RICH/IRDS^HNETrUD^ 
 
 LONDON. AD.CCCXa.
 
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 University of Illinois Library 
 
 NOV 2 9 
 
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 Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
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 http://www.archive.org/details/melincourt01peac
 
 MELINCOURT 
 
 SIR ORAN HAUT-TON

 
 (oiTeo vB>^ 
 
 RICtt/lRDSTiRNCTr. LID, 
 ;iND PVBLIJHeD^^ 
 <sJ.nD€NT §^C^, /IT hmHi 
 
 LONDON. ADC C ex C.l»
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chap. 
 
 Introduction 
 
 Page 
 
 7 
 
 Preface .... 
 
 II 
 
 I. Anthelia .... 
 
 14 
 
 II. Fashionable Arrivals 
 
 22 
 
 III. Hypocon House 
 
 32 
 
 IV. Redrose Abbey 
 
 37 
 
 V. Sugar .... 
 
 45 
 
 VI. Sir Oran Haut-ton 
 
 54 
 
 VII. The Principle of Population . 
 
 . 73 
 
 VIII. The Spirit of Chivalry . 
 
 . 79 
 
 IX. The Philosophy of Ballads 
 
 . 86 
 
 X. The Torrent 
 
 96 
 
 XI. Love and Marriage 
 
 IDS 
 
 XII. Love and Poverty 
 
 114 
 
 XIII. Desmond . . . , , 
 
 120 
 
 XIV. The CorrAGB , . , , 
 
 137
 
 Contents. 
 
 Chap. 
 
 Page 
 
 XV. The Library 
 
 . 147 
 
 XVI. The Symposium . 
 
 . 156 
 
 XVII. Music and Discord 
 
 . 169 
 
 XVIII. The Stratagem . 
 
 . 176 
 
 XIX. The Excursion . 
 
 . 182 
 
 XX. The Sea-shore 
 
 . 195
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 
 lOME one told Byron that a friend of 
 Shelley's had written a novel about his 
 bear. This intelligence pleased the poet, 
 but disgusted the novelist, who wrote, " When I 
 condensed Lord Monboddo's views of the humanity 
 of the Ouran Outang into the character of Sir Oran 
 Haut-ton, I thought neither of Lord Byron's bear 
 nor of Caligula's horse." The views in question are 
 contained, with much else, in Monboddo's works 
 on the "Origin and Progress of Language" and 
 " Antient Metaphysics," consisting of twelve 
 volumes, and are judiciously condensed by the 
 writer in the Dictionary of Natural Biography as 
 follows, " He maintained that the Ourang Outang 
 was a class of the human species, and that its want 
 of speech was merely accidental." The biographer 
 adds, "Many of his views appear less eccentric to 
 us than they did to his contemporaries." They do 
 indeed. After being the subject of derision for 
 nearly a century, Monboddo is now considered to 
 have been as much in advance of his age as the
 
 8 Introduction. 
 
 monkey who wore his tail off him was of the 
 monkey who wore his tail on him. He had won 
 Peacock's heart by his enthusiasm for ancient 
 Greece, and it is probable that much of the social 
 philosophy of '' Melincourt" is derived from one of 
 the most honourable traits in his character. " He 
 would not either raise the rents or eject a poor 
 tenant, but boasted that his lands were more 
 numerously peopled than any portion of equal 
 extent in the neighbourhood." 
 
 Shelley informed Peacock that " Melincourt " 
 was greatly admired and esteemed in Pisa, and 
 preferred to his other writings. The poet's licence 
 quidlibet audendi was carried far by Shelley, and 
 we are probably to understand that not the entire 
 reading population of Pisa was denoted, but only 
 the Gisbornes. Vox populi or not, the Pisan 
 verdict surely erred. Shelley rightly recognised 
 in " Melincourt " more of the true spirit, and an 
 object less indefinite than in " Headlong Hall " 
 or " Nightmare Abbey," but this is a subordinate 
 point. The book might have counted among its 
 author's best if planned on a more restricted scale. 
 The conception of Sir Oran Haut-ton is in itself 
 excellent, and would have been an admirable 
 foundation for a short story. But it does not 
 admit of extensive development ; we have soon 
 extracted all that is to be had from it : and, whim- 
 sically enough, though Sir Oran is speechless, 
 he is the only character that enlivens the book. 
 The Faxes, Portpipes, and other personages who
 
 Introduction. g 
 
 occupy the scene in his absence, are far below 
 Peacock's usual level, and the attacks on Coleridge 
 and Canning excite compassion for the assailant, 
 rather than amusement at the expense of the 
 assailed. Some scenes, such as the catastrophe of 
 the bubble bank, are certainly very happy : and the 
 novel possesses one incontestible merit in the 
 eloquence of much of the dialogue. The occur- 
 rence of such set orations in ordinary conversation, 
 and the superhuman patience of listeners, often 
 toto coilo dissentient from the speaker, violate 
 indeed nature and probability; but the vigour, 
 elegance, and impressiveness of the language are 
 beyond praise. Nor, great as is Peacock's merit 
 as a descriptive writer, will more beautiful pass- 
 ages be found in his writings than the description 
 of Anthelia's woodland walk in a mountainous 
 country, whether as regards truth to nature, or 
 the spiritual suggestiveness of the landscape. 
 
 " Melincourt " was translated into French shortly 
 after its appearance. A most amusing, and fortu- 
 nately a much shorter story, by Wilhelm Hauff, is 
 founded upon the same idea of the introduction of 
 an Ourang-Outang into polite society. It was 
 published about ten years later. Whether the 
 writer derived his inspiration from *' Melincourt " 
 is not known. It is entitled " The Young English- 
 man," and satirises the disposition of young 
 Germans, after the general peace, to copy the bad 
 rather than the good examples of the English who 
 resorted to the Continent. A "Young English-
 
 10 Introduction. 
 
 man" is introduced into the society of a small 
 German town, and is aped by it most dutifully 
 until he is discovered to be an ape himself, and is 
 dismissed to the Zoological Gardens.
 
 Melincourt 
 
 OR 
 
 SIR ORAN HAUT-TON. 
 
 VOCEM COMCEDIA TOLLIT* 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 TO THE EDITION PUBLISHED IN 1856,! 
 
 ELINCOURT" was first published 
 thirty-nine years ago. Many changes 
 have since occurred, social, mechani- 
 cal, and pohtical. The boroughs of Onevote and 
 Threevotes have been extinguished ; but there re- 
 main boroughs of Fewvotes,J in which Sir Oran 
 Haut-ton might still find a free and enlightened 
 constituency. Beards disfigure the face, and 
 
 * The following is the motto of the title-page of the first 
 edition: — "Nous nous moquons des Paladins ! quand ces 
 maximes romanesque commencerent a devenir ridicules, ce 
 changement fut moins I'ouvrage de la raison que celui des 
 mauvaises moeurs." — Rousseau. 
 
 t Written in 181 7.— Published in 1818. 
 
 J They are gone too.—- G.
 
 12 Preface to Edition published zji 1856. 
 
 tobacco poisons the air, in a degree not then 
 imagined. A boy, with a cigar in his mouth, was 
 a phenomenon yet unborn. Multitudinous bubbles 
 have been blown and have burst : sometimes pro- 
 strating dupes and impostors together ; sometimes 
 leaving a colossal jobber upright in his triumphal 
 chariot, which has crushed as many victims as the 
 car of Juggernaut. Political mountebanks have 
 founded profitable investments on public gulUbiHty. 
 British colonists have been compelled to eman- 
 cipate their slaves; and foreign slave labour, 
 under the pretext of free trade, has been brought 
 to bear against them by the friends of liberty. 
 The Court is more moral : therefore, the public is 
 more moral; more decorous, at least, in external 
 semblance, wherever the homage, which Hypocrisy 
 pays to Virtue,"* can yield any profit to the pro- 
 fessor : but always ready for the same reaction, 
 with which the profligacy of the Restoration 
 rolled, like a spring-tide, over the Puritanism of 
 the Commonwealth. The progress of intellect, 
 with all deference to those who believe in it, is not 
 quite so obvious as the progress of mechanics. 
 The "reading public" has increased its capacity 
 of swallow, in a proportion far exceeding that of 
 its digestion. Thirty-nine years ago, steam-boats 
 were just coming into action, and the railway 
 locomotive was not even thought of. Now every- 
 
 * This seems a slip of the pen. Hypocrisy does not pay 
 homage to Virtue, but is itself the homage paid to Virtue 
 by Vice.— G.
 
 Preface to Edition published in 1856. 13 
 
 body goes everywhere : going for the sake of 
 going, and rejoicing in the rapidity with which 
 they accomplish nothing. On va, mais on 7ie 
 voyage pas. Strenuous idleness drives us on the 
 wings of steam in boats and trains, seeking the 
 art of enjoying life, which, after all, is in the regula- 
 tion of the mind, and not in the whisking about of 
 the body."^ Of the disputants whose opinions and 
 public characters (for I never trespassed on private 
 life) were shadowed in some of the persons of the 
 story, almost all have passed from the diurnal 
 scene. Many of the questions, discussed in the 
 dialogues, have more of general than of temporary 
 application, and have still their advocates on both 
 sides : and new questions have arisen, which 
 furnish abundant argument for similar conversa- 
 tions, and of which I may yet, perhaps, avail 
 myself on some future occasion. 
 
 The Author of *^ Headlong Hall." 
 
 March ^ 1856. 
 
 Hor. Epist. I. ii. 27—30.
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ANTHELIA. 
 
 NTHELIA MELINCOURT, at the age of 
 
 'iW\\^ twenty-one, was mistress of herself and 
 '^^ of ten thousand a year, and of a very 
 ancient and venerable castle in one of the wildest 
 valleys in Westmoreland. It follows of course, 
 without reference to her personal qualifications, 
 that she had a very numerous list of admirers, and 
 equally of course that there were both Irishmen 
 and clergymen among them. The young lady 
 nevertheless possessed sufficient attractions to 
 kindle the flames of disinterested passion; and 
 accordingly we shall venture to suppose, that there 
 was at least one in the number of her sighing 
 swains with whom her rent-roll and her old castle 
 were secondary considerations ; and if the candid 
 reader should esteem this supposition too violent 
 for the probabilities of daily experience in this 
 calculating age, he will at least concede it to that 
 degree of poetical licence which is invariably ac- 
 corded to a tale founded on facts. 
 
 Melincourt Castle had been a place of consider- 
 
 y
 
 Anthelia. 15 
 
 able strength in those golden days of feudal and 
 royal prerogative, when no man was safe in his 
 own house unless he adopted every possible pre- 
 caution for shutting out all his neighbours. It is, 
 therefore, not surprising, that a rock, of which 
 three sides were perpendicular, and which was 
 only accessible on the fourth by a narrow ledge, 
 forming a natural bridge over a tremendous chasm, 
 was considered a very enviable situation for a 
 gentleman to build on. An impetuous torrent 
 boiled through the depth of the chasm, and after 
 eddying round the base of the castle-rock, which 
 it almost insulated, disappeared in the obscurity 
 of a woody glen, whose mysterious recesses, by 
 popular superstition formerly consecrated to the 
 devil, are now fearlessly explored by the solitary 
 angler, or laid open to view by the more profane 
 hand of the picturesque tourist, who contrives, by 
 the magic of his pencil, to transport their romantic 
 terrors from the depths of mountain-solitude to the 
 gay and crowded, though not very wholesome, 
 atmosphere of a metropolitan exhibition. 
 
 The narrow ledge, which formed the only natural 
 access to the castle-rock, had been guarded by 
 every impediment which the genius of fortification 
 could oppose to the progress of the hungry Scot, 
 who might be disposed, in his neighbourly way, to 
 drop in without invitation and carouse at the 
 expense of the owner, rewarding him, as usual, 
 for his extorted hospitality, by cutting his throat 
 and setting fire to his house. A drawbridge over
 
 i6 Melincourt, 
 
 the chasm, backed by a double portcullis, presented 
 the only mode of admission. In this secure 
 retreat thus strongly guarded both by nature and 
 art, and always plentifully victualled for a siege, 
 lived the lords of Melincourt in all the luxury of 
 rural seclusion, throwing open their gates on 
 occasional halcyon days to regale all the peasants 
 and mountaineers of the vicinity with roasted 
 oxen and vats of October. 
 
 When these times of danger and turbulence had 
 passed, Melincourt Castle was not, as most of its 
 brother edifices were, utterly deserted. The 
 drawbridge, indeed, became gradually divorced 
 from its chains; the double portculhs disappeared; 
 the turrets and battlements were abandoned to the 
 owl and the ivy; and a very spacious wing was 
 left free to the settlement of a colony of ghosts, 
 which, according to the report of the peasantry 
 and the domestics, very soon took possession, and 
 retained it most pertinaciously, notwithstanding 
 the pious incantations of the neighbouring vicar, 
 the Reverend Mr Portpipe, who often passed the 
 night in one of the dreaded apartments over a 
 blazing fire with the same invariable exorcising 
 apparatus of a large venison pasty, a little Prayer- 
 book, and three bottles of Madeira: for the 
 reverend gentleman sagaciously observed, that as 
 he had always found the latter an infallible charm 
 against blue devils, he had no doubt of its proving 
 equally efficacious against black, white, and gray. 
 In this opinion experience seemed to confirm him ;
 
 Anthelia. \J 
 
 for though he always maintained a becoming 
 silence as to the mysteries of which he was a 
 witness during his spectral vigils, yet a very correct 
 inference might be drawn from the fact, that he 
 was always found in the morning comfortably 
 asleep in his large arm-chair, with the dish scraped 
 clean, the three bottles empty, and the Prayer- 
 book clasped and folded precisely in the same 
 state and place in which it had lain the preceding 
 night. 
 
 But the larger and more commodious part of 
 the castle continued still to be inhabited; and 
 while one half of the edifice was fast improving 
 into a picturesque ruin, the other was as rapidly 
 degenerating, in its interior at least, into a com- 
 fortable modern dwelling. 
 
 In this romantic seclusion Anthelia was born. 
 Her mother died in giving her birth. Her father. 
 Sir Henry Melincourt, a man of great acquire- 
 ments, and of a retired disposition, devoted himself 
 in sohtude to the cultivation of his daughter's 
 understanding j for he was one of those who main- 
 tained the heretical notion that women are, or 
 at least may be, rational beings; though, from 
 the great pains usually taken in what is called 
 education to make them otherwise, there are 
 unfortunately very few examples to warrant the 
 truth of the theory. 
 
 The majestic forms and wild energies of Nature 
 that surrounded her from her infancy, impressed 
 their character on her mind, communicating to it 
 
 I. B
 
 1 8 Melincourt 
 
 all their own wildness, and more than their own 
 beauty. Far removed from the pageantry of courts 
 and cities, her infant attention was awakened to 
 spectacles more interesting and more impressive : 
 the misty mountain-top, the ash-fringed precipice, 
 tlie gleaming cataract, the deep and shadowy glen, 
 and the fantastic magnificence of the mountain 
 clouds. The murmur of the woods, the rush of 
 the winds, and the tumultuous dashing of the 
 torrents, were the first music of her childhood. A 
 fearless wanderer among these romantic solitudes, 
 the spirit of mountain liberty diffused itself through 
 the whole tenor of her feelings, modelled the 
 symmetry of her form, and illumined the expressive 
 but feminine brilliancy of her features : and when 
 she had attained the age at which the mind ex- 
 pands itself to the fascinations of poetry, the muses 
 of Italy* became the chosen companions of her 
 wanderings, and nourished a naturally susceptible 
 imagination by conjuring up the splendid visions 
 of chivalry and enchantment in scenes so congenial 
 to their development. 
 
