy rhetoric_ was sent

forth under the auspices of Sir Oran Haut-ton, Baronet, the brother

candidate of Simon Sarcastic, Esquire, for the representation of the

ancient and honourable borough.

The borough of Onevote stood in the middle of a heath, and consisted of

a solitary farm, of which the land was so poor and untractable, that it

would not have been worth the while of any human being to cultivate it,

had not the Duke of Rottenburgh found it very well worth his to pay his

tenant for living there, to keep the honourable borough in existence.

Mr. Sarcastic left the city of Novote some hours before his new

acquaintance, to superintend his preparations, followed by crowds of

persons of all descriptions, pedestrians and equestrians; old ladies in

chariots, and young ladies on donkeys; the farmer on his hunter, and the

tailor on his hack; the grocer and his family six in a chaise; the

dancing-master in his tilbury; the banker in his tandem; mantua-makers

and servant-maids twenty-four in the waggon, fitted up for the occasion

with a canopy of evergreens; pastry-cooks, men-milliners, and journeymen

tailors, by the stage, running for that day only, six inside and

fourteen out; the sallow artisan emerging from the cellar or the

furnace, to freshen himself with the pure breezes of Onevote Heath; the

bumpkin in his laced boots and Sunday coat, trudging through the dust

with his cherry-cheeked lass on his elbow; the gentleman coachman on his

box, with his painted charmer by his side; the lean curate on his

half-starved Rosinante; the plump bishop setting an example of Christian

humility in his carriage and six; the doctor on his white horse, like

Death in the Revelation; and the lawyer on his black one, like the devil

in the Wild Huntsmen.

Almost in the rear of this motley cavalcade went the barouche of Sir

Telegraph Paxarett, and rolled up to the scene of action amidst the

shouts of the multitude.

The heath had very much the appearance of a race-ground; with booths and

stalls, the voices of pie-men and apple-women, the grinding of barrel

organs, the scraping of fiddles, the squeaking of ballad-singers, the

chirping of corkscrews, the vociferations of ale-drinkers, the cries of

the ‘last dying speeches of desperate malefactors,’ and of ‘The History

and Antiquities of the honourable Borough of Onevote, a full and

circumstantial account, all in half a sheet, for the price of one

halfpenny!’

The hustings were erected in proper form, and immediately opposite to

them was an enormous marquee with a small opening in front, in which was

seated the important person of Mr. Christopher Corporate, with a tankard

of ale and a pipe. The ladies remained in the barouche under the care of

Sir Telegraph and Mr. Hippy. Mr. Forester, Mr. Fax, and Sir Oran

Haut-ton joined Mr. Sarcastic on the hustings.

Mr. Sarcastic stepped forward amidst the shouts of the assembled crowd,

and addressed Mr. Christopher Corporate:

‘Free, fat, and dependent burgess of this ancient and honourable

borough! I stand forward an unworthy candidate, to be the representative

of so important a personage, who comprises in himself a three-hundredth

part of the whole elective capacity of this extensive empire. For if the

whole population be estimated at eleven millions, with what awe and

veneration must I look on one who is, as it were, the abstract and

quintessence of thirty-three thousand six hundred and sixty-six people!

The voice of Stentor was like the voice of fifty, and the voice of Harry

Gill[59] was like the voice of three; but what are these to the voice of

Mr. Christopher Corporate, which gives utterance in one breath to the

concentrated power of thirty-three thousand six hundred and sixty-six

voices? Of such an one it may indeed be said, that _he is himself an

host_, and that _none but himself can be his parallel_.

‘Most potent, grave, and reverend signor! it is usual on these occasions

to make a great vapouring about honour and conscience; but as those

words are now generally acknowledged to be utterly destitute of meaning,

I have too much respect for your understanding to say anything about

them. The _monied interest_, Mr. Corporate, for which you are as

illustrious _as the sun at noonday_, is the great point of connection

and sympathy between us; and no circumstances can throw a _wet blanket_

on the ardour of our reciprocal esteem, while the _fundamental feature_

of our mutual interests presents itself to us in so _tangible a

shape_.[60] How high a value I set upon your voice, you may judge by the

price I have paid for half of it; which, indeed, deeply lodged as my

feelings are in my pocket, I yet see no reason to regret, since you will

thus confer on mine a transmutable and marketable value which I trust by

proper management will leave me no loser by the bargain.’

[Illustration: ‘_We shall always be deeply attentive to your

interests._’]

‘Huzza!’ said Mr. Corporate.

‘People of the city of Novote!’ proceeded Mr. Sarcastic, ‘some of you, I

am informed, consider yourselves aggrieved, that while your large and

populous city has no share whatever in the formation of the Honourable

House, the _plural unity_ of Mr. Christopher Corporate should be

invested with the privilege of double representation. But, gentlemen,

representation is of two kinds, actual and virtual; an important

distinction, and of great political consequence.

‘The Honourable Baronet and myself, being the actual representatives of

the fat burgess of Onevote, shall be the virtual representatives of the

worthy citizens of Novote; and you may rely on it, gentlemen (_with his

hand on his heart_), we shall always be deeply attentive to your

interests, when they happen, as no doubt they sometimes will, to be

perfectly compatible with our own.

‘A member of Parliament, gentlemen, to speak to you in your own phrase,

is a sort of staple commodity, manufactured for home consumption. Much

has been said of the improvement of machinery in the present age, by

which one man may do the work of a dozen. If this be admirable, and

admirable it is acknowledged to be by all the civilised world, how much

more admirable is the improvement of political machinery, by which one

man does the work of thirty thousand! I am sure I need not say another

word to a great manufacturing population like the inhabitants of the

city of Novote, to convince them of the beauty and utility of this most

luminous arrangement.

‘The duty of a representative of the people, whether actual or virtual,

is simply _to tax_. Now this important branch of public business is much

more easily and expeditiously transacted by the means of virtual, than

it possibly could be by that of actual representation. For when the

minister draws up his scheme of ways and means, he will do it with much

more celerity and confidence, when he knows that the propitious

countenance of virtual representation will never cease to smile upon him

as long as he continues in place, than if he had to encounter the

doubtful aspect of actual representation, which might, perhaps, look

black on some of his favourite projects, thereby greatly impeding the

distribution of secret service money at home, and placing foreign

legitimacy in a very awkward predicament. The carriage of the state

would then be like a chariot in a forest, turning to the left for a

troublesome thorn, and to the right for a sturdy oak; whereas it now

rolls forward like the car of Juggernaut over the plain crushing

whatever offers to impede its way.

‘The constitution says that no man shall be taxed but by his own

consent; a very plausible theory, gentlemen, but not reducible to

practice. Who will apply a lancet to his own arm, and bleed himself?

Very few, you acknowledge. Who then, _a fortiori_, would apply a lancet

to his own pocket, and draw off what is dearer to him than his blood—his

money? Fewer still, of course; I humbly opine, none.—What then remains

but to appoint a royal college of state surgeons, who may operate on the

patient according to their views of his case? Taxation is political

phlebotomy: the Honourable House is, figuratively speaking, a royal

college of state surgeons. A good surgeon must have firm nerves and a

steady hand; and, perhaps, the less feeling the better. Now, it is

manifest that, as all feeling is founded on sympathy, the fewer

constituents a representative has, the less must be his sympathy with

the public, and the less, of course as is desirable, his feeling for his

patient—the people:—who, therefore, with so much _sang froid_, can

phlebotomise the nation, as the representative of half an elector?

‘Gentlemen, as long as a _full Gazette_ is pleasant to the _quidnunc_;

as long as an empty purse is delightful to the spendthrift; as long as

the cry of _Question_ is a satisfactory _answer_ to an argument, and to

outvote reason is to refute it; as long as the way to pay old debts is

to incur new ones of five times the amount; as long as the grand recipes

of political health and longevity are _bleeding_ and _hot water_—so long

must you rejoice in the privileges of Mr. Christopher Corporate, so long

must you acknowledge from the very bottom of your pockets the benefits

and blessings of _virtual representation_.’

This harangue was received with great applause, acclamations rent the

air, and ale flowed in torrents. Mr. Forester declined speaking, and the

party on the hustings proceeded to business. Sir Oran Haut-ton, Baronet,

and Simon Sarcastic, Esquire, were nominated in form. Mr. Christopher

Corporate held up both his hands, with his tankard in one, and his pipe

in the other; and neither poll nor scrutiny being demanded, the two

candidates were pronounced duly elected as representatives of the

ancient and honourable borough of Onevote.

[Illustration: ‘_Hail, plural unit!_’]

The shouts were renewed; the ale flowed rapidly; the pipe and tankard of

Mr. Corporate were replenished. Sir Oran Haut-ton, Baronet, M.P., bowed

gracefully to the people with his hand on his heart.

A cry was now raised of ‘Chair ’em! chair ’em!’ when Mr. Sarcastic again

stepped forward.

‘Gentlemen,’ said he, ‘a slight difficulty opposes itself to the honour

you would confer on us. The members should, according to form, be

chaired by their electors; and how can one elector, great man as he is,

chair two representatives? But to obviate this dilemma as well as

circumstances admit, I move that the “large body corporate of one” whom

the Honourable Baronet and myself have the honour to represent, do

resolve himself into a committee.’

He had no sooner spoken, than the marquee opened, and a number of bulky

personages, all in dress, aspect, size, and figure, very exact

resemblances of Mr. Christopher Corporate, each with his pipe and his

tankard, emerged into daylight, who, encircling their venerable

prototype, lifted their tankards high in air, and pronounced with

Stentorian symphony, ‘HAIL, PLURAL UNIT!’ Then, after a simultaneous

draught, throwing away their pipes and tankards, for which the mob

immediately scrambled, they raised on high two magnificent chairs, and

prepared to carry into effect the last ceremony of the election. The

party on the hustings descended. Mr. Sarcastic stepped into his chair;

and his part of the procession, headed by Mr. Christopher Corporate, and

surrounded by a multiform and many-coloured crowd, moved slowly off

towards the city of Novote, amidst the undistinguishable clamour of

multitudinous voices.

Sir Oran Haut-ton watched the progress of his precursor, as his chair

rolled and swayed over the sea of heads, like a boat with one mast on a

stormy ocean; and the more he watched the agitation of its movements,

the more his countenance gave indications of strong dislike to the

process; so that when his seat in the second chair was offered to him,

he with a very polite bow declined the honour. The party that was to

carry him, thinking that his repugnance arose entirely from diffidence,

proceeded with gentle force to overcome his scruples, when not precisely

penetrating their motives, and indignant at this attempt to violate the

freedom of the natural man, he seized a stick from a sturdy farmer at

his elbow, and began to lay about him with great vigour and effect.