 It was seldom that the presence of a visitor dis- 
 pelled the solitude of Melincourt ; and the few 
 specimens of the living world with whom its inmates 
 held occasional intercourse, were of the usual char- 
 
 * Anthelia has been variously stated to have been an 
 idealisation of Peacock's first love and of the Welsh nymph 
 whom he afterwards married. The combination of mountain 
 liberty with Italian poetry suggests that she was intended to 
 unite the characteristics of both. — G.
 
 AntJielia. 19 
 
 acter of country acquaintance, not calculated to 
 leave behind them any very lively regret, except 
 for the loss of time during the period of their stay. 
 One of these was the Reverend Mr Portpipe, whom 
 we have already celebrated for his proficiency in 
 the art of exorcising goblins by dint of venison and 
 Madeira. His business in the ghost line had, in- 
 deed, declined with the progress of the human 
 understanding, and no part of his vocation was in 
 very high favour with Sir Henry, who, though an 
 unexceptionable moral character, was unhappily not 
 one of the children of grace, in the theological 
 sense of the word : but the vicar, ad optin g St Paul's 
 precept of being all things to all men, found it on 
 this occasion his interest to be liberal ; and ob 
 serving that no man could coerce his opinions, 
 repeated with great complacency the line of 
 Virgil : 
 
 Tros Tyriusque mihi nullo discrimine agetur ; 
 
 though he took especial care that his heterodox 
 concession should not reach the ears of his bishop, 
 who would infallibly have unfrocked him for pro- 
 mulgating a doctrine so subversive of the main 
 pillar of all orthodox establishments. 
 
 When Anthelia had attained her sixteenth year, 
 her father deemed it necessary to introduce her to 
 that human world of which she had hitherto seen 
 so little, and for this purpose took a journey to 
 London, where he was received by the surviving 
 portion of his old acquaintance as a ghost returned
 
 20 Melincourt. 
 
 from Acheron. The impression which the gay 
 scenes of the metropoHs made on the mind of 
 Anthelia — to what illustrious characters she was 
 introduced — ''and all she thought of all she saw," 
 — it would be foreign to our present purpose to 
 detail ; suffice it to say, that from this period Sir 
 Henry regularly passed the winter in London and 
 the summer in Westmoreland, till his daughter 
 attained the age of twenty, about which period he 
 died. 
 
 Anthelia passed twelve months from this time 
 in total seclusion at Melincourt, notwithstanding 
 many pressing invitations from various match-mak- 
 ing dowagers in London, who were solicitous to 
 dispose of her according to their views of her 
 advantage ; in which how far their own was lost 
 sight of, it may not be difficult to determine. 
 
 Among the numerous lovers who had hitherto 
 sighed at her shrine, not one had succeeded in 
 making the slightest impression on her heart ; and 
 during the twelve months of seclusion which 
 elapsed from the death of her father to the com- 
 mencement of this authentic history, they had all 
 completely vanished from the tablet of her memory. 
 Her knowledge of love was altogether theoretical ; 
 and her theory, being formed by the study of 
 Italian poetry in the bosom of mountain solitude, 
 naturally and necessarily pointed to a visionary 
 model of excellence which it was very little likely 
 the modern world could realise. 
 
 The dowagers at length despairing of drawing
 
 Ant he Ha. 21 
 
 her from her retirement, respectively came to 
 various resolutions for the accomplishment of 
 their ends ; some resolving to go in person to 
 Melincourt, and exert all their powers of oratory 
 to mould her to their wishes, and others instigating 
 their sqwqtbX proteges to set boldly forward in search 
 of fortune, and lay siege to the castle and its 
 mistress together.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 FASHIONABLE ARRIVALS. 
 
 ^T was late in the afternoon of an autumnal 
 day, when the elegant post-chariot of the 
 Honourable Mrs^Pinmoney, a lady of 
 high renown in the annals of match-making, turned 
 the corner of a stupendous precipice in the narrow 
 pass which formed the only access to the valley 
 of Melincourt. This honourable lady was accom- 
 panied by her only daughter Miss Danaretta 
 Contantina ; which names, by-the-bye, appear to 
 be female diminutives of the Italian words danaro 
 contante, signifying ready money ^ and genteelly hint- 
 ing to all fashionable Strephons, the only terms on 
 which the conwiodity so denominated would be 
 disposed of, according to the universal practice 
 of this liberal and enlightened generation, in that 
 most commercial of all bargains, marriage. 
 
 The ivied battlements and frowning towers of 
 Melincourt Castle, as they burst at once upon the 
 sight, very much astonished the elder and delighted 
 the younger lady ; for the latter had cultivated a 
 great deal of theoretical romance — in taste, not in
 
 f feeling — an i 
 her to be moj 
 put at all infli 
 
 Fashionable Arrivals. 23 
 
 \ — an important distinction — which enabled 
 most liberally sentimental in words, with- 
 influencing her actions ; to talk of heroic 
 affection and self-sacrificing enthusiasm, without in- 
 curring the least danger of forming a disinterested 
 attachment, or of erring in any way whatever on 
 the score of practical generosity. Indeed, in all 
 respects of practice the young lady was the true 
 counterpart of her mother, though they sometimes 
 differed a little in the forms of sentiment : thus, 
 for instance, when any of their dear friends 
 happened to go, as it is called, down hill in the 
 world, the old lady was generally very severe on 
 their iitiprudence^ and the young lady very pathetic 
 on their 7nisfortune : but as to holding any further 
 intercourse with, or rendering any species of assist- 
 ance to, any dear friend so circumstanced, neither 
 the one nor the other was ever suspected of con- 
 duct so very unfashionable. In the main point, 
 therefore, of both their lives, that of making a good 
 match for Miss Danaretta, their views perfectly 
 coincided ; and though Miss Danaretta, in her 
 speculative conversations on this subject, among 
 her female acquaintance, talked as young ladies 
 always talk, and laid down very precisely the only 
 ki7id of man she would ever think of marrying^ en- 
 dowing him, of course, with all the virtues in our 
 good friend Hookham's Library ; yet it was very 
 well understood, as it usually is on similar occa- 
 sions, that no other proof of the possession of the 
 aforesaid virtues would be required from any in-
 
 24 Melincourt. 
 
 dividual, who might present himself in the char- 
 acter of Corydon sospiroso, than a satisfactory 
 certificate from the old lady in Threadneedle 
 Street, that the bearer was a good^^jnan^ and could 
 be proved so in the Alley, 
 
 Such were the amiable specimens of worldly 
 wisdom and affected romance, that prepared to 
 invade the retirement of the mountain-enthusiast, 
 the really romantic unworldly Anthelia. 
 
 " What a strange-looking old place ! " said Mrs 
 Pinmoney : " it seems like anything but the dwell- 
 ing of a young heiress. I am afraid the rascally 
 postboys have joined in a plot against us, and 
 intend to deliver us to a gang of thieves ! " 
 
 " Banditti, you should say, mamma," said Miss 
 Danaretta : ^' thieves is an odious word." 
 
 "Pooh, child!" said Mrs Pinmoney. "The 
 reality is odious enough, let the word be what it 
 will. Is not a rogue a rogue, call him by what 
 
 rame you may ? " 
 "Oh, certainly not," said Miss Danaretta; "for 
 in that case a poor rogue without a title, would not 
 be more a rogue than a rich rogue with one ; but 
 
 Lthat he is so in a most infinite proportion, the 
 whole experience of the world demonstrates." 
 ' " True," said the old lady ; " and as our 
 reverend friend Dr Bosky observes, to maintain the 
 contrary would be to sanction a principle utterly 
 subversive of all social order and aristocratical 
 privilege." 
 The carriage now rolled over the narrow ledge
 
 Fashionable Arrivals. 25 
 
 which connected the site of the castle with the 
 neighbouring rocks. A furious peal at the outer 
 bell brought forth_a venerable porter, who opened 
 the gates with becoming gravity, and the carriage 
 entered a spacious court, of much more recent 
 architecture than the exterior of the castle, and 
 built in a style of modern Gothic, that seemed to 
 form a happy medium between the days of 
 feudality, commonly called the dark ages, and the ■^^^^.. , 
 nineteenth century, commonly called the en- / *^^ 
 lightened age : why I could never discover. ~ ' 
 
 The inner gates were opened by another grave 
 and venerable domestic, who with all the im- .' j/^ 
 perturbable decorum and formality of the old 
 school, assisted the ladies to alight, and ushered '^• 
 
 them along an elegant colonnade into the library, 
 which we shall describe no further than by saying,-, 
 that the apartment was Gothic, and the furniture 
 Grecian : whether this be an unpardonable in- 
 congruity calculated to disarrange all legitimate 
 associations, or a judicious combination of so- 
 lemnity and elegance, most happily adapted to 
 the purposes of study, we must leave to the deci- 
 sion, or rather discussion, of picturesque and 
 antiquarian disputants. 
 
 The windows, which were of stained glass, were 
 partly open to a shrubbery, which admitting the 
 meditative mind into the recesses of nature, and 
 excluding all view of distant scenes, heightened the 
 deep seclusion and repose of the apartment. It 
 consisted principally of evergreens ; but the parting
 
 -^■■?? 
 
 26 Melincourt. 
 
 beauty of the last flowers of autumn, and the 
 lighter and now fading tints of a few deciduous 
 shrubs, mingled with the imperishable verdure of 
 1 the cedar and the laurel. 
 
 The old domestic went in search of his young 
 mistress, and the ladies threw themselves on a 
 sofa in graceful attitudes. They were shortly 
 joined by Anthelia, who welcomed them to 
 Melincourt with all the politeness which the 
 necessity of the case imposed. 
 
 The change of dress, the dinner, the dessert, 
 seasoned with the newest news of the fashionable 
 world, which the visitors thought must be of all 
 things the most delightful to the mountain recluse, 
 filled up a portion of the evening. When they 
 returned from the dining-room to the library, the 
 windows were closed, the curtains drawn, and the 
 tea and coffee urns bubbling on the table, and 
 sending up ^their steamy columns : an old fashion 
 to be sure, and sufficiently rustic, for which we 
 apologise in due form to the reader, who prefers 
 his tea and coffee brought in cool by the butler in 
 little cups on a silver salver, and handed round to 
 the simpering company till it is as cold as an 
 Iceland spring. There is no disputing about taste, 
 and the taste of Melincourt Castle on this subject 
 
 ihad been always very poetically unfashionable ; for 
 the tea would have satisfied Johnson, and the 
 coffee enchanted Voltaire. 
 
 " I must confess, my dear," said the Honour- 
 able Mrs Pinmoney, "there is a great deal of
 
 Fashio7iable Arrivals. 27 
 
 comfort in your way of living, that is, there would 
 be, in good company ; but you are so solitary 
 
 " Here is the best of company," said Anthelia, 
 smiling, and pointing to the shelves of the 
 library. 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Pinitioney. — Very true : books 
 are very good things in their way ; but an hour or 
 two at most is quite enough of them for me : more 
 can serve no purpose but to muddle one's head. 
 If I were to live such a life for a week as you have 
 done for the last twelve months, I should have 
 more company than I like, in the shape of a whole 
 legion of blue devils. 
 
 Aliss Danaretta. — Nay, I think there is some- 
 thing delightfully romantic in Anthelia's mode of 
 life ; but I confess I should like now and then, 
 peeping through the ivy of the battlements, to 
 observe a preux chevalier exerting all his eloquence 
 to persuade the inflexible porter to open the castle 
 gates, and allow him one opportunity of throwing 
 himself at the feet of the divine lady of the castle, 
 for whom he had been seven years dying a linger- 
 ing death. 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Finmoney. — And growing fatter 
 all the while. — Heaven defend me from such 
 hypocritical fops ! Seven years indeed ! It did 
 not take as many weeks to bring me and poor dear 
 dead Mr Pinmoney together. 
 
 Afiihelia. — I should have been afraid that so 
 short an acquaintance would scarcely have been
 
 28 MelincoiirL 
 
 sufficient to acquire that mutual knowledge of each 
 other's ta^s,_ feelings, and character, which I 
 should think the only sure basis of matrimonial 
 happiness. 
 
 ''^The Hon. Mrs Finmoney. — Tastes, feelings, and 
 character ! Why, my love, you really do seem to 
 believe yourself in the age of chivalry, when those 
 words certainly signified very essential differences. 
 But now the matter is, very happily, simplified. 
 Tastes : — they depend on the fashion. There is 
 always a fashionable taste : a taste for driving the 
 mail — a taste for acting Hamlet — a taste for 
 philosophical lectures — a taste for the marvellous 
 — a taste for the simple — a taste for the brilliant — 
 a taste for the sombre — a taste for the tender — a 
 taste for the grim — a taste for banditti — a taste for 
 ghosts — a taste for the devil — a taste for French 
 dancers and Italian singers, and German whiskers 
 and tragedies — a taste for enjoying the country in 
 November, and wintering in London till the end 
 of the dog-days— a taste for making shoes — a taste 
 for picturesque tours — a taste for taste itself, or for 
 essays on taste : — but no gentleman would be so 
 rash as have a taste of his own, or his last winter's 
 taste, or any taste, my love, but the fashionable 
 taste. Poor dear Mr Pinmoney was reckoned a 
 man of exquisite taste among all his acquaintance ; 
 for the new taste, let it be what it would, always 
 fitted him as well as his new coat, and he was the 
 very pink and mirror of fashion, as much in the 
 one as the other. — So much for tastes, my dear.
 
 Fashionable Arrivals. 29 
 
 Anthelia. — I am afraid I shall always be a very 
 unfashionable creature ; for I do not think I should 
 have sympathised with any one of the tastes you 
 have just enumerated. 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Pinmoney. — You are so contu- 
 macious, such a romantic heretic from the ortho- 
 dox supremacy of fashion. Now, as for feelings, 
 my dear, you know there are no such things in the 
 fashionable world ; therefore that difficulty vanishes 
 even more easily than the first. 
 
 Anthelia. — I am sorry for it. ^ n/ 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Pimtioney. — Sorry ! — Feelings J ^< <^ 
 are very troublesome things, and always stand/ ■^t*^,. ^ . 
 in the way of a person's own interests. Then, as ^^^^ 
 
 to character, a gentleman's character is usually in 
 the keeping of his banker, or his agent, or his 
 steward, or his sohcitor; and if they can certify 
 and demonstrate that he has the means of keeping 
 a handsome equipage, and a town and country 
 house, and of giving routs and dinners, and of 
 making a good settlement on the happy object of 
 his choice — what more of any gentleman's char- 
 acter would you desire to know ? 
 
 Anthelia, — A great deal more. I would require 
 him to be free in all his thoughts, true in all his 
 words, generous in all his actions — ardent in 
 friendship, enthusiastic in love, disinterested in 
 both — prompt in the conception, and constant in 
 the execution, of benevolent enterprise — the friend 
 of the friendless, the champion of the feeble, the 
 firm opponent of the powerful oppressor — not to
 
 30 Melincourt. 
 
 be enervated by luxury, nor corrupted by avarice, 
 nor intimidated by tyranny, nor enthralled by 
 superstition — more desirous to distribute wealth 
 than to possess it, to disseminate liberty than to 
 appropriate power, to cheer the heart of sorrow 
 than to dazzle the eyes of folly. 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Pinmoney. — And do you really 
 expect to find such a knight-errant ? The age of 
 chivalry is gone. 
 