Those who escaped being knocked down by the first sweep of his weapon

ran away with all their might, but were soon checked by the pressure of

the crowd, who, hearing the noise of conflict, and impatient to

ascertain the cause, bore down from all points upon a common centre, and

formed a circumferential pressure that effectually prohibited the egress

of those within; and they, in their turn, in their eagerness to escape

from Sir Oran (who like Artegall’s Iron Man, or like Ajax among the

Trojans, or like Rodomonte in Paris, or like Orlando among the soldiers

of Agramant, kept clearing for himself an ample space in the midst of

the encircling crowd), waged desperate conflict with those without; so

that from the equal and opposite action of the centripetal and

centrifugal forces, resulted a stationary combat, raging between the

circumferences of two concentric circles, with barbaric dissonance of

deadly feud, and infinite variety of oath and execration, till Sir Oran,

charging desperately along one of the radii, fought a free passage

through all opposition; and rushing to the barouche of Sir Telegraph

Paxarett, sprang to his old station on the box, from whence he shook his

sapling at the foe with looks of mortal defiance. Mr. Forester, who had

been forcibly parted from him at the commencement of the strife, had

been all anxiety on his account, mounted with great alacrity to his

station on the roof; the rest of the party was already seated; the

Honourable Mrs. Pinmoney, half-fainting with terror, earnestly entreated

Sir Telegraph to fly: Sir Telegraph cracked his whip, the horses sprang

forward like racers, the wheels went round like the wheels of a

firework. The tumult of battle, lessening as they receded, came wafted

to them on the wings of the wind; for the flame of discord having been

once kindled, was not extinguished by the departure of its first

flambeau—Sir Oran; but war raged wide and far, here in the thickest mass

of central fight, there in the light skirmishing of flying detachments.

The hustings were demolished, and the beams and planks turned into

offensive weapons: the booths were torn to pieces, and the canvas

converted into flags floating over the heads of magnanimous heroes that

rushed to revenge they knew not what, in deadly battle with they knew

not whom. The stalls and barrows were upset; and the pears, apples,

oranges, mutton-pies, and masses of gingerbread, flew like missiles of

fate in all directions. The _sanctum sanctorum_ of the ale was broken

into, and the guardians of the Hesperian liquor were put to ignominious

rout. Hats and wigs were hurled into the air, never to return to the

heads from which they had suffered violent divorce. The collision of

sticks, the ringing of empty ale-casks, the shrieks of women, and the

vociferations of combatants, mingled in one deepening and indescribable

tumult; till at length, everything else being levelled with the heath,

they turned the mingled torrent of their wrath on the cottage of Mr.

Corporate, to which they triumphantly set fire, and danced round the

blaze like a rabble of village boys round the effigy of the immortal

Guy. In a few minutes the ancient and honourable borough of Onevote was

reduced to ashes; but we have the satisfaction to state that it was

rebuilt a few days afterwards, at the joint expense of its two

representatives, and His Grace the Duke of Rottenburgh.

[Illustration: _Began to lay about him with great vigour and effect._]

CHAPTER XXIII

THE COUNCIL OF WAR

The compassionate reader will perhaps sympathise in our anxiety to take

one peep at Lord Anophel Achthar and the Reverend Mr. Grovelgrub, whom

we left perched on the summit of the rock where Sir Oran had placed

them, looking at each other as ruefully as Hudibras and Ralpho in their

‘wooden bastile,’ and falling by degrees into as knotty an argument, the

_quaeritur_ of which was, how to descend from their elevation—an exploit

which to them seemed replete with danger and difficulty. Lord Anophel,

having, for the first time in his life, been made acquainted with the

salutary effects of manual discipline, sate boiling with wrath and

revenge; while the Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub, who in his youthful days had

been beaten black and blue in the capacity of _fag_ (a practice which

reflects so much honour on our public seminaries), bore the infliction

with more humility.

_Lord Anophel Achthar_ (_rubbing his shoulder_). This is all your doing,

Grovelgrub—all your fault, curse me!

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Oh, my Lord! my intention was good, though

the catastrophe is ill. The race is not always to the swift, nor the

battle to the strong.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ But the battle was to the strong in this

instance, Grovelgrub, curse me! though from the speed with which you

began to run off on the first alarm, it was no fault of yours that the

race was not to the swift.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ I must do your Lordship the justice to say,

that you too started with a degree of celerity highly creditable to your

capacity of natural locomotion; and if that ugly monster, the dumb

Baronet, had not knocked us both down in the incipiency of our

progression——

[Illustration: _Perched on the summit of the rock._]

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ We should have escaped as our two rascals did,

who shall bitterly rue their dereliction. But as to the dumb Baronet,

who has treated me with gross impertinence on various occasions, I shall

certainly call him out, to give me the satisfaction of a gentleman.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Oh, my Lord.

Though with pistols ’tis the fashion

To satisfy your passion;

Yet where’s the satisfaction,

If you perish in the action?

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ One of us must perish, Grovelgrub, ‘pon honour.

Death or revenge! We’re blown, Grovelgrub. He took off our masks; and

though he can’t speak, he can write, no doubt, and read too, as I shall

try with a challenge.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Can’t speak, my Lord, is by no means clear.

Won’t speak, perhaps; none are so dumb as those who won’t speak. Don’t

you think, my Lord, there was a sort of melancholy about him—a kind of

sullenness? Crossed in love, I suspect. People crossed in love, Saint

Chrysostom says, lose their voice.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ Then I wish you were crossed in love,

Grovelgrub, with all my heart.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Nay, my Lord, what so sweet in calamity as

the voice of the spiritual comforter? All shall be well yet, my Lord. I

have an infallible project hatching here; Miss Melincourt shall be

ensconced in Alga Castle, and then the day is our own.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ Grovelgrub, you know the old receipt for stewing

a carp: ‘First, catch your carp.’

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Your Lordship is pleased to be facetious; but

if the carp be not caught, let me be devilled like a biscuit after the

second bottle, or a turkey’s leg at a twelfth night supper. The carp

shall be caught.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ Well, Grovelgrub, only take notice that I’ll not

come again within ten miles of dummy.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ You may rely upon it, my Lord, I shall always

know my distance from the Honourable Baronet. But my plot is a good

plot, and cannot fail of success.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ You are a very skilful contriver, to be sure;

this is your contrivance, our perch on the top of this rock. Now

contrive, if you can, some way of getting to the bottom of it.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ My Lord, there is a passage in Aeschylus very

applicable to our situation, where the chorus wishes to be in precisely

such a place.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ Then I wish the chorus were here instead of us,

Grovelgrub, with all my soul.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ It is a very fine passage, my Lord, and worth

your attention: the rock is described as

λισσας αἰγιλιψ ἀπροσδεικτος

οἰοφρων ἐρημας γυπιας πετρα,

βαθυ πτωμα μαρτυρουσα μοι.[61]

That is, my Lord, a precipitous rock, inaccessible to the goat—not to be

pointed at (from having, as I take it, its head in the clouds), where

there is the loneliness of mind, and the solitude of desolation, where

the vulture has its nest, and the precipice testifies a deep and

headlong fall.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ I’ll tell you what, Grovelgrub; if ever I catch

you quoting Aeschylus again, I’ll cashier you from your tutorship—that’s

positive.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ I am dumb, my Lord.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ Think, I tell you, of some way of getting down.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Nothing more easy, my Lord.

_Lord Anophel Achthar._ Plummet fashion, I suppose?

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ Why, as your Lordship seems to hint, that

certainly is the most expeditious method; but not, I think, in all

points of view, the most advisable. On this side of the rock is a

_dumetum_: we can descend, I think, by the help of the roots and shoots.

O dear! I shall be like Virgil’s goat: I shall be seen from far to hang

from the bushy rock _dumosa pendere procul de rupe videbor_!

_Lord Anophel Achthar._—Confound your Greek and Latin! you know there is

nothing I hate so much; and I thought you did so too, or you have

_finished_ your _education_ to no purpose at college.

_The Rev. Mr. Grovelgrub._ I do, my Lord; I hate them mortally, more

than anything except philosophy and the dumb Baronet.

Lord Anophel Achthar proceeded to examine the side of the rock to which

the Reverend Mr. Grovelgrub had called his attention; and as it seemed

the most practicable mode of descent, it was resolved to submit to

necessity, and make a valorous effort to regain the valley; Lord

Anophel, however, insisting on the Reverend Mr. Grovelgrub leading the

way. The reverend gentleman seized with one hand the stem of a hazel,

with the other the branch of an ash; set one foot on the root of an oak,

and deliberately lowered the other in search of a resting-place; which

having found on a projecting point of stone, he cautiously disengaged

one hand and the upper foot, for which in turn he sought and found a

firm _appui_; and thus by little and little he vanished among the boughs

from the sight of Lord Anophel, who proceeded with great circumspection

to follow his example.

Lord Anophel had descended about one third of the elevation, comforting

his ear with the rustling of the boughs below, that announced the safe

progress of his reverend precursor; when suddenly, as he was shifting

his right hand, a treacherous twig in his left gave way, and he fell

with fearful lapse from bush to bush, till, striking violently on a

bough to which the unfortunate divine was appended, it broke beneath the

shock, and down they went, crashing through the bushes together. Lord

Anophel was soon wedged into the middle of a large holly, from which he

heard the intermitted sound of the boughs as they broke and were broken

by the fall of his companion; till at length they ceased, and fearful

silence succeeded. He then extricated himself from the holly as well as

he could, at the expense of a scratched face, and lowered himself down

without further accident. On reaching the bottom, he had the pleasure to

find the reverend gentleman in safety, sitting on a fragment of stone,

and rubbing his shin. ‘Come, Grovelgrub,’ said Lord Anophel, ‘let us

make the best of our way to the nearest inn.’—‘And pour oil and wine

into our wounds,’ pursued the reverend gentleman, ‘and over our Madeira

and walnuts lay a more hopeful scheme for our next campaign.’

CHAPTER XXIV

THE BAROUCHE

The morning after the election Sir Oran Haut-ton and his party took

leave of Mr. Sarcastic, Mr. Forester having previously obtained from him

a promise to be present at the anti-saccharine fête. The barouche left

the city of Novote, decorated with ribands; Sir Oran Haut-ton was loudly

cheered by the populace, and not least by those whom he had most

severely beaten; the secret of which was, that a double allowance of ale

had been distributed over-night, to wash away the effects of his

indiscretion; it having been ascertained by political economists, that a

practical appeal either to the palm or the palate will induce the

friends of _things as they are_ to submit to anything.

Autumn was now touching on the confines of winter, but the day was mild

and sunny. Sir Telegraph asked Mr. Forester if he did not think the mode

of locomotion very agreeable.

_Mr. Forester._ That I never denied; all I question is, the right of any

individual to indulge himself in it.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Surely a man has a right to do what he pleases

with his own money.

_Mr. Forester._ A legal right, certainly, not a moral one. The

possession of power does not justify its abuse. The quantity of money in

a nation, the quantity of food, and the number of animals that consume

that food, maintain a triangular harmony, of which, in all the

fluctuations of time and circumstance, the proportions are always the

same. You must consider, therefore, that for every horse you keep for

pleasure, you pass sentence of non-existence on two human beings.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Really, Forester, you are a very singular

fellow. I should not much mind what you say, if you had not such a

strange habit of practising what you preach; a thing quite

unprecedented, and, egad, preposterous. I cannot think where you got it:

I am sure you did not learn it at college.

_Mr. Fax._ In a political light, every object of perception may be

resolved into one of these three heads: the food consumed—the

consumers—and money. In this point of view all convertible property that

does not eat and drink is money. Diamonds are money. When a man changes

a bank-note for a diamond, he merely changes one sort of money for

another, differing only in the facility of circulation and the stability

of value. None of the produce of the earth is wasted by the permutation.