 Aiithelia, — It is, but its spirit survives. Disin- 
 terested benevolence, the mainspring of all that 
 is really admirable in the days of chivalry, will 
 never perish for want of some minds calculated 
 to feel its influence, still less for want of a proper 
 field of exertion. To protect the feeble, to raise 
 the fallen — to liberate the captive — to be the per- 
 severing foe of tyrants (whether the great tyrant of 
 an overwhelming empire, the petty tyrant of the 
 fields, or the " little tyrant of a little corporation "),'^ 
 it is not necessary to wind the bugle before en- 
 chanted castles, or to seek adventures in the 
 depths of mountain caverns and forests of pine : 
 there is no scene of human life but presents 
 sufficient scope to energetic generosity : the field 
 of action, though less splendid in its accompani- 
 ments, is not less useful in its results, nor less 
 attractive to a liberal spirit : and I believe it is 
 possible to find as true a knight-errant in a brown 
 coat in the nineteenth century, as in a suit of 
 golden armour in the days of Charlemagne. 
 * Junius.
 
 Fashionable Arrivals. 31 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Pimnofiey. — Well ! well ! my dear, 
 when you have seen a little more of the world, you 
 will get rid of some of your chivalrous whimsies ; 
 and I think you will then agree with me, that 
 there is not, in the whole sphere of fashion, a 
 more elegant, fine-spirited, dashing, generous fellow 
 than my nephew Sir Telegraph Paxarett, who, by- 
 the-by, will be driving his barouche this way 
 shortly, and if you do not absolutely forbid it, 
 will call on me in his route. 
 
 These words seemed to portend that the 
 Honourable ^Irs Pinmoney'"s visit would be a 
 visitation, and at the same time threw a clear 
 light on its motive; but they gave birth in the 
 mind of Anthelia to a train of ideas which con- 
 cluded in a somewhat singular determination.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HYPOCON HOUSE. 
 
 NTHELIA had received intimations from 
 various quarters, of similar intentions on 
 the part of various individuals, not less 
 valuable than Sir Telegraph Paxarett in the scale 
 of moral utility; and though there was not one 
 among them for whom she felt the slightest in- 
 terest, she thought it would be too uncourteous 
 in a pupil of chivalry, and too inhospitable in the 
 mistress of an old English castle, to bar her gates 
 against them. At the same time she felt the want 
 of a lord seneschal to receive and entertain visitors 
 so little congenial to her habits and inclinations : 
 and it immediately occurred to her that no one 
 would be more fit for this honourable office, if he 
 could be prevailed on to undertake it, than an 
 old relation — a medium, as it were, between 
 cousin and great uncle; who had occasionally 
 passed a week or a month with her father at 
 Melincourt. The name of this old gentleman 
 was Hippy — Humphrey Hippy, Esquire, of 
 Hypocon House, in the county of Durham.
 
 Hypocon House. 33 
 
 He was a bachelor, and his character exhibited 
 a singular compound of kind-heartedness, spleen, 
 and melancholy, which governed him by turns, 
 and sometimes in such rapid succession that they 
 seemed almost co-existent. To him Anthelia de- 
 termined on sending an express, with a letter 
 entreating him to take on himself, for a short 
 time, the superintendence of Melincourt Castle, 
 and giving as briefly as possible her reasons for 
 the request. In pursuance of this determination^rfi 
 old Peter Gray, a favourite domestic of Sir Henry, I 
 and, I believe, a distant relation of little Lucy,* /' 
 was despatched the following morning to Hypocon 
 House, where the gate was opened to him by old. , 
 Harry Fell, a distant relation of little Alice, who^^X 
 as the reader well knows, "belonged to Durham." 
 Old Harry had become, by long habit, a curious 
 species of animated mirror, and reflected all the .^ &f 
 humours of his master with wonderful nicety, j ^ ^-4^, 
 When Mr Hippy was in a rage, old Harry looked / A ^-^ ' 
 fierce : when Mr Hippy was in a good humour, 
 old Harry was the picture of human kindness : 
 when Mr Hippy was blue-devilled, old Harry was 
 vapourish : when Mr Hippy was as melancholy as 
 a gib-cat, old Harry was as dismal as a screech- 
 owl. The latter happened to be the case when 
 old Peter presented himself at the gate, and old 
 Harry accordingly opened it with a most rueful 
 elongation of visage. Peter Gray was ready with 
 
 * For Lucy Gray and Alice Fell, see Mr Wordsworth's 
 Lyrical Ballads. 
 
 I. C
 
 34 Melincourt, 
 
 a warm salutation for his old acquaintance Harry 
 Fell j but the lamentable cast of expression in the 
 physiognomy of the latter froze it on his lips, and 
 he contented himself with asking in a hesitating 
 tone, " Is Mr Hippy at home ? " 
 
 "He is," slowly and sadly articulated Harry 
 Fell, shaking his head. 
 
 " I have a letter for him," said Peter Gray. 
 
 " Ah ! " said Harry Fell, taking the letter, and 
 stalking off with it as solemnly as if he had been 
 following a funeral. 
 
 "A pleasant reception," thought Peter Gray, 
 " instead of the old ale and cold sirloin I dreamed 
 of" 
 
 Old Harry tapped three times at the door of 
 his master's chamber, observing the same interval 
 between each tap as is usual between the sounds 
 of a muffled drum : then, after a due pause, he 
 entered the apartment. Mr Hippy was in his 
 night-gown and slippers, with one leg on a cushion, 
 suffering under an imaginary attack of the gout, 
 and in the last stage of despondency. Old Harry 
 walked forward in the same slow pace till he found 
 himself at the proper distance from his master's 
 chair. Then putting forth his hand as deliberately 
 as if it had been the hour-hand of the kitchen- 
 clock, he presented the letter. Mr Hippy took it 
 in the same manner, sunk back in his chair as 
 if exhausted with the effort, and cast his eyes 
 languidly on the seal. Immediately his eyes 
 brightened, he tore open the letter, read it in an
 
 Hypocon House. 35 
 
 instant, sprang up, flung his night-gown one way, ^ 
 his night-cap another, kicked off his slippers, kicked A. 
 
 away his cushion, kicked over his chair, and 
 bounced downstairs, roaring for his coat and boots, 
 and his travelling chariot, with old Harry capering 
 at his heels, and re-echoing all his requisitions. 
 Harry Fell was now a new man : Peter Gray was 
 seized by the hand and dragged into the buttery, 
 w^here a cold goose and a flagon of ale were placed 
 before him, to which he immediately proceeded to 
 do ample justice; while old Harry rushed off with 
 a cold fowl and ham for the refection of Mr Hippy, 
 who had been too seriously indisposed in the 
 morning to touch a morsel of breakfast. Having 
 placed these and a bottle of Madeira in due form 
 and order before his master, he flew back to the 
 buttery, to assist old Peter in the demolition of 
 the goose and ale, his own appetite in the morning 
 having sympathized with his master's, and being 
 now equally disposed to make up for lost time. 
 
 Mr Hippy's travelling chariot was rattled up to 
 the door by four high-mettled posters from the 
 nearest inn. Mr Hippy sprang into the carriage, 
 old Harry vaulted into the dicky, the postilions 
 cracked their whips, and away they went. 
 
 Over the hills and the plains. 
 Over the rivers and rocks, 
 
 leaving old Peter gaping after them at the gate, in 
 profound astonishment at their sudden metamor- 
 phosis, and in utter despair of being able, by any
 
 36 Melincourt. 
 
 exertions of his own, to be their forerunner and 
 announcer at Melincourt. Considering, therefore, 
 that when the necessity of being too late is inevit- 
 able, hurry is manifestly superfluous, he mounted 
 his galloway with great gravity and deliberation, 
 and trotted slowly off towards the mountains, 
 philosophizing all the way in the usual poetical 
 style of a Cumberland peasant. Our readers will 
 of course feel much obliged to us for not present- 
 ing them with his meditations. But instead of 
 jogging back with old Peter Gray, or travelling 
 post with Humphrey Hippy, Esquire, we shall 
 avail ourselves of the four-in-hand barouche which 
 is just coming in view, to take a seat on the box 
 by the side of Sir Telegraph Paxarett, and proceed 
 in his company to Melincourt. v ^^^ . ^^ 
 
 v* 
 ^•^V^ 
 
 J>A^
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 REDROSE ABBEY. 
 
 IR TELEGRAPH PAXARETT had 
 entered the precmcts of the mountains 
 of Westmoreland, and was bowhng his 
 barouche along a romantic valley, looking out 
 very anxiously for an inn, as he had now driven 
 his regular diurnal allowance of miles, and was 
 becoming very impatient for his equally regular 
 diurnal allowance of fish, fowl, and Madeira. A 
 wreath of smoke ascending from a thick tuft of 
 trees at a distance, and in a straight direction 
 before him, cheered up his spirits, and induced 
 him to cheer up those of his horses with two or 
 three of those technical terms of the road, which 
 we presume to have formed part of the genuine 
 language of the ancient Houhynnhmns, since they 
 seem not only much better adapted to equine than 
 human organs of sound, but are certainly much 
 more generally intelligible to four-footed than to 
 two-footed animals. Sir Telegraph was doomed 
 to a temporary disappointment ; for when he had 
 attained the desired point, the smoke proved to
 
 38 Melincourt. 
 
 issue from the chimneys of an ancient abbey which 
 appeared to have been recently converted from a 
 pile of ruins into the habitation of some variety of 
 the human species, with very singular veneration 
 for the relics of antiquity, which, in their exterior 
 aspect, had suffered little from the alteration. 
 There was something so analogous between the 
 state of this building and what he had heard of 
 Melincourt, that if it had not been impossible to 
 mistake an abbey for a castle, he might almost 
 have fancied himself arrived at the dwelling of the 
 divine Anthelia. Under a detached piece of ruins 
 near the road, which appeared to have been part 
 of a chapel, several workmen were busily breaking 
 the ground with spade and pickaxe : a gentleman 
 was superintending their operations, and seemed 
 very eager to arrive at the object of his search. 
 Sir Telegraph stopped his barouche to inquire the 
 distance to the nearest inn : the gentleman replied, 
 " Six miles." " That is just five miles and a half 
 too far," said Sir Telegraph, and was proceeding 
 to drive on, when, on turning round to make his 
 parting bow to the stranger, he suddenly recognized 
 him for an old acquaintance and fellow-collegian. 
 
 " Sylvan Forester ! " exclaimed Sir Telegraph \ 
 " who should have dreamed of meeting you in this 
 uncivilized part of the world ? " 
 
 " I am afraid," said Mr Forester, " this part of 
 the world does not deserve the compliment implied 
 in the epithet you have bestowed on it. Within 
 no very great distance from this spot are divers
 
 Redrose Abbey. 39 
 
 towns, villages, and hamlets, in any one of which, 
 if you have money, you may make pretty sure of 
 being cheated, and if you have none, quite sure of ^ 
 being starved — strong evidences of a state off 
 civilization." " 
 
 " Aha ? " said Sir Telegraph, '' your old way, 
 now I recollect — always fond of railing at civilized 
 life, and holding fortBTm praise of savages and 
 what you called original men. But what, in truth, 
 make you in Westmoreland ? " 
 
 *' I have purchased this old abbey," said Mr 
 Forester "(anciently called the abbey of Rednose, 
 which I have altered to Redrose, as being more 
 analogous to my notions of beauty, whatever the 
 reverend Fellows of our old college might have 
 thought of it), and have fitted it up for my habi- 
 tation, with the view of carrying on in peace and 
 seclusion some peculiar experiments on the nature 
 and progress of man. Will you dine with me, and 
 pass the night here ? and I will introduce you to 
 an original character." 
 
 "With all my heart," said Sir Telegraph; "I 
 can assure you, independently of the pleasure of 
 meeting an old acquaintance, it is a great comfort 
 to dine in a gentleman's house, after living from 
 inn to inn, and being poisoned with bad wine for 
 a month." 
 
 Sir Telegraph descended from his box, and 
 directed one of his grooms to open the carriage- 
 door and emancipate the coachman, who was fast 
 asleep inside. Sir Telegraph gave him the reins,
 
 40 Melincourt. 
 
 t, J and Mr Forester sent one of his workmen to show 
 v/\ him the way to the stables. 
 
 ^^' ' " And pray," said Sir Telegraph, as the barouche 
 disappeared among the trees, " what may be the 
 /.)■ object of your researches in this spot ? " 
 
 " You know," said Mr Forester, " it is a part of 
 
 my tenets that the human species is gradually 
 
 ' decreasing in size and strength, and I am digging 
 
 in the old cemetery for bones and skulls to establish 
 
 the truth of my theory." 
 
 ^' Have you found any ? " said Sir Telegraph. 
 
 "Many," said Mr Forester. "About three 
 weeks ago we dug up a very fine skeleton, no 
 doubt of some venerable father, who must have 
 been, in more senses than one, a pillar of the 
 Church. I have had the skull polished and set in 
 silver. You shall drink your wme out of it, if you 
 please, to-day." 
 
 " I thank you," said Sir Telegraph, " but I am 
 n^t particular : a glass will suit me as well as the 
 best skull in Europe. Besides, I am a moderate 
 man : one bottle of Madeira and another of claret 
 are enough for me at any time ; so that the quantity 
 of wine a reverend sconce can carry would be 
 just treble my usual allowance." 
 
 They walked together towards the abbey. Sir 
 Telegraph earnestly requested, that, before they 
 entered, he might be favoured with a peep at the 
 stable. Mr Forester of course complied. Sir 
 Telegraph found this important part of the build- 
 ings capacious and well adapted to its purpose,
 
 Redrose Abbey. 41 
 
 but did not altogether approve its being totally 
 masked by an old ivied wall, which had served in 
 former times to prevent the braw and bonny Scot 
 from making too free with the beeves of the pious 
 fraternity. 
 
 The new dwelling-house was so well planned, 
 and fitted in so well between the ancient walls, 
 that very few vestiges of the modem architect f i'^ 
 were discernible ; and it was obvious that the ' 1/ 
 
 growth of the ivy, and of numerous trailing and "K ,JL. 
 twining plants, would soon overrun all vestiges ^^^<^ 
 of the innovation, and blend the whole exterior 
 into one venerable character of antiquity. 
 
 " I do not think," said Mr Forester, as they 
 proceeded through part of the grounds, " that 
 the most determined zealot of the picturesque 
 would quarrel with me here. I found the woods 
 around the abbey matured by time and neglect 
 into a fine state of wildness and intricacy, and 
 I think I have left enough of them to gratify 
 their most ardent admirer." nii^- 
 
 " Quite enough, in all conscience," said Sir / ^yy^^ "^^ 
 Telegraph, who was in white jean trousers, with ^^^^ 
 very thin silk stockings and pumps. "I do not"^ 
 generally calculate on being, as an old song I have 
 somewhere heard expresses it, 
 
 Forced to scramble. 
 
 When I ramble, 
 
 Through a copse of furze and bramble ; 
 
 which would be all very pleasant perhaps, if the 
 fine effect of picturesque roughness were not un-
 
 q>^ 
 
 ■^. 
 
 42 Melincourt. 
 
 fortunately, as Macbeth says of his dagger, 'sensible 
 to feeling as to sight.' But who is that gentleman, 
 sitting under the great oak yonder in the green 
 coat and nankins ? He seems very thoughtful." 
 
 " He is of a contemplative disposition," said Mr 
 Forester : " you must not be surprised if he should 
 not speak a word during the whole time you 
 are here. The politeness of his manner makes 
 amends for his habitual taciturnity. I will intro- 
 duce you." 
 
 The gentleman under the oak had by this time 
 discovered them, and came forward with great 
 alacrity to meet Mr Forester, who cordially shook 
 hands with him, and introduced him to Sir Tele- 
 graph as Sir Oran Haut-ton, Baronet. 
 
 Sir Telegraph looked earnestly at the stranger, 
 but was too polite to laugh, though he could not 
 help thinking there was something very ludicrous 
 in Sir Oran's physiognomy, notwithstanding the 
 air of high fashion which characterised his whole 
 deportment, and which was heightened by a pair 
 of enormous whiskers, and the folds of a vast 
 cravat. He therefore bowed to Sir Oran with 
 becoming gravity, and Sir Oran returned the bow 
 with very striking politeness. 
 
 " Possibly," thought Sir Tglegraph, " possibly I 
 may have seen an uglier fellow."' 
 
 The trio entered the abbey, and shortly after sat 
 down to dinner. 
 
 Mr Forester and Sir Oran Haut-ton took the 
 head and foot of the table. Sir Telegraph sat
 
 Redrose Abbey. 43 
 
 between them. "Some soup, Sir Telegraph?" 
 said Mr Forester. " I rather think," said Sir 
 Telegraph, '•' I shall trouble Sir Oran for a slice of 
 fish." Sir Oran helped him with great dexterity, 
 and then performed the same office for himself. 
 "I think you will like this Madeira?" said Mr 
 Forester. " Capital ! " said Sir Telegraph : " Sir 
 Oran, shall I have the pleasure of taking wine with 
 you?" Sir Oran Haut-ton bowed gracefully to 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett, and the glasses were tossed 
 off with the usual ceremonies. Sir Oran preserved 
 an inflexible silence during the whole duration of 
 dinner, but showed great proficiency in the 
 dissection of game. 
 
 When the cloth was removed, the wine circulated 
 freely, and Sir Telegraph, as usual, filled a numer- 
 ous succession of glasses. Mr Forester, not as 
 usual, did the same ; for he was generally very 
 abstemious in this respect : but, on the present 
 occasion, he relaxed from his severity, quoting the 
 Placari genius festis vnpune diebiis^ and the Dulce 
 est desipere in loco, of Horace. Sir Oran likewise 
 approved, by his practice, that he thought the wine 
 particularly excellent, and Bevianio tuiti tre ap- 
 peared to be the motto of the party. Mr Forester 
 inquired into the motives which had brought Sir 
 Telegraph to Westmoreland ; and Sir Telegraph 
 entered into a rapturous encomium of the heiress 
 of Melincourt which was suddenly cut short by Sir 
 Oran, who having taken a glass too much, rose 
 suddenly from table, took a flying leap through the
 
 44 Melincourt. 
 
 window, and went dancing along the woods like a 
 harlequin. 
 
 '"'"Upon my word," said Sir Telegraph, "a 
 /devilish lively, pleasant fellow ! Curse me, if I 
 / know what to make of him." 
 
 " I will tell you his history," said Mr Forester, 
 *' by-and-bye. In the meantime I must look after 
 him, that he may neither do nor receive mischief. 
 Pray take care of yourself till I return." Saying 
 this, he sprang through the window after Sir Oran, 
 and disappeared by the same track among the 
 trees. 
 
 " Curious enough ! " soliloquized Sir Telegraph ; 
 " however, not much to complain of, as the best 
 part of the company is left behind : videlicet, the 
 bottle."
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SUGAR. 
 
 IR TELEGRAPH was tossing off the last 
 he eltap of his regular diurnal allowance 
 of wine, when Mr Forester and Sir Oran 
 Haut-ton re-appeared, walking past the window 
 arm in arm ; Sir Oran's mode of progression being 
 very vacillating, indirect, and titubant ; enough so, 
 at least, to show that he had not completely danced 
 off the effects of the Madeira. Mr Forester shortly 
 after entered; and Sir Telegraph inquiring con- 
 cerning Sir Oran, " I have persuaded him to go to 
 bed," said Mr Forester, "and I doubt not he is 
 already fast asleep." A servant now entered with 
 tea. Sir Telegraph proceeded to help himself, 
 when he perceived there was no sugar, and re- 
 minded his host of the omission. 
 
 Mr Forester. — If I had anticipated the honour 
 of your company. Sir Telegraph, I would have 
 provided myself with a small quantity of that 
 nefarious ingredient : but in this solitary situation, 
 these things are not to be had at a moment's 
 notice. As it is, seeing little company, and regu-
 
 V 
 
 46 Melincourt. 
 
 lating my domestic arrangements on philosopiiical 
 principles, I never suffer an atom of West Indian 
 produce to pass my threshold. I have no wish to 
 resemble those pseudo-philanthropists, those miser- 
 able declaimers against slavery, who are very liberal 
 of words which cost them nothing, but are not 
 capable of advahcing the object they profess to 
 have at heart, by submitting to the smallest per- 
 sonal privation. If I wish seriously to exterminate 
 an evil, I begin by examining how far I am myself, 
 in any way whatever, an accomplice in the exten- 
 sion of its baleful influence. My reform com- 
 mences at home. How can I unblushingly de- 
 claim against thieves, while I am a receiver of 
 stolen goods ? How can I seriously call myself 
 an enemy to slavery, while I indulge in the luxuries 
 that slavery acquires ? How can the consumer of 
 sugar pretend to throw on the grower of it the 
 exclusive burden of their participated criminality ? 
 How can he wash his hands, and say with Pilate : 
 \ *' I am innocent of this bloody see ye to it" ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph poured some cream into his un- 
 sweetened tea, drank it, and said nothing. Mr 
 Forester proceeded : 
 
 If every individual in this kingdom, who is truly 
 and conscientiously an enemy to the slave-trade, 
 would subject himself to so very trivial a privation 
 as abstinence from colonial produce, I consider 
 that a mortal blow would be immediately struck at 
 the roots of that iniquitous system. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — If every individual
 
 Sugar. 47 
 
 enemy to the slave-trade would follow your example, 
 the object would no doubt be much advanced; 
 but the practice of one individual more or less, has 
 little or no influence on general society : most of 
 us go on with the tide, and the dread of the single 
 word quiz has more influence in keeping the greater 
 part of us within the pale of custom, fashion, and 
 precedent, than all the moral reasonings and 
 declamations in the world will ever have in per- 
 suading us to break through it. As to the diffu- 
 sion of liberty, and the general happiness of 
 mankind, which used to. be your favourite topics 
 when we were at college together, I should have 
 thought your subsequent experience would have 
 shown you that there is not one person in ten ^^ ^ 
 thousand who knows what liberty means, or cares ' *^ 
 
 a single straw for any happiness but his own 
 
 Mr'Forester, — Which his own miserable selfish- 
 ness must estrange from him for ever. He whose 
 heart has never glowed with a generous resolution, 
 who has never felt the conscious triumph of a 
 disinterested sacrifice, who has never sympathized 
 with human joys or sorrows, but when they have 
 had a direct and palpable reference to himself, can 
 never be acquainted with even the semblance of 
 happiness. His utmost enjoyment must be many 
 degrees inferior to that of a pig, inasmuch as the 
 sordid mire of selfish and brutal stupidity is more 
 defiling to the soul, than any coacervation of mere 
 material mud can possibly be to the body. The 
 latter may be cleared away with two or three
 
 4S Melincourt. 
 
 ablutions, but the former cleaves and accumulates 
 into a mass of impenetrable corruption, that bids 
 ^ defiance to the united powers of Hercules and 
 
 'A' Alpheus. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Be that as it may, 
 every man will continue to follow his own fancy. 
 
 )l'^ The world is bad enough, I dare say ; but it is not 
 
 ; for you or me to mend it. 
 
 (;;s^ Mr Forester. — There is the key-stone of the 
 
 evil — mistrust of the influence of individual 
 example. ** We are bad ourselves, because we 
 despair of the goodness of others."* Yet the history 
 of the world abounds with sudden and extraordinary 
 revolutions in the opinions of mankind, which have 
 been effected by single enthusiasts. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Speculative opinions 
 have been sometimes changed by the efforts of 
 roaring fanatics. Men have been found very 
 easily permutable into ites and 07iians^ avians^ and 
 aria?is, Wesleyites or Whitfieldites, Huntingdonians 
 or Muggletonians, Moravians, Trinitarians, Unita- 
 rians, Any thingarians : but the metamorphosis only 
 affects a few obscure notions concerning types, 
 symbols, and mysteries, which have scarcely any 
 effect on moral theory, and of course, a fortiori, 
 none whatever on moral practice: the latter 
 is for the most part governed by the general 
 habits and manners of the society we live in. 
 One man may twang responses in concert with 
 the parish clerk ; another may sit silent in a 
 * Coleridge's "Friend."
 
 Sugar. 49 
 
 Quaker's meeting, waiting for the inspiration of 
 the Spirit; a third may groan and howl in a 
 tabernacle ; a fourth may breakfast, dine, and sup 
 in a Sandemanian chapel : but meet any of the 
 four in the common intercourse of society, you will 
 scarcely know one from another. The single 
 adage, Charity begt?is at hoine^ will furnish a com- 
 plete key to the souls of all four : for I have found, 
 as far as my observation has extended, that men 
 carry their religion"^ in other men's heads, and 
 their morality in their own pockets. 
 
 * " There is not any burden that some would gladlier 
 post off to another than the charge and care of their religion. 
 There be of Protestants and professors who live and die in 
 as arrant and implicit faith as any lay Papist of Loretto. A 
 wealthy man, addicted to his pleasure and to his profits, 
 finds religion to be a traffic so entangled and of so many 
 peddling accounts, that, of all mysteries, he cannot skill to 
 keep a stock going upon that trade. What should he 
 do? Fain would he have the name to be religious : fain 
 would he bear up with his neighbours in that. What does 
 he, therefore, but resolves to give over toiling, and to find 
 himself out some factor, to whose care and credit he may 
 commit the whole management of his religious affairs ; some 
 divine of note and estimation that must be. To him he 
 adheres, resigns the whole warehouse of his religion, with 
 all the locks and keys, into his custody, and, indeed, makes 
 the very person of that man his religion, esteems his associat- 
 ing with him a sufficient evidence and commendatory of his 
 own piety. So that a man may say, his religion is now no more 
 within himself, but is become a dividual movable, and goes 
 and comes near him according as that good man frequents 
 the house. He entertains him, gives him gifts, feasts him, 
 lodges him : his religion comes home at night, prays, is 
 I. D
 
 fe 
 
 1 
 
 50 Melzncourt, 
 
 Mr Forester. — I think it will be found that 
 indivi^ual^xample has in many instances produced 
 great moral effects on the practice of society. 
 Even if it were otherwise, is it not better to be 
 Abdiel among the fiends, than to be lost and con- 
 founded in the legion of imps grovelling in the 
 train of the evil power ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett, — There is something in 
 that. 
 
 Mr Forester. — To borrow an allegory from 
 Homer : I would say society is composed of two 
 urns, one of good, and one of evil. I will suppose, 
 that every individual of the human species receives 
 from his natal genius a little phial, containing one 
 drop of a fluid, which shall be evil, if poured into 
 the urn of evil, and good if into that of good. If 
 you were proceeding to the station of the urns 
 with ten thousand persons, every one of them pre- 
 determined to empty his phial into the urn of evil, 
 which I fear is too true a picture of the practice of 
 society, should you consider their example, if you 
 were hemmed in in the centre of them, a sufficient 
 excuse for not breaking from them, and approach- 
 ing the neglected urn ? Would you say, " The 
 urn of good will derive little increase from my 
 
 liberally supped, and sumptuously laid to sleep, rises, is 
 saluted, and after the malmsey, or some well-spiced brewage, 
 and better breakfasted than he whose morning appetite would 
 have gladly fed on green figs between Bethany and Jerusalem, 
 his religion walks abroad at eight, and leaves his kind 
 entertainer in the shop, trading all day without his religion." 
 — Milton's Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing.
 
 Sugar. 5 1 
 
 solitary drop, and one more less will make very- 
 little difference in the urn of ill : I will spare 
 myself trouble, do as the world does, and let the 
 urn of good take its chance, from those who can 
 approach it with less difficulty " ? No : you would 
 rather say, " That neglected urn contains the hopes 
 of the human species : little, indeed, is the addition 
 I can make to it, but it will be good as far as it 
 goes j " and if, on approaching the urn, you should 
 find it not so empty as you had anticipated, if the 
 genius appointed to guard it should say to you, 
 " There is enough in this urn already to allow a 
 reasonable expectation that it will one day be full, 
 and yet it has only accumulated drop by drop 
 through the efforts of individuals, who broke 
 through the pale and pressure of the multitude, 
 and did not despair of human virtue ; " would you 
 not feel ten thousand times repaid for the 
 difficulties you had overcome, and the scoffs of the 
 fools and slaves you had abandoned, by the single 
 reflection that would then rush upon your mind, / 
 a?fi one of these ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Gad, very likely : I 
 never considered the subject in that light. You 
 have made no allowance for the mixture of good 
 and evil, which I think the fairest state of the case. 
 It seems to me, that the world always goes on 
 pretty much in one way. People eat, drink, and 
 sleep, make merry with their friends, get as much 
 money as they can, marry when they can afford it, 
 take care of their children because they are their
 
 \^ 
 
 52 Melincourt. 
 
 own, are thought well of while they live in propor- 
 tion to the depth of their purse, and when they 
 die, are sure of as good a character on their tomb- 
 stones as the bellman and stonemason can afford 
 for their money. 
 
 Mr Forester. — Such is the multitude ; but there 
 are noble exceptions to this general littleness. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Now and then an 
 original genius strikes out of the common track ; 
 but there are two ways of doing that — into a worse 
 as well as a better. 
 
 Mr Forester. — There are some assuredly, who 
 strike into a better, and these are the ornaments of 
 their age, and the lights of the world. You must 
 admit too, that there are many, who, though 
 without energy or capacity to lead, have yet 
 virtue enough to follow an illustrious example. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — One or two. 
 
 Mr Forester. — In every mode of human action 
 there are two ways to be pursued — a good and a 
 bad one. It is the duty of every man to ascertain 
 the former, as clearly as his capacity will admit, by 
 an accurate examination of general relations ; and 
 to act upon it rigidly, without regard to his own 
 previous habits, or the common practice of the 
 world. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — And you infer from all 
 this, that it is my duty to drink my tea without 
 sugar. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I infer, that it is the duty of every 
 one, thoroughly penetrated with the iniquity of the
 
 Sugar. 53 
 
 slave-trade, to abstain entirely from the use of 
 colonial produce. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — I may do that, without 
 any great effort of virtue. I find the difference in 
 this instance, more trivial than I could have 
 supposed. In fact, I never thought of it 
 before. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I hope I shall before long have 
 the pleasure of enrolling you a member of the 
 Anti-saccharine Society, which I have had the 
 happiness to organize, and which is daily extending 
 its numbers. Some of its principal members will 
 shortly pay a visit to Redrose Abbey; and I 
 purpose giving a festival, to which I shall invite all 
 that is respectable and intelligent] in this part of 
 the country, and in which I intend to demonstrate 
 practically, that a very elegant and luxurious 
 entertainment may be prepared without employing 
 a single particle of that abominable ingredient, and 
 theoretically, that the use of sugar is economically 
 superfluous, physically pernicious, morally atrocious, 
 and politically abominable. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — I shall be happy to 
 join the party, and I may possibly bring with me 
 one or two inside passengers, who will prove both 
 ornamental and attractive to your festival. But 
 you promised me an account of Sir Oran.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SIR ORAN HAUT-TON. 
 