_Mr. Forester._ The most pernicious species of luxury, therefore, is

that which applies the fruits of the earth to any other purposes than

those of human subsistence. All luxury is indeed pernicious, because its

infallible tendency is to enervate the few and enslave the many; but

luxury, which, in addition to this evil tendency, destroys the fruits of

the earth in the wantonness of idle ostentation, and thereby prevents

the existence of so many human beings as the quantity of food so

destroyed would maintain, is marked by criminality of a much deeper dye.

_Mr. Fax._ At the same time you must consider that, in respect of

population, the great desideratum is not number, but quality. If the

whole surface of this country were divided into gardens, and in every

garden were a cottage, and in every cottage a family living entirely on

potatoes, the number of its human inhabitants would be much greater than

at present; but where would be the spirit of commercial enterprise, the

researches of science, the exalted pursuits of philosophical leisure,

the communication with distant lands, and all that variety of human life

and intercourse, which is now so beautiful and interesting? Above all,

where would be the refuge of such a population in times of the slightest

defalcation? Now, the waste of plenty is the resource of scarcity. The

canal that does not overflow in the season of rain will not be navigable

in the season of drought. The rich have been often ready, in days of

emergency, to lay their superfluities aside; but when the fruits of the

earth are applied in plentiful or even ordinary seasons, to the utmost

possibility of human subsistence, the days of deficiency in their

produce must be days of inevitable famine.

_Mr. Forester._ What then will you say of those who in times of actual

famine persevere in their old course, in the wanton waste of luxury?

_Mr. Fax._ Truly I have nothing to say for them but that they know not

what they do.

_Mr. Forester._ If, in any form of human society, any one human being

dies of hunger, while another wastes or consumes in the wantonness of

vanity as much as would have preserved his existence, I hold that second

man guilty of the death of the first.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Surely, Forester, you are not serious.

_Mr. Forester._ Indeed I am. What would you think of a family of four

persons, two of whom should not be contented with consuming their own

share of diurnal provision but, having adventitiously the pre-eminence

of physical power, should either throw the share of the two others into

the fire, or stew it down into a condiment for their own?

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ I should think it very abominable, certainly.

_Mr. Forester._ Yet what is human society but one great family? What is

moral duty, but that precise line of conduct which tends to promote the

greatest degree of general happiness? And is not this duty most

flagrantly violated, when one man appropriates to himself the

subsistence of twelve; while, perhaps in his immediate neighbourhood,

eleven of his fellow-beings are dying with hunger? I have seen such a

man walk with a demure face into church, as regularly as if the Sunday

bell had been a portion of his corporeal mechanism, to hear a bloated

and beneficed sensualist hold forth on the text of _Do as ye would be

done by_, or _Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my

brethren, ye have done it unto me_: whereas, if he had wished his theory

to coincide with his practice he would have chosen for his text, _Behold

a man gluttonous, and a wine-bibber, a friend of publicans and

sinners_:[62] and when the duty of words was over, the auditor and his

ghostly adviser, issuing forth together, have committed poor Lazarus to

the care of Providence, and proceeded to feast in the lordly mansion,

like Dives that lived in purple.[63]

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Well, Forester, there I escape your shaft; for

I have ‘forgotten what the inside of a church is made of,’ since they

made me go to chapel twice a day at college. But go on, and don’t spare

_me_.

_Mr. Fax._ Let us suppose that ten thousand quarters of wheat will

maintain ten thousand persons during any given portion of time: if the

ten thousand quarters be reduced to five, or if the ten thousand persons

be increased to twenty, the consequence will be immediate and general

distress: yet if the proportions be equally distributed, as in a ship on

short allowance, the general perception of necessity and justice will

preserve general patience and mutual goodwill; but let the first

supposition remain unaltered, let there be ten thousand quarters of

wheat, which shall be full allowance for ten thousand people; then, if

four thousand persons take to themselves the portion of eight thousand,

and leave to the remaining six thousand the portion of two (and this I

fear is even an inadequate picture of the common practice of the world),

these latter will be in a much worse condition on the last than on the

first supposition; while the habit of selfish prodigality deadening all

good feelings and extinguishing all sympathy on the one hand, and the

habit of debasement and suffering combining with the inevitable sense of

oppression and injustice on the other, will produce an action and

reaction of open, unblushing, cold-hearted pride, and servile,

inefficient, ill-disguised resentment, which no philanthropist can

contemplate without dismay.

_Mr. Forester._ What then will be the case if the same disproportionate

division continues by regular gradations through the remaining six

thousand, till the lowest thousand receive such a fractional pittance as

will scarcely keep life together? If any of these perish with hunger,

what are they but the victims of the first four thousand, who

appropriated more to themselves than either nature required or justice

allowed? This, whatever the temporisers with the world may say of it, I

have no hesitation in pronouncing to be wickedness of the most atrocious

kind; and this I make no doubt was the sense of the founder of the

Christian religion when he said, _It is easier for a camel to pass

through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of

heaven_.

_Mr. Fax._ You must beware of the chimaera of an agrarian law, the

revolutionary doctrine of an equality of possession; which can never be

possible in practice, till the whole constitution of human nature be

changed.

_Mr. Forester._ I am no revolutionist. I am no advocate for violent and

arbitrary changes in the state of society. I care not in what

proportions property is divided (though I think there are certain limits

which it ought never to pass, and approve the wisdom of the American

laws in restricting the fortune of a private citizen to twenty thousand

a year), provided the rich can be made to know that they are but the

stewards of the poor, that they are not to be the monopolisers of

solitary spoil, but the distributors of general possession; that they

are responsible for that distribution to every principle of general

justice, to every tie of moral obligation, to every feeling of human

sympathy; that they are bound to cultivate simple habits in themselves,

and to encourage most such arts of industry and peace as are most

compatible with the health and liberty of others.

_Mr. Fax._ On this principle, then, any species of luxury in the

artificial adornment of persons and dwellings, which condemns the

artificer to a life of pain and sickness in the alternations of the

furnace and the cellar, is more baleful and more criminal than even that

which, consuming in idle prodigality the fruits of the earth, destroys

altogether, in the proportion of its waste, so much of the possibility

of human existence: since it is better not to be than to be in misery.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ That is some consolation for me, as it shows

me that there are others worse than myself; for I really thought you

were going between you to prove me one of the greatest rogues in

England. But seriously, Forester, you think the keeping of

pleasure-horses, for the reasons you have given, a selfish and criminal

species of luxury?

_Mr. Forester._ I am so far persuaded of it, that I keep none myself.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ But are not these four very beautiful

creatures? Would you wish not to see them in existence, living as they

do a very happy and easy kind of life?

_Mr. Forester._ That I am disposed to question, when I compare the wild

horse, in his native deserts, in the full enjoyment of health and

liberty, and all the energies of his nature, with those docked, cropped,

curtailed, mutilated animals, pent more than half their lives in the

close confinement of a stable, never let out but to run in trammels,

subject, like their tyrant man, to an infinite variety of diseases, the

produce of civilisation and unnatural life, and tortured every now and

then by some villain of a farrier, who has no more feeling for them than

a West Indian planter has for his slaves; and when you consider, too,

the fate of the most cherished of the species, racers and hunters,

instruments and often victims of sports equally foolish and cruel, you

will acknowledge that the life of the civilised horse is not an enviable

destiny.

_Mr. Fax._ Horses are noble and useful animals; but as they must

necessarily exist in great numbers for almost every purpose of human

intercourse and business, it is desirable that none should be kept for

purposes of mere idleness and ostentation. A pleasure-horse is a sort of

four-footed sinecurist.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Not quite so mischievous as a two-footed one.

_Mr. Forester._ Perhaps not: but the latter has always a large retinue

of the former, and therefore the evil is doubled.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Upon my word, Forester, you will almost talk

me out of my barouche, and then what will become of me? What shall I do

to kill time?

_Mr. Forester._ Read ancient books, the only source of permanent

happiness left in this degenerate world.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Read ancient books! That may be very good

advice to some people: but you forget that I have been at college, and

_finished_ my _education_. By the bye I have one inside, a portable

advocate for my proceedings, no less a personage than old Pindar.

_Mr. Forester._ Pindar has written very fine odes on driving, as

Anacreon has done on drinking; but the first can no more be adduced to

prove the morality of the whip, than the second to demonstrate the

virtue of intemperance. Besides, as to the mental tendency and emulative

associations of the pursuit itself, no comparison can be instituted

between the charioteers of the Olympic games and those of our turnpike

roads; for the former were the emulators of heroes and demigods, and the

latter of grooms and mail coachmen.

_Sir Telegraph Paxarett._ Well, Forester, as I recall to mind the

various subjects against which I have heard you declaim, I will make you

a promise. When ecclesiastical dignitaries imitate the temperance and

humility of the founder of that religion by which they feed and

flourish: when the man in place acts on the principles which he

professed while he was out: when borough electors will not sell their

suffrage, nor their representatives their votes: when poets are not to

be hired for the maintenance of any opinion: when learned divines can

afford to have a conscience: when universities are not a hundred years

in knowledge behind all the rest of the world: when young ladies speak

as they think, and when those who shudder at a tale of the horrors of

slavery will deprive their own palates of a sweet taste, for the purpose

of contributing all in their power to its extinction:—why then,

Forester, I will lay down my barouche.

CHAPTER XXV

THE WALK

They were to pass, in their return, through an estate belonging to Mr.

Forester, for the purpose of taking up his aunt Miss Evergreen, who was

to accompany them to Redrose Abbey. On arriving at an inn on the nearest

point of the great road, Mr. Forester told Sir Telegraph that, from the

arrangements he had made, it was impossible for any carriage to enter

his estate, as he had taken every precaution for preserving the

simplicity of his tenants from the contagious exhibitions and examples

of luxury. ‘This road,’ said he, ‘is only accessible to pedestrians and

equestrians: I have no wish to exclude the visits of laudable curiosity,

but there is nothing I so much dread and deprecate as the intrusion of

those heartless fops, who take their fashionable autumnal tour, to gape

at rocks and waterfalls, for which they have neither eyes nor ears, and

to pervert the feelings and habits of the once simple dwellers of the

mountains.[64] Nature seems to have raised her mountain-barriers for the

purpose of rescuing a few favoured mortals from the vortex of that

torrent of physical and moral degeneracy which seems to threaten nothing

less than the extermination of the human species:[65] but in vain, while

the annual opening of its sluices lets out a side stream of the worst

specimens of what is called refined society, to inundate the mountain

valleys with the corruptions of metropolitan folly. Thus innocence, and

health, and simplicity of life and manners, are banished from their last

retirement, and nowhere more lamentably so than in the romantic scenery

of the northern lakes, where every wonder of nature is made an article

of trade, where the cataracts are locked up, and the echoes are sold: so

that even the rustic character of that ill-fated region is condemned to

participate in the moral stigma which must dwell indelibly on its

poetical name.’

The party alighted, and a consultation being held, it was resolved to

walk to the village in a body, the Honourable Mrs. Pinmoney lifting her

hands and eyes in profound astonishment at Mr. Forester’s old-fashioned

notions.

They followed a narrow winding path through rocky and sylvan hills.

They walked in straggling parties of ones, twos, and threes. Mr.

Forester and Anthelia went first. Sir Oran Haut-ton followed alone,

playing a pensive tune on his flute. Sir Telegraph Paxarett walked

between his aunt and cousin, the Honourable Mrs. Pinmoney and Miss

Danaretta. Mr. Hippy, in a melancholy vein, brought up the rear with

Mr. Fax. A very beautiful child which had sat on the old gentleman’s

knee, at the inn where they breakfasted, had thrown him, not for the

first time on a similar occasion, into a fit of dismal repentance that

he had not one of his own: he stalked along accordingly, with a most

ruefully lengthened aspect, uttering every now and then a deep-drawn

sigh. Mr. Fax in philosophic sympathy determined to console him, by

pointing out to him the true nature and tendency of the principle of

population, and the enormous evils resulting from the multiplication

of the human species: observing that the only true criterion of the

happiness of a nation was to be found in the number of its old maids

and bachelors, whom he venerated as the sources and symbols of

prosperity and peace. Poor Mr. Hippy walked on sighing and groaning,

deaf as the adder to the voice of the charmer: for, in spite of all

the eloquence of the antipopulationist, the image of the beautiful

child which he had danced on his knee continued to haunt his

imagination, and threatened him with the blue devils for the rest of

the day.

‘I see,’ said Sir Telegraph to Mrs. Pinmoney, ‘my hopes are at an end.

Forester is the happy man, though I am by no means sure that he knows it

himself.’

‘Impossible,’ said Mrs. Pinmoney; ‘Anthelia may be amused a little while

with his rhapsodies, but nothing more, believe me. The man is out of his

mind. Do you know, I heard him say the other day, “that not a shilling

of his property was his own, that it was a portion of the general

possession of human society, of which the distribution had devolved upon

him: and that for the mode of that distribution he was most rigidly

responsible to the principles of immutable justice.” If such a mode of

talking——’

‘And acting too,’ said Sir Telegraph; ‘for I assure you he quadrates his

practice as nearly as he can to his theory.’

‘Monstrous!’ said Mrs. Pinmoney, ‘what would our reverend friend, poor

dear Doctor Bosky, say to him? But if such a way of talking and acting

be the way to win a young heiress, I shall think the whole world is

turned topsy-turvy.’

‘Your remark would be just,’ said Sir Telegraph, ‘were that young

heiress any other than Anthelia Melincourt.’

‘Well,’ said Mrs. Pinmoney, ‘there are maidens in Scotland more lovely

by far——’

‘That I deny,’ said Sir Telegraph.

‘Who will gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar,’ proceeded Mrs.

Pinmoney.

‘That will not do,’ said Sir Telegraph: ‘I shall resign with the best

grace I can muster to a more favoured candidate, but I shall never think

of another choice.’

‘Twelve months hence,’ said Mrs. Pinmoney, ‘you will tell another tale.

In the meantime you will not die of despair as long as there is a good

turnpike road and a pipe of Madeira in England.’

‘You will find,’ said Mr. Forester to Anthelia, ‘in the little valley we

are about to enter, a few specimens of that simple and natural life

which approaches as nearly as the present state of things will admit to

my ideas of the habits and manners of the primaeval agriculturists, or

the fathers of the Roman republic. You will think perhaps of Fabricius

under his oak, of Curius in his cottage, of Regulus, when he solicited

recall from the command of an army, because the man whom he had

intrusted, in his absence, with the cultivation of his field and garden

had run away with his spade and rake, by which his wife and children

were left without support; and when the senate decreed that the

implements should be replaced, and a man provided at the public expense

to maintain the consul’s family, by cultivating his fields in his

absence. Then poverty was as honourable as it is now disgraceful: then

the same public respect was given to him who could most simplify his

habits and manners that is now paid to those who can make the most

shameless parade of wanton and selfish prodigality. Those days are past

for ever: but it is something in the present time to resuscitate their

memory, to call up even the shadow of the reflection of republican

Rome—_Rome the seat of glory and of virtue, if ever they had one on

earth_.[66]

‘You excite my curiosity very highly,’ said Anthelia, ‘for, from the

time when I read

——in those dear books that first

Woke in my heart the love of poesy,

How with the villagers Erminia dwelt,

And Calidore, for a fair shepherdess,

Forgot his guest to learn the shepherd’s lore;

how much have I regretted never to discover in the actual inhabitants of

the country the realisation of the pictures of Spenser and Tasso!’

‘The palaces,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘that everywhere rise around them to

shame the meanness of their humble dwellings, the great roads that

everywhere intersect their valleys, and bring them continually in

contact with the overflowing corruption of cities, the devastating

monopoly of large farms, that has almost swept the race of cottagers

from the face of the earth, sending the parents to the workhouse or the

army, and the children to perish like untimely blossoms in the blighting

imprisonment of manufactories, have combined to diminish the numbers and

deteriorate the character of the inhabitants of the country; but

whatever be the increasing ravages of the Triad of Mammon, avarice,

luxury, and disease, they will always be the last involved in the vortex

of progressive degeneracy, realising the beautiful fiction of ancient

poetry, that, when primaeval Justice departed from the earth, her last

steps were among the cultivators of the fields.’[67]

CHAPTER XXVI

THE COTTAGERS

The valley expanded into a spacious amphitheatre, with a beautiful

stream winding among pastoral meadows, which, as well as the surrounding

hills, were studded with cottages, each with its own trees, its little

garden, and its farm. Sir Telegraph was astonished to find so many human

dwellings in a space that, on the modern tactics of rural economy,

appeared only sufficient for three or four _moderate_ farms; and Mr. Fax

looked perfectly aghast to perceive the principle of population in such

a fearful state of activity. Mrs. and Miss Pinmoney expressed their

surprise at not seeing a single lordly mansion asserting its regal

pre-eminence over the dwellings of its miserable vassals; while the

voices of the children at play served only to condense the vapours that

obfuscated the imagination of poor Mr. Hippy. Anthelia, as their path

wound among the cottages, was more and more delighted with the neatness

and comfort of the dwellings, the exquisite order of the gardens, the

ingenuous air of happiness and liberty that characterised the simple

inhabitants, and the health and beauty of the little rosy children that

were sporting in the fields. Mr. Forester had been recognised from a

distance. The cottagers ran out in all directions to welcome him: the

valley and the hills seemed starting into life, as men, women, and

children poured down, as with one impulse, on the path of his approach,

while some hastened to the residence of Miss Evergreen, ambitious of

being the first to announce to her the arrival of her nephew. Miss

Evergreen came forward to meet the party, surrounded by a rustic crowd

of both sexes, and of every age, from the old man leaning on his stick,

to the little child that could just run alone, but had already learnt to

attach something magical to the sound of the name of Forester.

The first idea they entertained at the sight of his party was that he

was married, and had brought his bride to visit his little colony; and

Anthelia was somewhat disconcerted by the benedictions that were poured

upon her under this impression of the warm-hearted rustics.

They entered Miss Evergreen’s cottage, which was small, but in a style

of beautiful simplicity. Anthelia was much pleased with her countenance

and manners; for Miss Evergreen was an amiable and intelligent woman,

and was single, not from having wanted lovers, but from being of that

order of minds which can love but once.

Mr. Fax took occasion, during a temporary absence of Miss Evergreen from

the apartment in which they were taking refreshment, to say he was happy

to have seen so amiable a specimen of that injured and calumniated class

of human beings commonly called old maids, who were often so from

possessing in too high a degree the qualities most conducive to domestic

happiness; for it might naturally be imagined that the least refined and

delicate minds would be the soonest satisfied in the choice of a

partner, and the most ready to repair the loss of a first love by the

substitution of a second. This might have led to a discussion, but Miss

Evergreen’s re-entrance prevented it. They now strolled out among the

cottages in detached parties and in different directions. Mr. Fax

attached himself to Mr. Hippy and Miss Evergreen. Anthelia and Mr.

Forester went their own way. She was above the little affectation of

feeling her _dignity_ offended, as our female novel-writers express it,

by the notions which the peasants had formed respecting her. ‘You see,’

said Mr. Forester, ‘I have endeavoured as much as possible to recall the

images of better times, when the country was well peopled, from the

farms being small, and cultivated chiefly by cottagers who lived in what

was in Scotland called a _cottar town_.[68] Now you may go over vast

tracts of country without seeing anything like an _old English Cottage_,

to say nothing of the fearful difference which has been caused in the

interior of the few that remain by the pressure of exorbitant taxation,

of which the real, though not the nominal burden, always falls most

heavily on the labouring classes, backed by that _canker at the heart of

national prosperity_, the imaginary riches of paper-credit, of which the

means are delusion, the progress monopoly, and the ultimate effect the

extinction of the best portion of national population, a healthy and

industrious peasantry. Large farms bring more rent to the landlord, and

therefore landlords in general make no scruple to increase their rents

by depopulating their estates,[69] though Anthelia Melincourt will not

comprehend the mental principle in which such feelings originate.’

‘Is it possible,’ said Anthelia, ‘that you, so young as you are, can

have created such a scene as this?’

‘My father,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘began what I merely perpetuate. He

estimated his riches, not by the amount of rent his estate produced, but

the number of simple and happy beings it maintained. He divided it into

little farms of such a size as were sufficient, even in indifferent

seasons, to produce rather more than the necessities of their

cultivators required. So that all these cottagers are rich, according to

the definition of Socrates;[70] for they have at all times a little more

than they actually need, a subsidium for age or sickness, or any

accidental necessity.’

They entered several of the cottages, and found in them all the same

traces of comfort and content, and the same images of the better days of

England: the clean-tiled floor, the polished beechen table, the tea-cups

on the chimney, the dresser with its glittering dishes, the old woman

with her spinning-wheel by the fire, and the old man with his little

grandson in the garden, giving him his first lessons in the use of the

spade, the good wife busy in her domestic arrangements, and the pot

boiling on the fire for the return of her husband from his labour in the

field.

[Illustration: _‘My father,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘began what I merely

perpetuate.’_]

‘Is it not astonishing,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘that there should be any

who think, as I know many do, the number of cottagers on their land a

grievance, and desire to be quit of them,[71] and have no feeling of

remorse in allotting to one solitary family as much extent of cultivated

land as was ploughed by the whole Roman people in the days of

Cincinnatus?[72] The three great points of every political system are

the health, the morals, and the number of the people. Without health and

morals the people cannot be happy; but without numbers they cannot be a

great and powerful nation, nor even exist for any considerable time.[73]

And by numbers I do not mean the inhabitants of the cities, the sordid

and sickly victims of commerce, and the effeminate and enervated slaves

of luxury; but in estimating the power and the riches of a country, I

take my only criterion from its agricultural population.’

CHAPTER XXVII

THE ANTI-SACCHARINE FÊTE

Miss Evergreen accompanied them in their return, to preside at the

anti-saccharine fête. Mr. Hippy was turned out to make room for her in

the barouche, and took his seat on the roof with Messieurs Forester and

Fax. Anthelia no longer deemed it necessary to keep a guard over her

heart: the bud of mutual affection between herself and Mr. Forester,

both being, as they were, perfectly free and perfectly ingenuous, was

rapidly expanding into the full bloom of happiness: they dreamed not

that evil was near to check, if not to wither it.