 'R FORESTER.— '^ix Oran Haut-ton was 
 caught very young in the woods of 
 Angola. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Caught ! 
 
 Mr Forester. — Very young. He is a specimen 
 of the natural and original man — the wild man of 
 the woods ; called in the language of the more 
 civilized and sophisticated natives of Angola, 
 Fo7igo, and in that of the Indians of South 
 America,"^ Oran Oufa?ig. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Faxarett. — The devil he is ! 
 
 Mr Forester. — Positively. Some presumptuous 
 naturalists have refused his species the honours of 
 humanity; but the most enlightened and illustrious 
 philosophers agree in considering him in his true 
 light as the natural and original man.f One 
 
 * Rather in that of the Malays.— G. 
 
 t " I think I have established his humanity by proof that 
 ought to satisfy every one who gives credit to human testi- 
 mony." — Ancient Metaphysics^ vol. iii. p. 40. 
 
 " I have brought myself to a perfect conviction that the 
 oran outang is a human creature as much as any of us." — Ibid. 
 
 "Nihil humani ei deesse diceres prteter loquelam." — 
 
 BONTIUS.
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton. 5 5 
 
 French philosopher, indeed, has been guilty of an 
 inaccuracy, in considering him as a degenerated 
 
 " The fact truly is, that the man is easily distinguishable 
 in him ; nor are there any differences betwixt him and us, 
 but what may be accounted for in so satisfactory a manner 
 that it would he extraordinary and unnatural if they were 
 not to be found. His body, which is of the same shape as 
 ours, is bigger and stronger than ours, . . . according to 
 that general law of nature above observed [that all animals 
 thrive best in their natural state). His mind is such as that 
 of a man must be, uncultivated by arts and sciences, and 
 
 living wild in the woods One thing, at least, is 
 
 certain : that if ever men were in that state which I call 
 natural, it must have been in such a country and climate as 
 Africa, where they could live without art upon the natural 
 fruits of the earth. 'Such countries,' Linnaeus says, 'are 
 the native country of man ; there he Hves naturally ; in other 
 countries, non 7iisi coacti^ that is, by force of art.' If this 
 be so, then the short history of man is, that the race, having 
 begun in those fine climates, and having, as is natural, 
 multiplied there so much that the spontaneous productions 
 of the earth could not support them, they migrated into other 
 countries, where they were obliged to invent arts for their 
 subsistence ; and with such arts, language, in process of 
 
 time, would necessarily come That my facts and 
 
 arguments are so convincing as to leave no doubt of the 
 humanity of the oran outang, I will not take upon me to 
 say ; but thus much I will venture to affirm, that I have said 
 enough to make the philosopher consider it as problematical, 
 and a subject deserving to be inquired into. For, as to the 
 vulgar, I can 7iever expect that they should acknoiuledge any 
 relation to those inhabitants of the woods of Angola ; but that 
 they should continue, through a false pride, to think highly 
 derogatory from human nature what the philosopher, on the 
 contrary, will think the greatest praise of man, that from the 
 savage state in which the oran outang is, he should, by his
 
 56 Melincourt. 
 
 man;"^ degenerated he cannot be; as his pro- 
 digious physical strength, his uninterrupted health, 
 and his amiable simplicity of manners demonstrate. 
 He is, as I have said, a specimen of the natural 
 and original man — a genuine fac-simile of the 
 philosophical Adam. ' 
 
 Ifle was caught by an intelligent negro very 
 young, in the woods of Angola; and his gentleness 
 and sweet temper! winning the hearts of the negro 
 and negress, they brought him up in their cottage 
 as the playfellow of their little boys and girls, 
 where, with the exception of speech, he acquired 
 the practice of such of the simpler arts of life as 
 the degree of civilization in that part of Africa 
 admits. In this way he lived till he was about 
 seventeen years of age 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — By his own reckon- 
 ing? 
 
 Mr Forester. — By analogical computation. At 
 
 own sagacity and industry, have arrived at the state in which 
 we now see him." — Origin and Progress of Language, book 
 ii. chap. 5. 
 
 * " L'Oran Outang, ou Thomme des bois, est un etre 
 particulier a la zone torride de notre hemisphere : le Pline 
 de la nation qui I'a range dans la classe de singes ne me 
 paroit pas consequent ; car il resulte des principaux traits 
 de sa description que c'est un homme degenere." — Philo- 
 Sophie de la Nature. 
 
 t " The dispositions and affections of his mind are mild, 
 gentle, and humane." — Origin and Progress of Language, 
 book ii. chap. 4. 
 
 *'The oran outang whom Buffon himself saw was of a 
 sweet temper." — Ibid.
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton. 57 
 
 this period, my old friend Captain Hawltaught * of 
 the Tornado frigate, being driven by stress of 
 weather to the coast of Angola, was so much struck 
 with the contemplative cast of Sir Oran's counte- 
 nance,! that he offered the negro an irresistible 
 bribe to surrender him to his possession. The 
 negro brought him on board, and took an oppor- 
 tunity to leave him slily, but with infinite reluct- 
 ance and sympathetic grief. When the ship 
 weighed anchor, and Sir Oran found himself 
 separated from the friends of his youth, and sur- 
 rounded with strange faces, he wept bitterly,^ and 
 
 * Peacock's grandfather, Thomas Love, Master of H. M. S. 
 Protk, who lost a leg under Rodney. — G. 
 
 t " But though I hold the oran outang to be of our species, 
 it must not be supposed that I think the monkey or ape, 
 with or without a tail, participates of our nature : on the 
 contrary, I maintain that, however much his form may re- 
 semble man's, yet he is, as Linnaeus says, of the Troglodyte, 
 nee nostri generis nee sanguinis. For as the mind, or internal 
 principle, is the chief part of every animal, it is by it princi- 
 pally that the ancients have distinguished the several species. 
 Now it is laid down by Mr Bufifon, and I believe it to be a 
 fact that cannot be contested, that neither monkey, ape, nor 
 baboon, have anything mild or gentle, tractable or docile, 
 benevolent or humane in their dispositions ; but, on the con- 
 trary, are malicious and untractable, to be governed only by 
 force and fear, and without any gravity or composure in their 
 gait or behaviour, sueh as the 07-an outang has.'' — Origin and 
 Progress of Language, book ii. chap. 4. 
 
 X *' He is capable of the greatest affection, not only to his 
 brother oran outangs, but to such among us as use him 
 kindly. And it is a fact well attested to me by a gentleman 
 who was an eye-witness of it, that an oran outang on board
 
 58 Melincourt. 
 
 fell into such deep grief that his life was despaired 
 of "^ The surgeon of the ship did what he could 
 for him ; and a much better doctor, Time, com- 
 pleted his cure. By degrees a very warm friend- 
 ship for my friend Captain Hawltaught extinguished 
 his recollection of his negro friends. Three years 
 they cruised together in the Tornado, when a 
 dangerous wound compelled the old captain to 
 renounce his darling element, and lay himself up 
 in ordinary for the rest of his days. He retired 
 on his half pay and the produce of his prize-money 
 to a little village in the West of England, where 
 he employed himself very assiduously in planting 
 cabbages and watching the changes of the wind. 
 Mr Oran, as he was then called, was his insepar- 
 able companion, and became a very expert practi- 
 cal gardener. The old captain used to observe, 
 he could always say he had an honest man in his 
 house, which was more than could be said of many 
 
 his ship conceived such an affection for the cook, that when 
 upon some occasion he left the ship to go ashore, the gentle- 
 man saw the oran outang shed tears in great abundance." — 
 Origin and Progress of Language, book ii. chap. 4. 
 
 * " One of them was taken, and brought with some negro 
 slaves to the capital of the kingdom of Malemba. He was 
 a young one, but six feet and a half tall. Before he came 
 to this city he had been kept some months in company with 
 the negro slaves, and during that time was tame and gentle, 
 and took his victuals very quietly ; but when he was brought 
 into the town, such crowds of people came about him to 
 gaze at him, that he could not bear it, but grew sullen, 
 abstained from food, aud died in four or five days. — " 
 Ibid^ book ii. chap. 4.
 
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton. 59 
 
 honourable houses where there was much vapour- 
 ing about honour. 
 
 Mr Oran had long before shown a taste for 
 music, and with some little instruction from a 
 marine officer in the Tornado, had become a ^ ^ 
 proficient on the flute and French horn.* He '^-^■'^r^ 
 could never be brought to understand the notes \ 
 but, from hearing any simple tune played or sung 
 two or three times, he never failed to perform it 
 with great exactness and brilliancy of execution. 
 I shall merely observe, en passant^ that music 
 appears, from this and several similar circum- 
 stances, to be more natural to man than speech. 
 
 * " He has the capacity of being a musician, and has 
 actually learned to play upon the pipe and harp : a fact 
 attested, not by a common traveller, but by a man of 
 science, Mr Peiresc, and who relates it, not as a hearsay, 
 but as a fact consisting with his own knowledge. And tliis 
 is the more to be attended to, as it shows that the oran 
 outang has a perception of numbers, measure, and melody, 
 which has always been accounted peculiar to our species. 
 But the learning to speak, as well as the learning music, 
 must depend upon particular circumstances ; and men living 
 as the oran outangs do, upon the natural fruits of the earth, 
 with few or no arts, are not in a situation that is proper for 
 the invention of language. The oran outangs who played 
 upon the pipe had certainly not invented this art in the 
 woods, but they had learned it from the negroes or the 
 Europeans ; and that they had not at the same time learned 
 to speak, may be accounted for in one or other of two ways : 
 either the same pains had not been taken to teach them 
 articulation ; or, secondly, music is more natural to man, 
 and more easily acquired than speech." — Origin and Pro- 
 gress of Language, book ii. chap. 5.
 
 6o Melincourt. 
 
 The old captain was fond of his bottle of wine 
 after dinner, and his glass of grog at night. Mr 
 Oran was -easily brought to sympathise in this 
 taste ; "^ and they have many times sat up together 
 half the night over a flowing bowl, the old captain 
 singing Rule Britannia, True Courage, or Tom 
 Tough, and Sir Oran accompanying him on the 
 French horn. 
 
 During a summer tour in Devonshire, I called 
 on my old friend Captain Hawltaught, and was 
 introduced to Mr Oran. You, who have not for- 
 gotten my old speculations on the origin and pro- 
 gress of man, may judge of my delight at this happy 
 rencontre. I exerted all the eloquence I was master 
 of to persuade Captain Hawltaught to resign him 
 to me, that I might give him a philosophical educa- 
 tion.! Finding this point unattainable, I took a 
 house in the neighbourhood, and the intercourse 
 which ensued was equally beneficial and agreeable 
 to all three. 
 
 * " Ces animaux," dit M. de la Brosse, " ont I'instinct de 
 s'asseoir a table comme les hommes ; ils mangent de tout 
 sans distinction ; ils se servent du couteau, de la cuill^re, 
 et de la fourchette, pour prendre et couper ce qu'on sert 
 sur I'assiette : ils boivent die vin et cCautres liqueurs : nous 
 les portames a bord ; quand ils etoient a table ils se faisoient 
 entendre des mousses lorsqu'ils avoient besoin de quelque 
 chose." — BuFFON. 
 
 t "If I can believe the newspapers, there was an oran 
 outang of the great kind, that was some time ago shipped 
 aboard a French East India ship. I hope he has had a safe 
 voyage to Europe, and that his education will be taken care 
 of." — Ancient Metaphysics, vol. iii. p. 40.
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton. 6i 
 
 Sir Telegraph Faxarett. — And what part did you 
 take in their nocturnal concerts, with Tom Tough 
 and the French horn ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — I was seldom present at them, and 
 often remonstrated, but ineffectually, with the cap- 
 tain, on his corrupting the amiable simplicity of 
 the natural man by this pernicious celebration of 
 vinous and spirituous orgies ; but the only answer 
 I could ever get from him was a hearty damn 
 against all water-drinkers, accompanied with a 
 reflection that he was sure every enemy to wine 
 and grog must have clapped down the hatches 
 of his conscience on some secret villany, which 
 he feared good liquor would pipe ahoy : and he 
 usually concluded by striking up Nothing like 
 Grog, Saturday Night, or Siving the flowing Bowl, 
 his friend Oran's horn ringing in sympathetic 
 symphony. 
 
 The old captain used to say that grog was the 
 ehxir of life ; but^it did not prove so to him \ for 
 one night he tossed off his last bumper, sung his 
 last stave, and heard the last flourish of his Oran's 
 horn. I thought poor Oran would have broken his 
 heart ; and, had he not been familiarized to me, 
 and conceived a very lively friendship for me before 
 the death of his old friend, I fear the consequences 
 would have been fatal. 
 
 Considering that change of scene would divert 
 his melancholy, I took him with me to London. 
 The theatres delighted him, particularly the opera, , 
 which not only accorded admirably with his taste
 
 62 Melincourt. 
 
 for music, but where, as he looked round on the 
 ornaments of the fasliionable world, he seemed to 
 be particularly comfortable, and to feel himself 
 completely at home. 
 
 There is, to a stranger, something ludicrous in 
 a first view of his countenance, which led me to 
 introduce him only into the best society, where 
 politeness would act as a preventive to the pro- 
 pensity to laugh ; for he has so nice a sense of 
 honour (which I shall observe, by the way, is 
 peculiar to man), that if he were to be treated 
 with any kind of contumely, he would infallibly 
 die of a broken heart, as has been seen in some 
 of his species."^ With a view of ensuring him the 
 respect of society which always attends on rank 
 and fortune, I have purchased him a baronetcy, 
 and made over to him an estate. I have also 
 purchased of the Duke of Rottenburgh one half 
 of the elective franchise vested in the body of Mr 
 Christopher Corporate, the free, fat, and dependent 
 burgess of the ancient and honourable borough of 
 Onevote, who returns two members to Parhament, 
 one of whom will shortly be Sir Oran. {Sir Tele- 
 graph gave a long whistle^ But before taking this 
 important step, I am desirous that he should finish 
 his education. {Sir Telegraph whistled again.) I 
 mean to say that I wish, if possible, to put a few 
 words into his mouth, which I have hitherto found 
 impracticable, though I do not entirely despair of 
 ultimate success. But this circumstance, for 
 * Origin and Progress of Language, book ii. chap. 4.
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton. 63 
 
 reasons which I will give you by-and-bye, does 
 not at all miHtate against the proofs of his being 
 a man. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Faxareft. — If he be but half a man, 
 he will be the fitter representative of half an elector; 
 for as that " large body corporate of one," the free, 
 fat, and dependent burgess of Onevote returns two 
 members to the honourable house, Sir Oran can only 
 be considered as the representative of half of him. 
 But, seriously, is not your principal object an 
 ; irresistible exposure of the universality and omnipo- 
 tence of corruption by purchasing for an oran 
 outang one of those seats, the sale of which is 
 unblushingly acknowledged to be as notoi'ious as 
 the sun at noon-day ? or do you really think him ojie 
 of us? 
 
 Mr Forester, — I really think him a variety of the 
 human species ; and this is a point which I have it 
 much at heart to establish in the acknowledgmient 
 of the civilized world. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Faxarett. — Buffon, whom I dip 
 into now and then in the winter, ranks him, with 
 Linnaeus, in the class of Simice. 
 
 Mr Forester. — Linnsus has given him the curious 
 denominations of Troglodytes, Homo nodurnus^ and 
 Homo silvestris : but he evidently thought him a 
 man ; he describes him as having a hissing speech, 
 thinking, reasoning, believing that the earth was 
 made for him, and that he will one day be its 
 sovereign."^ 
 
 * " Homo nocturnus, Troglodytes, Silvestris, orangoutang
 
 64 Melhicourt. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — God save King Oran ! 
 By-the-by, you put me very much in mind of Valen- 
 tine and Orson. This wild man of yours will turn 
 out some day to be the son of a king, lost in the 
 woods, and suckled by a lioness : — " No waiter, but 
 a knight templar : " — no Oran, but a true prince. 
 
 Mr Forester, — As to Buffon, it is astonishing how 
 that great naturalist could have placed him among 
 the singes^ when the very words of his description 
 give him all the characteristics of human nature.! 
 
 Bontii. Corpus album, incessu erectum Loquitur 
 
 sibilo, cogitat, ratiocinatur, credit sui causa factam tellurem, 
 se aliquando iterum fore imperantem." — LlNN.^us. 
 
 t " II n'a point de queue : ses bras, ses mains, ses doigts, 
 ses ongles, sont pareils aux notres : il marche toujours debout : 
 il a des traits approchans de ceux de I'homme, des oreilles de 
 la meme forme, des cheveux sur la tete, de la barbe au menton, 
 et du poil ni plus ni moins que I'homme en a dans I'etat de 
 nature. Aussi les habitans de son pays, les Indiens polices, 
 n'ont pas hesite de I'associer a I'espece humaine, par le nom 
 d'oran outang, homme sativage. Si Ton ne faisoit attention 
 qu'a la figure, on pourroit regarder I'oran outang comme le 
 premier des singes ou le dernier des hommes, parce qu'a 
 I'exception de I'ame, il ne lui manque rien de tout ce que 
 nous avons, et parce qu'il differe moins de I'homme pour le 
 corps qu'il ne dififere des autres animaux auxquels on a donne 
 le meme nom de singe. — S'il y avoit un degre par lequel on 
 put descendre a la nature humaine a celle des animaux, si 
 I'essence de cette nature consistoit en entier dans la forme du 
 corps et dependoit de son organisation, I'oran outang se 
 trouveroit plus pres de I'homme que d'aucun animal : assis 
 au second rang des etres, s'il ne pouvoit commander en pre- 
 mier, il feroit au moins sentir aux autres sa superiorite, et 
 s'efforceroit a ne pas obeir :'si I'imitation qui semble copier de 
 si pres la pensee en etoit le vrai signe ou I'un des resultats, il
 
 Sir Oran H ant -ton. 65 
 
 It is still more curious to think that modem travel- 
 lers should have made beasts, under the names of 
 Pongos, Tvlandrills, and Oran Outangs, of the very ^ 
 same beings whom the ancients worshipped as/ 
 divinities under the names of Fauns and Satyrs- 
 Silenus and Pan."^ 
 
 se trouveroit encore a une plus grande distance des animaux 
 et plus voisin del'homme." — Buffon. 
 
 " On est tout etonne, d'apres tous ces aveux, que !M. de 
 BufFon ne fasse de I'oran outang qu'une espece de magot, 
 essentiellement circonscrit dans les bornes de I'animalite : il 
 falloit, ou infirmer les relations des voyageurs, ou s'en tenir a 
 leurs resultats. — Quand on lit dans ce naturaliste, I'histoire 
 du Negre blanc, on voit que ce bipede diSere de nous bien 
 plus que I'oran outang, soit par I'organisation, soit par 
 I'intelligence, et cependant on ne balance pas a le mettre dans 
 la classe des hommes." — Philosophie de la Nature. 
 
 * "Les jugemens precipites, et qui ne sont point le fmit 
 d'une raison eclairee, sont sujets a donner dans I'exces. Nos 
 voyageurs font sans facon des betes, sous les noms de pongos, 
 de mandrills, d'oran outangs, de ces memes etres, dont, sous 
 le nom de satyres, de faunes, de sylvains, les anciens faisoient 
 des divinites. Peut-etre, apres des recherches plus exactes, 
 trouvera-t-on que ce sont des hommes." — RousSEAU, Dis- 
 cours sur Pljiegalite, note 8. 
 
 "II est presque demontre que les faunes, les satyres, let 
 sylvains, les aegipans, et toute cette foule de demi-dieux 
 difformes et libertins, a qui les filles des Phocion et des Paul 
 Emile s'aviserent de rendre hommage, ne furent dans I'origine 
 que des oran outangs. Dans la suite, les poetes chargerent 
 le portrait de I'tiomme des bois, en lui donnant des pieds de 
 chevre, une queue et des comes ; mais le type primordial 
 resta, et le philosophe I'appercoit dans les monumens les plus 
 defigures par I'imagination d'Ovide et le ciseau de Phidias. 
 Les anciens, tres embarrasses de trouver la filiation de leurs 
 I. E
 
 66 Melincoiirt. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Your Oran rises rap- 
 idly in the scale of being : — from a baronet and 
 M.P. to a king of the world, and now to a god of 
 ^^ the woods. 
 
 Mr Forester. — When I was in London last winter, 
 I became acquainted with a learned mythologist, 
 who has long laboured to rebuild the fallen temple 
 of Jupiter."^ I introduced him to Sir Oran, for 
 whom he immediately conceived a high veneration, 
 and would never call him by any name but Pan. 
 His usual salutation to him was in the following 
 words : 
 
 EX^e, [xaKap, a-KLprrjTa, (ptXepdeos, avrpodiaLre, 
 'ApfxovLT]v Kocrfxoto KpeKWv (pCKoiraiyixovL fxoKirri, 
 KoafjiOKpaTCjp, ^aKx^vra ! f 
 
 Which he thus translated : 
 
 King of the world ! enthusiast free, 
 Who dwell'st in caves of liberty ! 
 And on thy wild pipe's notes of glee 
 Respondent Nature's harmony ! 
 Leading beneath the spreading tree 
 The Bacchanalian revelry ! 
 
 " This," said he, " is part of the Orphic invocation 
 
 sylvains, et de leurs satyres, se tirerent d'affaire en leur 
 donnant des dieux pour peres : les dieux etoient d'un grand 
 secours aux philosophes des terns recules, pour resoudre les 
 problemes d'histoire naturelle ; ils leur servoient comnie les 
 cycles et les epicycles dans le systeme planetaire de Ptolomee : 
 avec des cycles et des dieux on repond a tout, quoiqu'on ne 
 satisfasse personne." — Philosophie de la Nature. 
 
 * This is, no doubt, Thomas Taylor, the Platonist, who 
 called Peacock Greeky Peeky. — G. 
 
 t Orphica, Hymn. XI. (X Gesn.)
 
 Sir Oran Hatit-ton. 6y 
 
 of Pan. It alludes to the happy existence of the 
 
 dancing Pans, Fauns, Orans, et id genus onme, 
 
 whose dwellings are the caves of rocks and the 
 
 hollows of trees, such as undoubtedly was, or 
 
 would have been, the natural mode of Hfe of our 
 
 friend Pan among the woods of Angola. It alludes, 
 
 too, to their musical powers, which in our friend 
 
 Pan it gives me indescribable pleasure to find so 
 
 happily exemplified. The epithet Bacchic, our 
 
 friend Pan's attachment to the bottle demonstrates 
 
 to be very appropriate ; and the epithet TcocfioTcparupj 
 
 king of the world, points out a striking similarity 
 
 between the Orphic Pan and the Troglodyte of / 
 
 Linnaeus, 7v/io believes that the earth was made for ' 
 
 hi77i, and that he will again be its sovereign P He"" 
 
 laid great stress on the word again, and observed, 
 
 if he were to develop all the ideas to which this 
 
 word gave rise in his mind, he should find ample 
 
 matter for a volume. Then repeating several 1l#^^ 
 
 times, Ilav '/,o6[j.o-/.parcfip, and iterum fore telhms -' , | ^ 
 
 imperantein, he concluded by saying he had known / ,^^ J^f^^^^ 
 
 many profound philosophical and mythological J ^^^^^ 
 
 systems founded on much slighter analogies. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett, — Your learned mytho- 
 logist appears to be non compos. 
 
 Mr Forester. — By no means. He has a system 
 of his own, which only appears in the present day 
 more absurd than other systems, because it has 
 fewer followers. The manner in which the spirit 
 of system twists everything to its own views is truly 
 wonderful. I believe that in every nation of the
 
 68 Meltncourf. 
 
 earth the system which has most followers will be 
 found the most absurd in the eye of an enlightened 
 philosophy. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — But if your Oran be a 
 man, how is it that his long intercourse with other 
 varieties of the human species has not taught him 
 to speak ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — Speech is a highly artificial faculty. 
 Civilized man is a highly artificial animal. The 
 change from the wild to the civilized state, affects 
 not only his moral, but his physical nature, and 
 this not rapidly and instantly, but in a long pro- 
 cess of generations. The same change is obvious 
 in domestic animals, and in cultivated plants. You 
 know not where to look for the origin of the com- 
 mon dog, or the common fowl. The wild and 
 tame hog, and the wild and tame cat, are marked 
 by more essential differences than the oran and 
 the civilized man. The origin of corn is as much 
 a mystery to us as the source of the Nile was to 
 the ancients. Innumerable flowers have been so 
 changed from their original simplicity, that the 
 act of horticulture may almost lay claim to the 
 magic of a new creation. Is it then wonder- 
 ful that the civilized man should have acquired 
 some physical faculties which, the natural man 
 has not ? It is demonstrable that speech is one. 
 I do not, however, despair of seeing him make 
 some progress in this art. Comparative anatomy 
 shows that he has all the organs of articula- 
 tion. Indeed he has, in every essential parti-
 
 Sir Or an Haut-ton. 6g 
 
 cular, the human form, and the human anatomy. 
 /iow I will only observe that if an animal who 
 walks upright — is of the human form^ both outside 
 and inside — uses a weapon for defence and attack — 
 associates with his kiiid — snakes huts to defend him- 
 self fro7n the zveather, better I believe than those of 
 the New Hollanders — is tame and ge?itle — a7td 
 instead of killing men a?id women, as he could easily 
 do, takes them prisojiers and makes servants of them — 
 who has, what I think essential to the human kind, 
 a sense of honoicr ; which is shown by breaking his 
 heart, if laughed at, or made a show, or treated 
 with any kind of contumely — who, ivhen he is 
 brought i7ito the company of civilized men, behaves 
 (as you have seen) with dignity and composure, 
 altogether unlike a monkey ; fro77i who7n he differs 
 likewise in this 77iaterial respect, that he is capable of 
 great attachme7it to particular persons, of which the 
 monkey is altogether incapable ; a7id also i7i this 
 respect, that a 77ionkey 7iever can be so ta77ied that we 
 may depe7id on his not doing 77iischief taken left 
 alone, by breaking glasses or chi7ia withi7i his reach ; 
 whereas the ora7i outang is altogether harmless ; — 
 who has so 77iuch of the docility of a 7nan that he 
 learns not only to do the conufion offices of life, but 
 also to play on the flute and French horn ; which 
 shows that he 77iust have a7i idea of melody a7id 
 concord of sounds, which no brute ani77ial has ; — a7id 
 lastly, ifJoi7ied to all these qualities he has the organ 
 of pro7iunciation, a7id consequently the capacity of 
 speech, though 7iot the actual use of it ; if, I say,
 
 X. 
 
 70 Melincourt. 
 
 such a7t animal be not a 7nan^ I should desire to 
 know in what the essence of a man consists, and 
 what it is that distinguishes a natui-al manfro^n the 
 man of art.^ That he understands many words, 
 though he does not yet speak any, I think you may 
 have observed, when you asked him to take wine, 
 and appHed to him for fish and partridge.! 
 
 * The words in italics are from the Ancient Metaphysics^ 
 vol. iii. pp. 41, 42. Lord Monboddo adds : " I hold it to 
 be impossible to convince any 'philosopher, or any man of 
 common sense, who has bestowed any time to consider the 
 mechanism of speech, that such various actions and configura- 
 tions of the organs of speech as are necessary for articulation 
 can be natural to man. Whoever thinks this possible, 
 should go and see, as I have done, Mr Braidwood of Edin- 
 burgh, or the Abbe de I'Epee in Paris, teach the dumb to 
 speak ; and when he has observed all the different actions of 
 the organs, which those professors are obliged to mark 
 distinctly to their pupils with a great deal of pains and 
 labour, so far from thinking articulation natural to man, he 
 will rather wonder how, by any teaching or imitation, he 
 should attain to the ready performance of such various and 
 compHcated operations." 
 
 *' Quoique I'organe de la parole soit naturel a I'homme, la 
 parole elle-meme ne lui est pourtant pas naturelle." — 
 Rousseau, Discours sur rinegalite, note 8. 
 
 " The oran outang, so accurately dissected by Tyson, had 
 exactly the same organs of voice that a man has." — Ancient 
 Metaphysics^ vol. iii. p. 44. 
 
 " I have been told that the oran outang who is to be seen 
 in Sir Ashton Lever's collection, had learned before he died 
 to articulate some words. " — Ibid. p. 40. 
 
 t " I desire any philosopher to tell me the specific differ- 
 ence between an oran outang sitting at table, and behaving 
 as M. de la Brosse or M. Buffon himself has described him,
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton. yi 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett — The gestures, however 
 slight, that accompany the expression of the 
 ordinary forms of intercourse, may possibly explain 
 that. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You will find that he understands 
 many things addressed to him on occasions of 
 very unfrequent occurrence. With regard to his 
 moral character, he is undoubtedly a maji, and a 
 much better man tha?i many that are to be found in 
 civilized countries ^"^ as, when you are better 
 acquainted with him, I feel very confident you 
 will readily acknowledge.! 
 
 and one of our dumb persons ; and in general I believe it 
 will be very difficult, or rather impossible, for a man who is 
 accustomed to divide things according to specific marks, not 
 individual differences, to draw the line betwixt the oran 
 outang and the dumb persons among us : they have both 
 their organs of pronunciation, and both show signs of intelli- 
 gence by their actions." — Origin and Progress of Language ^ 
 book ii. chap. 4. 
 
 * Ancient Metaphysics^ vol. iv. p. 55. 
 
 t " Toute la terre est couverte de nations, dont nous ne 
 connoissons que les noms, et nous nous melons de juger le 
 genre humain ! Supposons un Montesquieu, un Bufifon, un 
 Diderot, un Duclos, un D'Alembert, un Condillac, ou des 
 hommes de cette trempe, voyageant pour instruire leurs 
 compatriotes, observant et decrivant comme ils S9avent faire, 
 la Turquie, I'Egypte, la Barbaric, I'Empire de Maroc, la 
 Guinee, le pays des Caffres, I'interieur de I'Afrique et ses 
 cotes orientales, les Malabares, le Mogol, les rives du Gange, 
 les royaumes de Siam, de Pegu et d'Ava, la Chine, la 
 Tartaric, et sur-tout le Japon ; puis dans I'autre hemisphere 
 le M6xique, le Perou, le Chili, les Terres Magellaniques, 
 sans oublier les Patagons vrais ou faux, le Tucuman, le 
 
 IL
 
 72 Melincourt. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — I shall be very happy, 
 when his election comes on for Onevote, to drive 
 him down in my barouche to the honourable and 
 ancient borough. 
 
 Mr Forester promised to avail himself of this 
 proposal j when the iron tongue of midnight toll- 
 ing twelve induced them to separate for the night. 
 