The whole party was prevailed on by Miss Evergreen to be her guests at

Redrose Abbey till after the anti-saccharine fête, which very shortly

took place, and was attended by the principal members of the

Anti-saccharine Society, and by an illustrious assemblage from near and

from far: amongst the rest by our old acquaintance, Mr. Derrydown, Mr.

O’Scarum, Major O’Dogskin, Mr. Sarcastic, the Reverend Mr. Portpipe, and

Mr. Feathernest the poet, who brought with him his friend Mr. Vamp the

reviewer. Lord Anophel Achthar and the Reverend Mr. Grovelgrub deemed it

not expedient to join the party, but ensconced themselves in Alga

Castle, studying _michin malicho_, which means mischief.

The anti-saccharine fête commenced with a splendid dinner, as Mr.

Forester thought to make luxury on this occasion subservient to

morality, by showing what culinary art could effect without the

intervention of West Indian produce; and the preparers of the feast,

under the superintendence of Miss Evergreen, had succeeded so well, that

the company testified very general satisfaction, except that a worthy

Alderman and Baronet from London (who had been studying the picturesque

at Low-wood Inn, and had given several manifestations of exquisite taste

that had completely won the hearts of Mr. O’Scarum and Major O’Dogskin)

having just helped himself to a slice of venison, fell back aghast

against the back of his chair, and dropped the knife and fork from his

nerveless hands, on finding that currant-jelly was prohibited: but being

recovered by an application of the Honourable Mrs. Pinmoney’s

vinaigrette, he proceeded to revenge himself on a very fine pheasant,

which he washed down with floods of Madeira, being never at a loss for

some one to take wine with him, as he had the good fortune to sit

opposite to the Reverend Mr. Portpipe, who was _toujours prêt_ on the

occasion, and a _coup-d’œil_ between them arranged the whole preliminary

of the compotatory ceremonial.

After dinner Mr. Forester addressed the company. They had seen, he said,

that culinary luxury could be carried to a great degree of refinement

without the intervention of West Indian produce: and though he himself

deprecated luxury altogether, yet he would waive that point for the

present, and concede a certain degree of it to those who fancied they

could not do without it, if they would only in return make so very

slight a concession to philanthropy, to justice, to liberty, to every

feeling of human sympathy, as to abstain from an indulgence which was

obtained by the most atrocious violation of them all, an indulgence of

which the foundations were tyranny, robbery, and murder, and every form

of evil, anguish, and oppression, at which humanity shudders; all which

were comprehended in the single name of SLAVERY. ‘Sugar,’ said he, ‘is

economically superfluous, nay, worse than superfluous: in the middling

classes of life it is a formidable addition to the expenses of a large

family, and for no benefit, for no addition to the stock of domestic

comfort, which is often sacrificed in more essential points to this

frivolous and wanton indulgence. It is physically pernicious, as its

destruction of the teeth, and its effects on the health of children much

pampered with sweetmeats, sufficiently demonstrate. It is morally

atrocious, from being the primary cause of the most complicated

corporeal suffering and the most abject mental degradation that ever

outraged the form and polluted the spirit of man. It is politically

abominable, for covering with every variety of wretchedness some of the

fairest portions of the earth, which, if the inhabitants of free

countries could be persuaded _to abstain from sugar till it were sent to

them by free men_, might soon become the abodes of happiness and

liberty. Slaves cannot breathe in the air of England: ‘They touch our

country and their fetters fall.’ Who is there among you that is not

proud of this distinction?—Yet this is not enough: the produce of the

labour of slavery should be banished from our shores. Not anything, not

an atom of anything, should enter an Englishman’s dwelling, on which the

Genius of Liberty had not set his seal. What would become of slavery if

there were no consumers of its produce? Yet I have seen a party of

pretended philanthropists sitting round a tea-table, and while they

dropped the sugar into their cups repeat some tale of the sufferings of

a slave, and execrate the colonial planters, who are but their caterers

and stewards—the obsequious ministers of their unfeeling sensuality! O

my fair countrywomen! you who have such tender hearts, such affectionate

spirits, such amiable and delicate feelings, do you consider the mass of

mischief and cruelty to which you contribute, nay, of which you are

among the primary causes, when you indulge yourselves in so paltry, so

contemptible a gratification as results from the use of sugar? while to

abstain from it entirely is a privation so trivial, that it is most

wonderful to think that Justice and Charity should have such a boon to

beg from Beauty in the name of the blood and the tears of human beings.

Be not deterred by the idea that you will have few companions by the

better way: so much the rather should it be strictly followed by amiable

and benevolent minds.[74] Secure to yourselves at least the delightful

consciousness of reflecting that you are in no way whatever accomplices

in the cruelty and crime of slavery, and accomplices in it you certainly

are, nay, its very original springs, as long as you are receivers and

consumers of its iniquitous acquisitions.’

‘I will answer you, Mr. Forester,’ said Mr. Sarcastic, ‘for myself and

the rest of the company. You shock our feelings excessively by calling

us the primary causes of slavery; and there are very few among us who

have not shuddered at the tales of West Indian cruelty. I assure you we

are very liberal of theoretical sympathy; but as to practical abstinence

from the use of sugar, do you consider what it is you require? Do you

consider how very agreeable to us is the sensation of sweetness in our

palates? Do you suppose we would give up that sensation because human

creatures of the same flesh and blood as ourselves are oppressed and

enslaved, and flogged and tortured, to procure it for us? Do you

consider that Custom[75] is the great lord and master of our conduct?

And do you suppose that any feeling of pity, and sympathy, and charity,

and benevolence, and justice, will overcome the power of Custom, more

especially where any pleasure of sense is attached to his dominion? In

appealing to our pockets, indeed, you touched us to the quick: you aimed

your eloquence at our weak side—you hit us in the vulnerable point; but

if it should appear that in this particular we really might save our

money, yet being expended in a matter of personal and sensual

gratification, it is not to be supposed so completely lost and wasted as

it would be if it were given either to a friend or a stranger in

distress. I will admit, however, that you have touched our feelings a

little, but this disagreeable impression will soon wear off: with some

of us it will last as long as pity for a starving beggar, and with

others as long as grief for the death of a friend; and I find, on a very

accurate average calculation, that the duration of the former may be

considered to be at least three minutes, and that of the latter at most

ten days.

‘Mr. Sarcastic,’ said Anthelia, ‘you do not render justice to the

feelings of the company; nor is human nature so selfish and perverted as

you seem to consider it. Though there are undoubtedly many who sacrifice

the general happiness of humankind to their own selfish gratification,

yet even these, I am willing to believe, err not in cruelty but in

ignorance, from not seeing the consequences of their own actions; but it

is not by persuading them that all the world is as bad as themselves,

that you will give them clearer views and better feelings. Many are the

modes of evil—many the scenes of human suffering; but if the general

condition of man is ever to be ameliorated, it can only be through the

medium of BELIEF IN HUMAN VIRTUE.’

‘Well, Forester,’ said Sir Telegraph, ‘if you wish to increase the

numbers of the Anti-saccharine Society, set me down for one.’

‘Remember,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘by enrolling your name among us you

pledge yourself to perpetual abstinence from West Indian produce.’

‘I am aware of it,’ said Sir Telegraph, ‘and you shall find me zealous

in the cause.’

The fat Alderman cried out about the ruin of commerce, and Mr. Vamp was

very hot on the subject of the revenue. The question was warmly

canvassed, and many of the party who had not been quite persuaded by

what Mr. Forester had said in behalf of the anti-saccharine system, were

perfectly convinced in its favour when they had heard what Mr. Vamp and

the fat Alderman had to say against it; and the consequence was, that,

in spite of Mr. Sarcastic’s opinion of the general selfishness of

mankind, the numbers of the Anti-saccharine Society were very

considerably augmented.

‘You see,’ said Mr. Fax to Mr. Sarcastic, ‘the efficacy of associated

sympathies. It is but to give an impulse of cooperation to any good and

generous feeling, and its progressive accumulation, like that of an

Alpine avalanche, though but a snowball at the summit, becomes a

mountain in the valley.’

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE CHESS DANCE

The dinner was followed by a ball, for the opening of which Sir

Telegraph Paxarett, who officiated as master of the ceremonies, had

devised a fanciful scheme, and had procured for the purpose a number of

appropriate masquerade dresses. An extensive area in the middle of the

ballroom was chalked out into sixty-four squares of alternate white and

red, in lines of eight squares each. Sir Telegraph, while the rest of

the company was sipping, not without many wry faces, their

anti-saccharine tea, called out into another apartment the gentlemen

whom he had fixed on to perform in his little ballet; and Miss Evergreen

at the same time withdrew with the intended female performers. Sir

Telegraph now invested Mr. Hippy with the dignity of White King, Major

O’Dogskin with that of Black King, and the Reverend Mr. Portpipe with

that of White Bishop, which the latter hailed as a favourable omen, not

precisely comprehending what was going forward. As the reverend

gentleman was the only one of his cloth in the company, Sir Telegraph

was under the necessity of appointing three lay Bishops, whom he fixed

on in the persons of two country squires, Mr. Hermitage and Mr. Heeltap,

and of the fat Alderman already mentioned, Sir Gregory Greenmould. Sir

Telegraph himself, Mr. O’Scarum, Mr. Derrydown, and Mr. Sarcastic, were

the Knights: and the Rooks were Mr. Feathernest the poet; Mr.

Paperstamp, another variety of the same genus, chiefly remarkable for an

affected infantine lisp in his speech, and for always wearing waistcoats

of a duffel gray; Mr. Vamp the reviewer; and Mr. Killthedead, from

Frogmarsh Hall, a great compounder of narcotics, under the denomination

of BATTLES, for he never heard of a deadly field, especially if dotage

and superstition, to which he was very partial, gained the advantage

over generosity and talent, both of which he abhorred, but immediately

seizing his goosequill and foolscap,

He fought the BATTLE o’er again,

And twice he slew the slain.

[Illustration: _The company was sipping, not without many wry faces,

their anti-saccharine tea._]

Mr. Feathernest was a little nettled on being told that he was to be the

_King’s Rook_, but smoothed his wrinkled brow on being assured that no

_mauvaise plaisanterie_ was intended.

The Kings were accordingly crowned, and attired in regal robes. The

Reverend Mr. Portpipe and his three brother Bishops were arrayed in full

canonicals. The Knights were equipped in their white and black armour,

with sword, and dazzling helm, and nodding crest. The Rooks were

enveloped in a sort of mural robe, with a headpiece formed on the model

of that which occurs in the ancient figures of Cybele; and thus attired

they bore a very striking resemblance to the walking wall in Pyramus and

Thisbe.

The Kings now led the way to the ballroom, and the two beautiful Queens,

Miss Danaretta Contantina Pinmoney and Miss Celandina Paperstamp, each

with eight beautiful nymphs, arrayed for the mimic field in light

Amazonian dresses, white and black, did such instant execution among the

hearts of the young gentlemen present, that they might be said to have

‘fought and conquered ere a sword was drawn.’