 Paraguai, s'il etoit possible, le Bresil, enfin les Caraibes, la 
 Floride, et toutes les contrees sauvages, voyage le plus 
 important de tous, et celui qu'il faudroit faire avec le plus de 
 soin ; supposons que ces nouveaux Hercules, de retour de 
 ces courses mdmorables, fissent a loisir I'histoire naturelle, 
 morale, et politique de ce qu'ils auroient vus, nous verrions 
 nous-memes sortir un nionde nouveau de dessous leur plume, 
 et nous apprendrions ainsi a connoitre le notre : je dis que 
 quand de pareils observateurs affirmeront d'un tel animal que 
 c'est un homme, et d'un autre que c'est une bete, il faudra 
 les en croire : mais ce seroit une grande simplicite de s'en 
 rapporter ladessus a des voyageurs grossiers, sur lesquels on 
 seroit quelquefois tente de faire la meme question qu'ils se 
 melent de resoudre sur d'autres animaux." — Rousseau, 
 Discours sur flnegaliie, note 8.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. 
 
 HE next morning, while Sir Telegraph, Sir 
 Oran, and Mr Forester were sitting down 
 to their breakfast, a post-chaise rattled up 
 to the door; the glass was let down, and a tall, 
 thin, pale, grave-looking personage peeped from 
 the aperture. " This is Mr Fax," ^ said Mr 
 Forester, " the champion of calm reason, the inde- 
 fatigable explorer of the cold clear springs of 
 knowledge, the bearer of the torch of dispassionate 
 truth, that gives more light than warmth. He 
 looks on the human world, the world of mind, the 
 conflict of interests, the collision of feelings, the 
 infinitely diversified developments of energy and 
 intelligence, as a mathematician looks on his 
 diagrams, or a mechanist on his wheels and 
 pulleys, as if they were foreign to his own nature, 
 and were nothing more than subjects of curious 
 speculation." 
 
 Mr Forester had not time to say more ; for Mr 
 Fax entered, and shook hands with him, was 
 
 * Mr Fax appears to be an idealised portrait of Malthus. 
 — G.
 
 u 
 
 74 Melincourt. 
 
 introduced in due form to Sir Telegraph, and sat 
 down to assist in the demoHtion of the materiel 
 of breakfast. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Your Redrose Abbey is a beautiful 
 metamorphosis. — I can scarcely believe that these 
 are the mouldering walls of the pious fraternity 
 of Rednose, which I contemplated two years 
 ago. 
 
 Mr Forester. — The picturesque tourists will owe 
 me no good-will for the metamorphosis, though I 
 have endeavoured to leave them as much mould, 
 mildew, and weather-stain as possible. 
 
 Mr Fax. — The exterior has suffered little; it 
 still retains a truly venerable monastic character. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Something monastic 
 in the interior too. — Very orthodox old wine in 
 the cellar, I can tell you. And the Reverend 
 Father Abbot there, as determined a bachelor as 
 the Pope. 
 
 Mr Forester. — If I am so, it is because, like the 
 Squire of Dames, I seek and cannot find. I see 
 in my mind's eye the woman I would choose, but 
 I very much fear that is the only mode of optics 
 in which she will ever be visible. 
 
 Mr Fax. — No matter. Bachelors and spinsters 
 I decidedly venerate. The w^orld is overstocked 
 with featherless bipeds. More men than corn is a 
 fearful pre-eminence, the sole and fruitful cause of 
 penury, disease, and war, plague, pestilence, and 
 famine. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — I hope you will not
 
 The Principle of Population. 75 
 
 long have cause to venerate me. AVhat is life 
 without love? A rose-bush in winter, all thorns, 
 and no flowers. 
 
 Mr Fax. — And what is it with love ? A double- 
 blossomed cherry, flowers without fruit ; if the 
 blossoms last a month, it is as much as can be 
 expected : they fall, and what comes in their 
 place ? Vanity, and vexation of spirit. j 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Better vexation, than / 
 stagnation : marriage may often be a stormy lake, 
 but celibacy is almost always a muddy horsepond. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Rather a calm clear river 
 
 Mr Forester. — Flowing through a desert, where 
 it moves in loneliness, and reflects no forms of 
 beauty. 
 
 Mr Fax. — That is not the way to consider the ^ \ 
 case. Feelings and poetical images are equally 7 V 
 out of place in a calm philosophical view of, 
 human society. Some must marry, that the world" 
 may be peopled : many must abstain, that it may 
 not be overstocked. Little a?td good, is very 
 applicable in this case. It is better that the 
 world should have a smaller number of peaceable 
 and rational inhabitants, living in universal har- 
 mony and social intercourse, than the dispro- 
 portionate mass of fools, slaves, coxcombs, thieves, 
 rascals, liars, and cut-throats, with which its sur- 
 face is at present encumbered. It is in vain to 
 declaim about the preponderance of physical and 
 moral evil, and attribute it, with the Manicheans, 
 to a mythological principle, or, with some modern
 
 76 Melincourt. 
 
 philosophers, to the physical constitution of the 
 globe. The cause of all the evils of human society 
 is single, obvious, reducible to the most exact 
 mathematical calculation; and of course suscept- 
 ible not only of remedy but even of utter annihila- 
 tion. The cause is the tendency of population to 
 increase beyond the means of subsistence. The 
 remedy is an universal social compact, binding 
 both sexes to equally rigid celibacy, till the 
 prospect of maintaining the average number of 
 six children be as clear as the arithmetic of 
 futurity can make it. 
 
 Mr Forester. — The arithmetic of futurity has 
 been found in a more than equal number of 
 instances to baffle human skill. The rapid and 
 sudden mutations of fortune are the inexhaustible 
 theme of history, poetry, and romance ; and they 
 are found in forms as various and surprising, in 
 the scenes of daily life, as on the stage of Drury 
 Lane. 
 
 Mr Fax. — That the best prospects are often 
 overshadowed, is most certainly true ; but there 
 are degrees and modes of well-grounded reliance 
 on futurity, sufficient to justify the enterprises of 
 prudence, and equally well-grounded prospiciencies 
 of hopelessness and helplessness, that should check 
 the steps of rashness and passion, in their headlong 
 progress to perdition. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You have little cause to complain 
 of the present age. It is calculating enough to 
 gratify the most determined votary of moral and
 
 The Principle of Population. jy 
 
 political arithmetic. This certainly is not the 
 time, 
 
 When unrevenged stalks Cocker's injured ghost. 
 What is friendship — except in some most rare 
 and miraculous instances — but the fictitious bond 
 of interest, or the heartless intercourse of idleness 
 and vanity ? What is love, but the most venal of 
 all venal commodities ? What is marriage, but the 
 most sordid of bargains, the most cold and slavish 
 of all the forms of commerce? We want no 
 philosophical ice-rock, towed into the Dead Sea of 
 modern society, to freeze that which is too cold 
 already. We want rather the torch of Prometheus 
 to revivify our frozen spirits. We are a degenerate 
 race, half-reasoning developments of the principle 
 of infinite littleness, " with hearts in our bodies no 
 bigger than pins' heads." We are in no danger of 
 forgetting that two and two make four. There is 
 no fear that the warm impulses of feeling will ever 
 overpower, with us, the tangible eloquence of the 
 pocket. 
 
 Mr Fax. — With relation to the middle and 
 higher classes, you are right in a great measure as 
 to fact, but wrong, as I think, in the asperity of 
 your censure. But among the lower orders the 
 case is quite different. The baleful influence of 
 the poor laws has utterly destroyed the principle 
 of calculation in them. They marry by wholesale, 
 without scruple or compunction, and commit the 
 future care of their family to Providence and the 
 overseer. They marry even in the workhouse, and
 
 ^8 Melincourt. 
 
 convert the intended asylum of age and infirmity 
 into a flourishing manufactory of young beggars 
 and vagabonds. 
 
 Sir Telegraph's barouche rolled up gracefully 
 to the door. Mr Forester pressed him to stay 
 another day, but Sir Telegraph's plea of urgency 
 was not to be overcome. He promised very 
 shortly to revisit Redrose Abbey, shook hands 
 with Mr Forester and Sir Oran, bowed politely to 
 Mr Fax, mounted his box, and disappeared among 
 the trees. 
 
 "Those four horses," said Mr Fax, as the 
 carriage rolled away, " consume the subsistence of 
 eight human beings, for the foolish amusement of 
 one. As Solomon observes : ' This is vanity, and 
 a great evil.'" 
 
 " Sir Telegraph is thoughtless," said Mr Forester, 
 " but he has a good heart and a good natural 
 capacity. I have great hopes of him. He had/ ,/ 
 some learning, when he went to college; but hej' j 
 was cured of it before he came away. Great,* Y 
 indeed, must be the zeal for improvement which 
 an academical education cannot extinguish."
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF CHIVALRY. 
 
 ^IR TELEGRAPH was welcomed to Melin- 
 court in due form by Mr Hippy, and in a 
 private interview with the Honourable 
 Mrs Pinmoney, was exhorted to persevere in his 
 suit to Anthelia, though she could not flatter him 
 with very strong hopes of immediate success, the 
 young lady's notions being, as she observed, 
 extremely outre and fantastical, but such as she 
 had no doubt time and experience would cure. 
 She informed him at the same time, that he would 
 shortly meet a formidable rival, no less a person- 
 age than Lord Anophel Achthar,* son and heir of 
 the Marquis of Agaric,! who was somewhat in 
 favour with Mr Hippy, and seemed determined at 
 all hazards to carry his point ; " and with any other 
 girl than Anthelia," said Mrs Pinmoney, "con- 
 sidering his title and fortune, I should pronounce 
 his success infallible, unless a duke were to make 
 
 * ANJM'EAo;/ AXGos APovpas. Terrce pondus inutile. 
 
 t Agaricus, in Botany, a genus of plants of the class 
 Cryptogamia, comprehending the mushroom, and a copious 
 variety of toadstools.
 
 8o Melincourt. 
 
 his appearance." She added, "The young lord 
 would be accompanied by his tutor, the Reverend 
 Mr Grovelgrub, and by a celebrated poet, Mr 
 Feathernest,* to whom the Marquis had recently 
 given a place in exchange for his conscience. It 
 was thought by Mr Feathernest's friends that he 
 had made a very good bargain. The poet had, 
 in consequence, burned his old ' Odes to Truth 
 and Liberty,' and had published a volume of 
 Panegyrical Addresses ' to all the crowned heads 
 in Europe,' with the motto, ' Whatever is at court, 
 is right.' " 
 
 The dinner-party that day at Melincourt Castle 
 consisted of Mr Hippy, in the character of lord of 
 the mansion ; Anthelia, in that of his inmate ; 
 Mrs and Miss Pinmoney, as her visitors ; and Sir 
 Telegraph, as the visitor of Mrs Pinmoney, 
 seconded by Mr Hippy's invitation to stay. 
 Nothing very luminous passed on this occasion. 
 
 The fame of Mr Hipp)^ and his hospitable 
 office, was rapidly diffused by Dr Killquick, the 
 physician of the district ; who thought a draught 
 or pill could not possibly be efficacious, unless 
 administered with an anecdote, and who was called 
 in, in a very few hours after Mr Hippy's arrival, to 
 cure the hypochondriacal old gentleman of an 
 imaginary swelling in his elbow. The learned 
 doctor, who had studied with peculiar care the 
 
 * Southey. The constant attacks made by Peacock and 
 others for his alleged political apostacy were certainly unjust, 
 but as certainly made in good faith, and plausible. — G.
 
 The Spirit of Chivalry. 8i 
 
 symptoms, diagnostics, prognostics, sedatives, 
 lenitives, and sanatives of hypochondriasis, had y^ 
 arrived at the sagacious conclusion, that^ the most/^i^t^ 
 effectual method of curing an imaginary disease q. 
 was^ give the patient a real one; and he accord- ^iJ 
 ingly sent Mr Hippy a pint bottle of mixture, to ^^ 
 be taken by a tablespoonful every two hours, which 
 would have infallibly accomplished the purpose, but 
 that the bottle was cracked over the head of Harry 
 Fell, for treading on his master's toe, as he 
 presented the composing potion, which would 
 perhaps have composed him in the Roman 
 sense. 
 
 The fashionable attractions of Low Wood and 
 Keswick afforded facilities to some of Anthelia's 
 lovers to effect a logeinent in her neighbourhood, 
 from whence occasionally riding over to MeHncourt 
 Castle, they were hospitably received by the lord 
 seneschal, Humphrey Hippy, Esquire, who often 
 made them fixed stars in the circumference of that 
 jovial system, of which the bottle and glasses are 
 the sun and planets, till it was too late to dislodge 
 for the night; by which means they sometimes 
 contrived to pass several days together at the 
 Castle. 
 
 The gentlemen in question were Lord Anophel 
 Achthar, with his two parasites, Mr Feathernest 
 and the Reverend Mr Grovelgrub; Harum 
 O'Scarum, Esquire, the sole proprietor of a vast 
 tract of undrained bog in the county of Kerry; 
 and Mr Derrydown, the only son of an old lady in 
 
 I. F
 
 82 Melincotcrt. 
 
 London, who having in vain solicited a visit from 
 Anthelia, had sent off her hopeful progeny to try 
 his fortune in Westmoreland. Mr Derrydown 
 had received a laborious education, and had con- 
 sumed a great quantity of midnight oil, over 
 ponderous tomes of ancient and modern learning, 
 particularly of moral, political, and metaphysical 
 philosophy, ancient and modern. His lucubrations 
 in the latter branch of science having conducted 
 ^ him, as he conceived, into the central opacity of 
 
 utter darkness, he formed a hasty conclusion " that 
 all human learning is vanity; " and one day, in a 
 ^4 listless mood, taking down a volume of the 
 
 -i^"'"*^ " Reliques of Ancient Poetry," he found, or 
 «ia fancied he found, in the plain language of the old 
 
 V English ballad, glimpses of the truth of things, 
 
 ^5^ which he had vainly sought in the vast volumes of 
 
 ^^ philosophical disquisition. In consequence of this 
 
 - luminous discovery, he locked up his library, 
 
 ^ purchased a travelling chariot, with a shelf in the 
 
 back, which he filled with collections of ballads 
 and popular songs ; and passed the greater part of 
 every year in posting about the country, for the 
 purpose, as he expressed it, of studying together 
 poetry and the peasantry, unsophisticated nature 
 ' and the truth of things. 
 
 Mr Hippy introduced Lord Anophel, and his 
 two learned friends, to Sir Telegraph, and Mrs and 
 Miss Pinmoney. Mr Feathernest whispered to the 
 Reverend Mr Grovelgrub, "This Sir Telegraph 
 Paxarett has some good livings in his gift;" which
 
 The Spirit of Chivalry. 83 
 
 bent the plump figure of the reverend gentleman 
 into a very orthodox right angle. 
 
 Anthelia, who felt no inclination to show parti- 
 cular favour to any one of her Strephons, was not 
 sorry to escape the evil of a sohtary persecutor, 
 more especially as they so far resembled the 
 suitors of Penelope, as to eat and drink together 
 with great cordiality. She could have wished, 
 when she left them to the congenial society of 
 Bacchus, to have retired to company more con- 
 genial to her than that of Mrs Pinmoney and Miss 
 Danaretta ; but she submitted to the course of 
 necessity with the best possible grace. 
 