They now proceeded to their stations on their respective squares: but

before we describe their manœuvres we will recapitulate the

TRIPUDII PERSONAE

WHITE

_King_ MR. HIPPY.

_Queen_ MISS DANARETTA CONTANTINA PINMONEY.

_King’s Bishop_ THE REVEREND MR. PORTPIPE.

_Queen’s Bishop_ SIR GREGORY GREENMOULD.

_King’s Knight_ MR. O’SCARUM.

_Queen’s Knight_ SIR TELEGRAPH PAXARETT.

_King’s Rook_ MR. FEATHERNEST.

_Queen’s Rook_ MR. PAPERSTAMP.

_Eight Nymphs._

BLACK

_King_ MAJOR O’DOGSKIN.

_Queen_ MISS CELANDINA PAPERSTAMP.

_King’s Bishop_ SQUIRE HERMITAGE.

_Queen’s Bishop_ SQUIRE HEELTAP.

_King’s Knight_ MR. SARCASTIC.

_Queen’s Knight_ MR. DERRYDOWN.

_King’s Rook_ MR. KILLTHEDEAD.

_Queen’s Rook_ MR. VAMP.

_Eight Nymphs._

Mr. Hippy took his station on a black square, near the centre of one of

the extreme lines, and Major O’Dogskin on an opposite white square of

the parallel extreme. The Queens, who were to command in chief, stood on

the left of the Kings: the Bishops were posted to the right and left of

their respective sovereigns; the Knights next to the Bishops; the

corners were occupied by the Rooks. The two lines in front of these

principal personages were occupied by the Nymphs;—a space of four lines

of eight squares each being left between the opposite parties for the

field of action.

The array was now complete, with the exception of the Reverend Mr.

Portpipe, who being called by Miss Danaretta to take his place at the

right hand of Mr. Hippy, and perceiving that he should be necessitated,

in his character of Bishop, to take a very active part in the diversion,

began to exclaim with great vehemence, NOLO EPISCOPARI! which is

probably the only occasion on which these words were ever used with

sincerity. But Mr. O’Scarum, in his capacity of White Knight, pounced on

the reluctant divine, and placing him between himself and Mr. Hippy,

stood by him with his sword drawn, as if to prevent his escape; then

clapping a sword into the hand of the reverend gentleman, exhorted him

to conduct himself in a manner becoming an efficient member of the true

church militant.

Lots were then cast for the privilege of attack; and the chance falling

on Miss Danaretta, the music struck up the tune of _The Triumph_, and

the whole of the white party began dancing, with their faces towards the

King, performing at the same time various manœuvres of the sword

exercise, with appropriate pantomimic gestures, expressive of their

entire devotion to His Majesty’s service, and their desire to be

immediately sent forward on active duty. In vain did the Reverend Mr.

Portpipe remonstrate with Mr. O’Scarum that his dancing days were over:

the inexorable Knight compelled him to caper and flourish his sword,

‘till the toil-drops fell from his brows like rain.’ Sir Gregory

Greenmould did his best on the occasion, and danced like an elephant in

black drapery; but Miss Danaretta and her eight lovely Nymphs rescued

the exertions of the male performers from too critical observation. King

Hippy received the proffered service of his army with truly royal

condescension. Miss Danaretta waved her sword with inimitable grace, and

made a sign to the damsel in front of the King to advance two squares.

The same manœuvres now took place on the black side; and Miss Celandina

sent forward the Nymph in front of Major O’Dogskin to obstruct the

further progress of the white damsel. The dancing now recommenced on the

white side, and Miss Danaretta ordered out the Reverend Mr. Portpipe to

occupy the fourth square in front of Squire Heeltap. The reverend

gentleman rolled forward with great alacrity, in the secret hope that he

should very soon be taken prisoner, and put _hors de combat_ for the

rest of the evening. Squire Hermitage was detached by Miss Celandina on

a similar service; and these two episcopal heroes being thus brought

together in the centre of the field, entered, like Glaucus and Diomede,

into a friendly parle, in the course of which the words Claret and

Burgundy were repeatedly overheard. The music frequently varied as in a

pantomime, according to circumstances: the manœuvres were always

directed by the waving of the sword of the Queen, and were always

preceded by the dancing of the whole party, in the manner we have

mentioned, which continued _ad libitum_, till she had decided on her

movement. The Nymph in front of Sir Gregory Greenmould advanced one

square. Mr. Sarcastic stepped forward to the third square of Squire

Hermitage. Miss Danaretta’s Nymph advanced two squares, and being

immediately taken prisoner by the Nymph of Major O’Dogskin, conceded her

place with a graceful bow, and retired from the field. The Nymph in

front of Sir Gregory Greenmould avenged the fate of her companion; and

Mr. Hippy’s Nymph withdrew in a similar manner. Squire Hermitage was

compelled to cut short his conversation with Mr. Portpipe, and retire to

the third square in front of Mr. Derrydown. Sir Telegraph skipped into

the place which Sir Gregory Greenmould’s Nymph had last forsaken. Mr.

Killthedead danced into the deserted quarters of Squire Hermitage, and

Major O’Dogskin swept round him with a minuet step into those of Mr.

Sarcastic. To carry on the detail would require more time than we can

spare, and, perhaps, more patience than our readers possess. The

Reverend Mr. Portpipe saw his party fall around him, one by one, and

survived against his will to the close of the contest. Miss Danaretta

and Miss Celandina moved like light over the squares, and Fortune

alternately smiled and frowned on their respective banners, till the

heavy mural artillery of Mr. Vamp being brought to bear on Mr.

Paperstamp, who fancied himself a tower of strength, the latter was

overthrown and carried off the field. Mr. Feathernest avenged his fate

on the embattled front of Mr. Killthedead, and fell himself beneath the

sword of Mr. Sarcastic. Squire Heeltap was taken off by the Reverend Mr.

Portpipe, who begged his courteous prisoner to walk to the sideboard and

bring him a glass of Madeira; for Homer, he said, was very orthodox in

his opinion that wine was a great refresher in the toils of war.[76]

The changeful scene concluded by Miss Danaretta, with the aid of Sir

Telegraph and the Reverend Mr. Portpipe, hemming Major O’Dogskin into a

corner, where he was reduced to an incapacity of locomotion; on which

the Major bowed and made the best of his way to the sideboard, followed

by the reverend gentleman, who, after joining the Major in a pacific

libation, threw himself into an arm-chair, and slept very comfortably

till the annunciation of supper.

Waltzes, quadrilles, and country dances followed in succession, and,

with the exception of the interval of supper, in which Miss Evergreen

developed all the treasures of anti-saccharine taste, were kept up with

great spirit till the rising of the sun.

Anthelia, who of course did not join in the former, expressed to Mr.

Forester her astonishment to see waltzing in Redrose Abbey. ‘I did not

dream of such a thing,’ said Mr. Forester; ‘but I left the whole

arrangement of the ball to Sir Telegraph, and I suppose he deemed it

incumbent on him to consult _the general taste of the young ladies_.

Even I, young as I am, can remember the time when there was no point of

resemblance between an English girl in a private ballroom and a French

_figurante_ in a theatrical _ballet_; but waltzing and Parisian drapery

have levelled the distinction, and the only criterion of the difference

is the place of the exhibition. Thus every succeeding year witnesses

some new inroad on the simple manners of our ancestors; some importation

of continental vice and folly; some unnatural fretwork of tinsel and

frippery on the old Doric column of the domestic virtues of England. An

Englishman in stays, and an Englishwoman waltzing in treble-flounced

short petticoats, are anomalies so monstrous, that till they actually

existed, they never entered the most ominous visions of the speculators

on progressive degeneracy. What would our Alfred, what would our third

Edward, what would our Milton, and Hampden, and Sidney, what would the

barons of Runnymead have thought, if the voice of prophecy had denounced

to them a period, when the perfection of accomplishment in the daughters

of England would be found in the dress, manner, and action of the

dancing girls of Paris?’

The supper, of course, did not pass off without songs; and among them

Anthelia sang the following, which recalled to Mr. Forester their

conversation on the sea-shore.

THE MORNING OF LOVE

O the spring-time of life is the season of blooming,

And the morning of love is the season of joy;

Ere noontide and summer, with radiance consuming,

Look down on their beauty, to parch and destroy.

O faint are the blossoms life’s pathway adorning,

When the first magic glory of hope is withdrawn;

For the flowers of the spring, and the light of the morning,

Have no summer budding, and no second dawn.

Through meadows all sunshine, and verdure, and flowers,

The stream of the valley in purity flies;

But mix’d with the tides, where some proud city lowers,

O where is the sweetness that dwelt on its rise?

The rose withers fast on the breast it first graces;

Its beauty is fled ere the day be half done:—

And life is that stream which its progress defaces,

And love is that flower which can bloom but for one.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE DISAPPEARANCE

The morning after the fête Anthelia and her party returned to

Melincourt. Before they departed she conversed a few minutes alone with

Mr. Forester in his library. What was said on this occasion we cannot

precisely report; but it seemed to be generally suspected that Mr.

Hippy’s authority would soon be at an end, and that the services of the

Reverend Mr. Portpipe would be required in the old chapel of Melincourt

Castle, which, we are sorry to say, had fallen for some years past very

much into disuse, being never opened but on occasions of birth,

marriage, and death in the family; and these occasions, as our readers

are aware, had not of late been very numerous.

The course of mutual love between Anthelia and Mr. Forester was as

smooth as the gliding of a skiff down a stream, through the flowery

meadows of June: and if matters were not quite definitely settled

between them, yet, as Mr. Forester was shortly to be a visitor at the

Castle, there was a very apparent probability that their intercourse

would terminate in that grand climax and finale of all romantic

adventure—marriage.

After the departure of the ladies, Mr. Forester observed with concern

that his friend Sir Oran’s natural melancholy was visibly increased, and

Mr. Fax was of opinion that he was smitten with the tender passion: but

whether for Miss Melincourt, Mrs. Pinmoney, or Miss Danaretta, it was

not so easy to determine. But Sir Oran grew more and more fond of

solitude, and passed the greater part of the day in the woods, though it

was now the reign of the gloomy November, which, however, accorded with

the moody temper of his spirit; and he often went without his breakfast,

though he always came home to dinner. His perpetual companion was his

flute, with which he made sad response to the wintry wind.

[Illustration: _Mr. Fax was of opinion that he was smitten._]

Mr. Forester and Mr. Fax were one morning consulting on the means to be

adopted for diverting Sir Oran’s melancholy, when Sir Telegraph Paxarett

drove up furiously to the door—sprang from the box—and rushed into the

apartment with the intelligence that Anthelia had disappeared. No one

had seen her since the hour of breakfast on the preceding day. Mr.

Hippy, Mr. Derrydown, Mr. O’Scarum, and Major O’Dogskin were scouring

the country in all directions in search of her.

Mr. Forester determined not to rest night or day till he had discovered

Anthelia. Sir Telegraph drove him, with Mr. Fax and Sir Oran, to the

nearest inn, where leaving Sir Telegraph to pursue another track, they

took a chaise-and-four, and posted over the country in all directions,

day after day, without finding any clue to her retreat. Mr. Forester had

no doubt that this adventure was connected with that which we have

detailed in the eighteenth chapter; but his ignorance of the actors on

that occasion prevented his deriving any light from the coincidence. At

length, having investigated in vain all the main and cross roads for

fifty miles round Melincourt, Mr. Fax was of opinion that she could not

have passed so far along any of them, being conveyed, as no doubt she

was, against her will, without leaving some trace of her course, which

their indefatigable inquiries must have discovered. He therefore advised

that they should discontinue their system of posting, and take a

thorough pedestrian perlustration of all the most bye and unfrequented

paths of the whole mountain-district, in some secluded part of which he

had a strong presentiment she would be found. This plan was adopted; but

the season was unfavourable to its expeditious accomplishment; and they

could sometimes make but little progress in a day, being often compelled

to turn aside from the wilder tracks, in search of a town or village,

for the purposes of refreshment or rest:—there being this remarkable

difference between the lovers of the days of chivalry and those of

modern times, that the former could pass a week or two in a desert or a

forest, without meat, drink, or shelter—a very useful art for all

travellers, whether lovers or not, which these degenerate days have

unfortunately lost.

They arrived in the evening of the first day of their pedestrianism at a

little inn among the mountains. They were informed they could have no

beds; and that the only parlour was occupied by two gentlemen, who meant

to sit up all night, and would, perhaps, have no objection to their

joining the party. A message being sent in, an affirmative answer was

very politely returned; and on entering the apartment they discovered

Mr. O’Scarum and Major O’Dogskin engaged in a deep discussion over a

large jug of wine.

‘Troth, now,’ said Mr. O’Scarum, ‘and this is a merry meeting, sure

enough, though it’s on a dismal occasion, for it’s Miss Melincourt

you’re looking for, as we are too, though you have most cause, Mr.

Forester; for I understand you are to be the happy man. Troth, and I did

not know so much when I came to your fête, or, perhaps, I should have

been for arguing the point of a prior claim (as far as my own consent

was concerned) over a bit of neat turf, twelve yards long; but Major

O’Dogskin tells me, that by getting muzzy, and so I did, sure enough, on

your old Madeira, and rare stuff it is, by my conscience, when Miss

Melincourt was in your house, I have sanctioned the matter, and there’s

an end of it: but, by my soul, I did not mean to have been cut out

quietly: and the Major says, too, you’re too good a fellow to be kilt,

and that’s true enough: so I’ll keep my ammunition for other friends;

and here’s to you and Miss Melincourt, and a happy meeting to you both,

and the devil take him that parts you, says Harum O’Scarum.’—‘And so

says Dermot O’Dogskin,’ said the Major. ‘And my friend O’Scarum and

myself will ride about till we get news of her, for we don’t mind a

little hardship.—You shall be wanting some dinner, joys, and there’s

nothing but fat bacon and potatoes; but we have made a shift with it,

and then here is the very creature itself, old sherry, my jewels! troth,

and how did we come home by it, think you? I know what it is to pass a

night in a little inn in the hills, and you don’t find Major O’Dogskin

turning out of the main road, without giving his man a couple of kegs of

wine just to balance the back of his saddle. Sherry’s a good traveller,

and will stand a little shaking; and what would one do without it in

such a place as this, where it is water in the desert, and manna in the

wilderness?’

Mr. Forester thanked them very warmly for their good wishes and active

exertions. The humble dinner of himself and his party was soon

despatched; after which, the Major placed the two little kegs on the

table and said, ‘They were both filled to-day; so, you see, there is no

lack of the good creature to keep us all alive till morning, and then we

shall part again in search of Miss Melincourt, the jewel! for there is

not such another on the face of the earth. Och!’ continued the Major, as

he poured the wine from one of the kegs into a brown jug; for the house

could not afford them a decanter, and some little ale tumblers supplied

the place of wine-glasses,—‘Och! the ould jug that never held anything

better than sour ale: how proud he must feel of being filled to the brim

with sparkling sherry, for the first and last time in the course of his

life!’

CHAPTER XXX

THE PAPER-MILL

Taking leave of Mr. O’Scarum and Major O’Dogskin, they continued their

wandering as choice or chance directed: sometimes penetrating into the

most sequestered valleys; sometimes returning into the principal roads,

and investigating the most populous districts. Passing through the town

of Gullgudgeon, they found an immense crowd assembled in a state of

extreme confusion, exhibiting every symptom of hurry, anxiety,

astonishment, and dismay. They stopped to inquire the cause of the

tumult, and found it to proceed from the sudden explosion of a

paper-mill, in other words, the stoppage of the country bank of

Messieurs Smokeshadow, Airbubble, Hopthetwig, and Company. Farmers,

bumpkins, artisans, mechanics, tradesmen of all descriptions, the

innkeeper, the lawyer, the doctor, and the parson; soldiers from the

adjoining barracks, and fishermen from the neighbouring coast, with

their shrill-voiced and masculine wives, rolled in one mass, like a

stormy wave, around a little shop, of which the shutters were closed,

with the word BANK in golden letters over the door, and a large board on

the central shutter, notifying that ‘Messieurs Smokeshadow, Airbubble,

Hopthetwig, and Company had found themselves under the disagreeable

necessity of suspending their payments’; in plain English, had found it

expedient to fly by night, leaving all the machinery of their mill, and

all the treasures of their mine, that is to say, several reams of paper,

half a dozen account-books, a desk, a joint-stool, and inkstand, a bunch

of quills, and a copper-plate, to satisfy the claims of the distracted

multitude, who were shoaling in from all quarters, with _promises to

pay_, of the said Smokeshadow, Airbubble, Hopthetwig, and Company, to

the amount of a hundred thousand pounds.

Mr. Fax addressed himself for an explanation of particulars to a plump

and portly divine, who was standing at a little distance from the rest

of the crowd, and whose countenance exhibited no symptoms of the rage,

grief, and despair which were depicted on the physiognomies of his

dearly beloved brethren of the town of Gullgudgeon.

‘You seem, sir,’ said Mr. Fax, ‘to bear the general calamity with

Christian resignation.’

‘I do, sir,’ said the reverend gentleman, ‘and for a very orthodox

reason—I have none of their notes—not I. I was obliged to take them now

and then against my will, but I always sent them off to town, and got

cash for them directly.’

‘You mean to say,’ said Mr. Forester, ‘you got a Threadneedle Street

note for them.’

‘To be sure, sir,’ said the divine, ‘and that is the same thing as cash.

There is a Jacobin rascal in this town, who says it is a bad sign when

the children die before the parent, and that a day of reckoning must

come sooner or later for the old lady as well as for her daughters; but

myself and my brother magistrates have taken measures for him, and shall

soon make the town of Gullgudgeon too hot to hold him, as sure as my

name is Peppertoast.’

‘You seriously think, sir,’ said Mr. Fax, ‘that his opinion is false?’

‘Sir,’ said the reverend gentleman, somewhat nettled, ‘I do not know

what right any one can have to ask a man of my cloth what he seriously

thinks, when all that the world has to do with is what he seriously

says.’

‘Then you seriously say it, sir?’ said Mr. Fax.

‘I do, sir,’ said the divine; ‘and for this very orthodox reason, that

the system of paper-money is inseparably interwoven with the present

order of things, and the present order of things I have made up my mind

to stick by, precisely as long as it lasts.’

‘_And no longer?_’ said Mr. Fax.

‘I am no fool, sir,’ said the divine.

‘But, sir,’ said Mr. Fax, ‘as you seem to have perceived the instability

of what is called (like _lucus a non lucendo_) the _firm_ of

Smokeshadow, Airbubble, Hopthetwig, and Company, why did not you warn

your flock of the impending danger?’

‘Sir,’ said the reverend gentleman, ‘I dined every week with one of the

partners.’

Mr. Forester took notice of an elderly woman who was sitting with a

small handful of dirty paper, weeping bitterly on the step of a door.

‘Forgive my intrusion,’ said he; ‘I need not ask you why you weep; the

cause is in your hand.’—‘Ah, sir!’ said the poor woman, who could hardly

speak for sobbing, ‘all the savings of twenty years taken from me in a

moment; and my poor boy, when he comes home from sea——’ She could say no

more: grief choked her utterance.

‘Good God!’ said Mr. Fax, ‘did you lay by your savings in country

paper?’

‘O sir!’ said the poor woman, ‘how was I to know that one piece of paper

was not as good as another? And everybody said that the firm of

Smokeshadow, Airbubble, Hopthetwig, and Company was as good as the Bank

of England.’ She then unfolded one of the _promises to pay_, and fell to

weeping more bitterly than ever. Mr. Forester comforted her as well as

he could; but he found the purchasing of one or two of her notes much

more efficacious than all the lessons of his philosophy.

‘This is all your fault,’ said a fisherman to his wife; ‘you would be

hoarding and hoarding, and stinting me of my drop of comfort when I came

in after a hard day’s work, tossed and beaten, and wet through with salt

water, and there’s what we’ve got by it.’

‘It was all your fault,’ retorted the wife; ‘when we had scraped

together twenty as pretty golden guineas as ever laid in a chest, you

would sell ’em, so you would, for twenty-seven pounds of Mr.

Smokeshadow’s paper; _and now you see the difference_.’

‘Here is an illustration,’ said Mr. Fax to Mr. Forester, ‘of the old

maxim of _experience teaching wisdom_, or, as Homer expresses it, ῥεχθεν

δε τε νηπιος ἐγνω.’

‘_We ought now to be convinced, if not before_,’ said Mr. Forester,

‘_that what Plato has said is strictly true, that there will be no end

of human misery till governors become philosophers or philosophers

governors_; and that all the evils which this country suffers, and, I

fear, will suffer to a much greater extent, from the bursting of this

fatal bubble of paper-money—this chimerical symbol of imaginary

riches—_are owing to the want of philosophy and true political wisdom in

our rulers, by which they might have seen things in their causes, not

felt them only in their effects, as even the most vulgar man does: and

by which foresight, all the mischiefs that are befalling us might have

been prevented_.’[77]

‘Very hard,’ said an old soldier, ‘very, very hard:—a poor five pounds,

laid up for a rainy day,—hardly got, and closely kept—very, very hard.’

‘Poor man!’ said Mr. Forester, who was interested in the soldier’s

physiognomy, ‘let me repair your loss. Here is better paper for you; but

get gold and silver for it as soon as you can.’

‘God bless your honour,’ said the soldier, ‘and send as much power as

goodwill to all such generous souls. Many is the worthy heart that this

day’s work will break, and here is more damage than one man can mend.

God bless your honour.’

A respectable-looking female approached the crowd, and addressing

herself to Mr. Fax, who seemed most at leisure to her, asked him what

chance there seemed to be for the creditors of Messieurs Smokeshadow,

Airbubble, Hopthetwig, and Company. ‘By what I can gather from the

people around me,’ said Mr. Fax, ‘none whatever.’ The lady was in great

distress at this intelligence, and said they were her bankers, and it

was the second misfortune of the kind that had happened to her. Mr. Fax

expressed his astonishment that she should have been twice the victim of

the system of paper-coinage, which seemed to contradict the old adage

about a burnt child; and said it was for his part astonishing to him how

any human being could be so deluded after the perils of the system had

been so clearly pointed out, and amongst other things, in a pamphlet of

his own on the Insubstantiality of Smoke. ‘Indeed,’ she said, ‘she had

something better to do than to trouble herself about politics, and

wondered he should insult her in her distress by talking of such stuff

to her.’

‘Was ever such infatuation?’ said Mr. Fax, as the lady turned away.

‘This is one of those persons who choose to walk blindfold on the edge

of a precipice, because it is too much trouble to see, and quarrel with

their best friends for requesting them to make use of their eyes. There

are many such, who think they have no business with politics; but they

find to their cost that politics will have business with them.’

‘A curse light on all kite-flyers!’ vociferated a sturdy farmer. ‘Od

rabbit me, here be a bundle o’ trash, measters! not worth a

voive-and-zixpenny dollar all together. This comes o’ peaper-mills. “I

promise to pay,” ecod! O the good old days o’ goulden guineas, when I

used to ride whoame vrom market wi’ a great heavy bag in my pocket; and

when I whopped it down on the old oak teable, it used to make zuch a

zound as did one’s heart good to hear it. No _promise to pay_ then. Now

a man may eat his whole vortin in a zandwich, or zet vire to it in a

vardin rushlight. Promise to pay!—the lying rascals, they never meant to

pay: they knew all the while they had no effects to pay; but zuch a

pretty, zmooth-spoken, palavering zet o’ fellers! why, Lord bless you!

they’d ha’ made you believe black was white! and though you could never

get anything of ’em but one o’ their own dirty bits o’ peaper in change

vor another, they made it out as clear as daylight that they were as

rich as zo many Jews. Ecod! and we were all vools enough to believe ’em,

and now mark the end o’t.’

‘Yes, father,’ said a young fop at his elbow, ‘all blown, curse me!’

‘Ees,’ said the farmer, ‘and thee beest blown, and thee mun zell thy

hunter, and turn to the plough-tail; and thy zisters mun churn butter,

and milk the cows, instead of jingling penny-vorties, and dancing at

race-balls wi’ squires. We mun be old English varmers again, and none o’

your voine high-flying promise-to-pay gentlevolks. There they be—spell

’em: _I promise to pay to Mr. Gregory Gas, or bearer, on demand, the zum

o’ voive pounds. Gullgudgeon Bank, April the virst. Vor Zmokeshadow,

Airbubble, Zelf, and Company, Henry Hopthetwig. Entered, William

Walkoff._ And there be their coat o’ arms: two blacksmiths blowing a

vorge, wi’ the chimney vor a crest, and a wreath o’ smoke coming out

o’t; and the motto, ‘YOU CAN’T CATCH A BOWLFUL.’ Od rabbit me! here be a

whole handvul of ’em, and I’ll zell ’em all vor a voive-and-zixpenny

dollar.’

The ‘Jacobin rascal,’ of whom the reverend gentleman had spoken,

happened to be at the farmer’s elbow. ‘I told you how it would be,’ said

he, ‘Master Sheepshead, many years ago; and I remember you wanted to put

me in the stocks for my trouble.’

‘Why, I believe I did, Mr. Lookout,’ said the farmer, with a very

penitent face; ‘but if you’ll call on me zome day we’ll drown old

grudges in a jug o’ ale, and light our poipes wi’ the promises o’

Measter Hopthetwig and his gang.’

‘Not with all of them I entreat you,’ said Mr. Lookout. ‘I hope you will

have one of them framed and glazed, and suspended over your chimney, as

a warning to your children, and your children’s children for ever,

against “_the blessed comforts of paper-money_.”’

‘Why, Lord love you, Measter Lookout,’ said the farmer, ‘we shall ha’

nothing but peaper-money still, you zee, only vrom another mill like.’

‘As to that, Master Sheepshead,’ replied Mr. Lookout, ‘I will only say

to you in your own phrase, MARK THE END O’T.’

‘Do you hear him?’ said the Rev. Mr. Peppertoast; ‘do you hear the

Jacobin rascal? Do you hear the libellous, seditious, factious,

levelling, revolutionary, republican, democratical, atheistical

villain?’

CHAPTER XXXI

CIMMERIAN LODGE

After a walk of some miles from the town of Gullgudgeon, where no

information was to be obtained of Anthelia, their path wound along

the shores of a lonely lake, embosomed in dark pine-groves and

precipitous rocks. As they passed near a small creek, they

observed a gentleman just stepping into a boat, who paused and

looked up at the sound of their approximation; and Mr. Fax

immediately recognised the poeticopolitical, rhapsodicoprosaical,

deisidaemoniacoparadoxographical, pseudolatreiological,

transcendental meteorosophist, Moley Mystic, Esquire, of Cimmerian

Lodge. This gentleman’s Christian name, according to his own

account, was improperly spelt with an _e_, and was in truth

nothing more nor less than

That Moly,

Which Hermes erst to wise Ulysses gave;

and which was, in the mind of Homer, _a pure anticipated cognition_ of

the system of Kantian metaphysics, or grand transcendental science of

the _luminous obscure_; for it had a _dark root_,[78] which was mystery;

and _a white flower_, which was abstract truth: _it was called Moly by

the gods_, who then kept it to themselves; and was _difficult to be dug

up by mortal men_, having, in fact, lain _perdu_ in subterranean

darkness till the immortal Kant dug for it _under the stone of doubt_,

and produced it to the astonished world as the _root of human science_.

Other persons, however, derived his first name differently; and

maintained that the _e_ in it showed it very clearly to be a corruption

of _Mole-eye_, it being the opinion of some naturalists that the _mole_

has _eyes_, which it can withdraw or project at pleasure, implying a

faculty of wilful blindness, most happily characteristic of a

transcendental metaphysician; since, according to the old proverb, _None

are so blind as those who won’t see_. But be that as it may, Moley

Mystic was his name, and Cimmerian Lodge was his dwelling.

Mr. Mystic invited Mr. Fax and his friends to step with him into the

boat, and cross over his lake, which he called the _Ocean of Deceitful

Form_, to the _Island of Pure Intelligence_, on which Cimmerian Lodge

was situated: promising to give them a great treat in looking over his

grounds, which he had laid out according to the _topography of the human

mind_; and to enlighten them, through the medium of ‘darkness visible,’

with an opticothaumaturgical process of transcendentalising a

_cylindrical mirror_, which should teach them the difference between

_objective_ and _subjective reality_.[79] Mr. Forester was unwilling to

remit his search, even for a few hours; but Mr. Fax observing that great

part of the day was gone, and that Cimmerian Lodge was very remote from

the human world; so that if they did not avail themselves of Mr.

Mystic’s hospitality, they should probably be reduced to the necessity

of passing the night among the rocks, _sub Jove frigido_, which he did

not think very inviting, Mr. Forester complied; and with Mr. Fax and Sir

Oran Haut-ton stepped into the boat. The reader who is deficient in

_taste for the bombast_, and is no _admirer of the obscure_, may as well

wait on the shore till they return. But we must not enter the regions of

mystery without an Orphic invocation.

ὙΠΝΕ ἀναξ, καλεω δε μολειν κεχαρηοτα ΜΥΣΤΑΙΣ·

και δε, μακαρ, λιτομαι, Tανυδιπτερε, οὐλε ὈΝΕΙΡΕ·

και ΝΕΦΕΛΑΣ καλεω, δροσοειμονας, ἠεροπλαγκτους·

ΝΥΚΤΑ τε πρεσβιστην, πολυηρατον ὈΡΓΙΟΦΑΝΤΑΙΣ,

ΝΥΚΤΕΡΙΟΥΣ τε ΘΕΟΥΣ, ὑπο κευθεδιν οἰκι έχοντας,

ἀντρῳ ἐν ἠεροεντι, παρα ΣΤΥΓΟΣ ἱερον ὑδωρ·

ΠΡΩΤΕΙ συν πολυβουλῳ, ὁν ὈΛΒΟΔΟΤΗΝ[80] καλεουσιν.

Ο sovereign Sleep! in whose papaverous glen

Dwell the dark Muses of Cimmerian men!

O Power of Dreams! whose dusky pinions shed

Primaeval chaos on the slumberer’s head!

Ye misty Clouds! amid whose folds sublime

Blind Faith invokes the Ghost of Feudal Time!

And thou, thick night! beneath whose mantle rove

The Phantom Powers of Subterranean Jove!

Arise, propitious to the mystic strain,

From Lethe’s flood, and Zeal’s Tartarian fane;

Where Freedom’s Shade, ‘mid Stygian vapours damp,

Sits, cold and pale, by Truth’s extinguished lamp;

While Cowls and Crowns portentous orgies hold,

And tuneful Proteus seals his eyes with gold!

They had scarcely left the shore when they were involved in a fog of

unprecedented density, so that they could not see one another; but they

heard the dash of Mr. Mystic’s oars, and were consoled by his assurances

that he could not miss his way in a state of the atmosphere so

consentaneous to his peculiar mode of vision; for that, though, in

navigating his little skiff on the _Ocean of Deceitful Form_, he had

very often wandered wide and far from the _Island of Pure Intelligence_,

yet this had always happened when he went with his eyes open, in broad

daylight; but that he had soon found the means of obviating this little

inconvenience, by always keeping his eyes close shut whenever the sun

had the impertinence to shine upon him.

He immediately added that he would take the opportunity of making a

remark perfectly in point: ‘that Experience was a Cyclops, with his eye

in the back of his head’; and when Mr. Fax remarked that he did not see

the connection, Mr. Mystic said he was very glad to hear it; for he

should be sorry if any one but himself could see the connection of his

ideas, as he arranged his thoughts _on a new principle_.

They went steadily on through the dense and heavy air, over waters that

slumbered like the Stygian pool; a chorus of frogs, that seemed as much

delighted with their own melody as if they had been an oligarchy of

poetical critics, regaling them all the way with the Aristophanic

symphony of BREK-EK-EK-EX! KO-AX! KO-AX![81] till the boat fixed its

keel in the _Island of Pure Intelligence_; and Mr. Mystic landed his

party, as Charon did Aeneas and the Sibyl, in a bed of weeds and

mud:[82] after floundering in which for some time, from losing their

guide in the fog, they were cheered by the sound of his voice from

above, and scrambling up the bank, found themselves on a hard and barren

rock; and, still following the sound of Mr. Mystic’s voice, arrived at

Cimmerian Lodge.

The fog had penetrated into all the apartments: there was fog in the

hall, fog in the parlour, fog on the staircases, fog in the bedrooms;

The fog was here, the fog was there,

The fog was all around.

It was a little rarefied in the kitchen, by virtue of the enormous fire;

so far, at least, that the red face of the cook shone through it, as

they passed the kitchen door, like the disk of the rising moon through

the vapours of an autumnal river: but to make amends for this, it was

condensed almost into solidity in the library, where the voice of their

invisible guide bade them welcome to the _adytum_ of the LUMINOUS

OBSCURE.

Mr. Mystic now produced what he called his _synthetical torch_, and

requested them to follow him, and look over his grounds. Mr. Fax said it

was perfectly useless to attempt it in such a state of the atmosphere;

but Mr. Mystic protested that it was the only state of the atmosphere in

which they could be seen to advantage; as daylight and sunshine utterly

destroyed their beauty.