 She explicitly made known to all her suitors her 
 ideas on the subject of marriage. She had never 
 perverted the simplicity of her mind by indulging 
 in the usual cant of joung ladies, that she should 
 prefe r a singl e.iife : but she assured them that the 
 spirit of the age of chivalry, manifested in the 
 forms of modern life, would constitute the only 
 character on which she could fix her affections. 
 
 Lord Anophel was puzzled, and applied for 
 information to his tutor. " Grovelgrub," said 
 he, " what is the spirit of the age of chivalry ? " 
 
 "Really, my lord," said the Reverend Mr 
 Grovelgrub, " my studies never lay that way." 
 
 " True," said Lord Anophel ; " it was not 
 necessary to your degree." 
 
 His lordship's next recourse was to Mr Feather- 
 nest. " Feathernest, what is the spirit of the age of 
 chivalry ? "
 
 84 Melincourt 
 
 Mr Feathernest was taken by surprise. Since 
 his profitable metamorphosis into an ami du prince^ 
 he had never dreamed of such a question. It 
 burst upon him Uke the spectre of his youthful 
 integrity, and he mumbled a half-intelligible reply 
 about truth and liberty — disinterested benevolence 
 — self-oblivion — heroic devotion to love and 
 honour — protection of the feeble, and subversion of 
 tyranny. 
 J^ "All the ingredients of a rank Jacobin, Feather- 
 f nest, 'pon honour ! " exclaimed his lordship. 
 
 There was something in the word Jacobin very 
 
 grating to the ears of Mr Feathernest, and he 
 
 feared he had thrown himself between the horns of 
 
 a dilemma ; but from all such predicament he was 
 
 happily provided with an infallible means of extri- 
 
 t cation. His friend Mr Mystic, of Cimmerian 
 
 I Lodge, "^ had initiated him in some of the mysteries 
 
 I of the transcendental philosophy, which on this, as 
 
 all similar occasions, he called in to his assistance ; 
 
 and overwhelmed his lordship with a volley of 
 
 ponderous jargon, which left him in profound 
 
 astonishment at the depth of Mr Feathernest's 
 
 knowledge. 
 
 " The spirit of the age of chivalry !" soliloquized 
 Mr O'Scarum \ " I think I know what that is : 
 : I'll shoot all my rivals, one after another, as fast as 
 I can find a decent pretext for picking a quarrel. 
 I'll write to my friend Major O'Dogskin to come 
 to Low Wood Inn, and hold himself in readiness. 
 * Coleridge.— G.
 
 The Spirit of Chivalry. 85 
 
 He is the neatest hand in Ireland at delivering a 
 challenge." 
 
 " The spirit_ofJthe_age of chivalry ! " soliloquized 
 Mr Derrydown ; "I think I am at home there. I 
 will be a knight of the round table. I will be Sir 
 Lancelot, or Sir Gawaine, or Sir Tristram. No : I 
 will be a troubadour — a love-lorn minstrel. I will 
 write the most irresistible ballads in praise of the 
 beautiful Anthelia. She shall be my lady of the 
 lake. We will sail about Ulleswater in our pinnace, 
 and sing duets about MerHn, and King Arthur, 
 and Fairyland. I will develop the idea to her in a 
 ballad : it cannot fail to fascinate her romantic 
 spirit." And he sat down to put his scheme in 
 execution. 
 
 Sir Telegraph's head ran on tilts and tourna- 
 ments, and trials^ skill and courage. How could 
 they be resolved into the forms of modern life ? A 
 four-in-hand 'race he thought would be a pretty 
 substiFute : Anthelia to be arbitress of the contest, 
 and place the Olympic wreath on the head of the 
 victor, which he had no doubt would be himself, 
 though Harum O'Scarum, Esquire, would dash 
 through neck or nothing, and Lord Anophel 
 Achthar was reckoned one of the best coachmen in 
 Ensland. 
 
 ^i:>- 
 
 /^«^^^^^
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF BALLADS. 
 
 HE very indifferent success of Lord Anophel 
 did not escape the eye of his abject slave, 
 the Reverend Mr Grovelgrub, whose 
 vanity led him to misinterpret Anthelia's general 
 sweetness of manner into the manifestation of 
 something like a predilection for himself. Having 
 made this notable discovery, he sate down to cal- 
 culate the probability of his chance of Miss Melin- 
 court's fortune on the one hand, and the certainty 
 of church-preferment, through the patronage of 
 the Marquis of Agaric, on the other. The saga- 
 cious reflection, that a bird in the hand was worth 
 two in the bush, determined him not to risk the 
 loss of the Marquis's favour for the open pursuit of 
 a doubtful success ; but he resolved to carry on a 
 secret attack on the affections of Anthelia, and not 
 to throw off the mask to Lord Anophel till he could 
 make sure of his prize. 
 
 It would have totally disconcerted the schemes 
 of the Honourable Mrs Pinmoney, if Lord Anophel 
 had made any progress in the favour of Anthelia —
 
 The Philosophy of Ballads. Sy 
 
 not not only because she had made up her mind 
 that her young friend should be her niece and Lady 
 Paxarett, but because, from the moment of Lord 
 Anophel's appearance, she determined on drawing 
 lines of circumvallation round him, to compel him 
 to surrender at discretion to her dear Danaretta, 
 who was very willing to second her views. That 
 Lord Anophel was both a fool and a coxcomb, did 
 not strike her at all as an objection; on the con- 
 trary, she considered them as very favourable 
 circumstances for the facilitation of her design. 
 
 As Anthelia usually passed the morning in the 
 seclusion of her library. Lord Anophel and the 
 Reverend Mr Grovelgrub killed the time in shoot- 
 ing ; Sir Telegraph, in driving Mrs and Miss Pin- 
 money in his barouche, to astonish the natives of 
 the mountain-villages ; Harum O'Scarum, Esquire, 
 in riding full gallop along the best roads, looking 
 every now and then at his watch, to see how 
 time went; Mr Derrydo\vn, in composing his 
 troubadour ballad; Mr Feathernest, in writing 
 odes to all the crowned heads in Europe ; and Mr 
 Hippy, in getting very ill after breakfast every day 
 of a new disease, which came to its climax at the 
 intermediate point of time between breakfast and 
 dinner, showed symptoms of great amendment at 
 the ringing of the first dinner-bell, was very much 
 alleviated at the butler's summons, vanished en- 
 tirely at the sight of Anthelia, and was consigned 
 to utter oblivion after the ladies retired from table,
 
 88 Melincourt. 
 
 when the Reverend Mr Grovelgrub lent his clerical 
 assistance to lay its ghost in the Red Sea of a 
 copious libation of claret. 
 
 Music and conversation consumed the evenings. 
 Mr Feathernest and Mr Derrydown were both 
 zealous admirers of old English literature ; but the 
 former was chiefly enraptured with the ecclesi- 
 astical Avriters and the translation of the Bible ; the 
 latter admired nothing but ballads, which he main- 
 tained to be, whether ancient or modern, the only 
 manifestations of feeling and thought containing 
 any vestige of truth and nature. 
 
 "Surely," said Mr Feathernest one evening, 
 "You will not maintain that Chevy Chase is a 
 finer poem than Paradise Lost ? " 
 
 Mr Derrydowji. — I do not know what you 
 mean by a fine poem j but I will maintain that it 
 gives a much deeper insight into the truth of 
 things. 
 
 Mr Feathernest — I do not know what you mean 
 by the truth of things. 
 
 The Rev Mr Grovelgrub. — Define, gentleman, 
 define : let the one explain what he means by a 
 fine poem, and the other what he means by the 
 truth of things. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — A fine poem is a luminous 
 ' development of the complicated machinery of 
 action and passion, exalted by sublimity, softened 
 by pathos, irradiated with scenes of magnificence, 
 figures of loveliness and characters of energy, and
 
 The Philosophy of Ballads. 89 
 
 harmonized with infinite variety of melodious com- 
 bination. 
 
 Lord Aiiophel Achthar. — Admirable ! 
 
 Miss Daiiaretta Constantina Finmoney. — Admir- 
 able, indeed, my lord ! ( With a sweet smile at his 
 Lordships which unluckily missed fire.) 
 
 The Rev. Mr Grovelgrub. — Now, Sir, for the 
 truth of things. 
 
 Mr 0'Scaru??i. — Troth, Sir, that is the last point 
 about which I should expect a gentleman of your 
 cloth to be very solicitous. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Grovelgrub. — I must say. Sir, 
 that is a very uncalled-for and very illiberal 
 observation. 
 
 Mr O'Scarum. — Your coat is your protection, Sir. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Grovelgrub, — I will appeal to his 
 lordship if 
 
 Mr O'Scarum. — I shall be glad to know his 
 lordship's opinion. 
 
 Lord Anophel Achthar. — Really, Sir, I have no 
 opinion on the subject. 
 
 Mr O'Scarum. — I am sorry for it, my lord. 
 
 Mr Derrydown. — The truth of things is nothing 
 more than an exact view of the necessary relations 
 between object and subject, in all the modes of 
 reflection and sentiment which constitute the re- 
 ciprocities of human association. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Grovelgrub. — I must confess I do 
 not exactly comprehend 
 
 Mr Derrydown. — I will illustrate. You all know 
 the ballad of Old Robin Gray.
 
 90 Melincourt. 
 
 Young Jamie loved me well, and asked me for his bride ; 
 But saving a crown, he had nothing else beside. 
 To make the crown a pound my Jamie went to sea, 
 And the crown and the pound they were both for me. 
 
 He had not been gone a twelvemonth and a day, 
 
 When my father broke his arm, and our cow was stolen 
 
 away ; 
 My mother she fell sick, and Jamie at the sea, 
 And old Robin Gray came a-courting to me. 
 
 In consequence whereof, as you all very well know, 
 old Robin being rich, the damsel married the afore- 
 said old Robin. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Grovelgrub. — In the heterodox kirk 
 of the north ? 
 
 Mr Derrydown, — Precisely. Now, in this short 
 space, you have a more profound view than the 
 deepest metaphysical treatise or the most elaborate 
 history can give you of the counteracting power of 
 opposite affections, the conflict of duties and in- 
 clinations, the omnipotence of interest, tried by the 
 test of extremity, and the supreme and irresistible 
 dominion of universal moral necessity. 
 
 Young Jamie loved me well, and ask'd me for his bride ; 
 
 and would have had her, it is clear, though she 
 does not explicitly say so, if there had not been a 
 necessary moral motive counteracting what would 
 have been otherwise the plain free will of both. 
 "Young Jamie loved me well." She does not 
 say that she loved young Jamie; and here is a 
 striking illustration of that female decorum which
 
 The Philosophy of Ballads. 91 
 
 forbids young ladies to speak as they think on 
 any subject whatever: an admirable political 
 institution, which has been found by experience 
 to be most happily conducive to that ingenuous- 
 ness of mind and simplicity of manner which 
 constitute so striking a charm in the generality 
 of the fair sex. 
 
 But saving a crown, he had nothing else beside. 
 
 Here is the quintessence of all that has been said 
 and written on the subject of love and prudence, 
 a decisive refutation of the stoical doctrine that 
 poverty is no evil, a very clear and deep insight 
 into the nature of the preventive or prudential 
 check to population, and a particularly luminous 
 view of the respective conduct of the two sexes 
 on similar occasions. The poor love-stricken 
 swain, it seems, is ready to sacrifice all for love. 
 He comes with a crown in his pocket, and asks 
 for his bride. The damsel is a better arithmeti- 
 cian. She is fully impressed with the truth of the 
 old proverb about poverty coming in at the door, 
 and immediately stops him short, with "What can 
 you settle on me. Master Jamie ? " or, as Captain 
 Bobadil would express it, " How much money ha' 
 you about you, Master Matthew?" Poor Jamie 
 looks very foolish — fumbles in his pocket — pro- 
 duces his crown-piece — and answers like Master 
 Matthew, with a remarkable elongation of visage, 
 *"Faith, I ha'n't past a five shillings or so." 
 "Then," says the young lady, in the words of
 
 92 
 
 Melincourt. 
 
 
 another 
 
 very admirable ballad — where you 
 
 will 
 
 observe 
 
 it is also the damsel who asks 
 
 the 
 
 question 
 
 Will the love that you're so rich in, 
 Make a fire in the kitchen ? 
 
 
 On which the poor lover shakes his head, and the 
 lady gives him leave of absence. Hereupon Jamie 
 falls into a train of reflections. 
 
 Mr O'Scarum. — Never mind his reflections. 
 
 Mr Derrydown. — The result of which is, that he 
 goes to seek his fortune at sea; intending, with 
 the most perfect and disinterested affection, to 
 give all he can get to his mistress, who seems much 
 pleased with the idea of having it. But when he 
 comes back, as you will see in the sequel, he finds 
 his mistress married to a rich old man. The detail 
 of the circumstances abounds with vast and lumin- 
 ous views of human nature and society, and striking 
 illustrations of the truth of things. 
 
 Mr Feather7iest. — I do not yet see that the 
 illustration throws any light on the definition, or 
 that we are at all advanced in the answer to the 
 question concerning Chevy Chase and Paradise 
 Lost. 
 
 Mr Derrydown. — We will examine Chevy Chase, 
 then, with a view to the truth of things, instead of 
 Old Robin Gray : 
 
 God prosper long our noble king, 
 Our lives and safeties all. 
 
 Mr OScarum. — God prosper us all, indeed ! if
 
 The Philosophy of Ballads. 93 
 
 you are going through Chevy Chase at the same 
 rate as you were through Old Robin Gray, there is 
 an end of us all for a month. The truth of things, 
 now! — is it that you're looking for? Ask Miss 
 Melincourt to touch the harp. The harp is the 
 great key to the truth of things : and in the hand 
 of Miss Melincourt it will teach you the music of 
 the spheres, the concord of creation, and the har- 
 mony of the universe. 
 
 Anthelia. — You are a libeller of our sex, Mr 
 Derrydown, if you think the truth of things consists 
 in showing it to be more governed by the meanest 
 species of self-interest than yours. Few, indeed, 
 are the individuals of either in whom the spirit of 
 the age of chivalry survives. 
 
 Mr Derrydown. — And yet, a man distinguished 
 by that spirit would not be in society w^hat Miss 
 Melincourt is — a phoenix. Many knights can wield 
 the sword of Orlando, but only one nymph can 
 wear the girdle of Florimel. 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Ftnmoney. — That would be a very 
 pretty compliment, Mr Derrydown, if there were no 
 other ladies in the room. 
 
 Poor Mr Derrydown looked a little disconcerted : 
 he felt conscious that he had on this occasion lost 
 sight of his usual poHteness by too close an ad- 
 herence to the truth of things. 
 
 Anthelia. — Both sexes, I am afraid, are too 
 much influenced by the spirit of mercenary cal- 
 culation. The desire of competence is prudence ; 
 but the desire of more than competence is avarice :
 
 94 Melincourt. 
 
 it is against the latter only that moral censure 
 should be directed : but I fear that in ninety-nine 
 cases out of a hundred in which the course of true 
 love is thwarted by considerations of fortune, it 
 will be found that avarice rather than prudence is 
 to be considered as the cause. Love in the age of 
 chivalry, and love in the age of commerce, are 
 certainly two very different deities ; so much so, 
 that the former may almost be regarded as a de- 
 parted power \ and, perhaps, the little ballad I am 
 about to sing does not contain too severe an 
 allegory in placing the tomb of chivalric love 
 among the ruins of the castles of romance. 
 
 THE TOMB OF LOVE. 
 
 By the mossy weed-flower'd column, 
 
 Where the setting moonbeam's glance 
 Streams a radiance cold and solemn 
 
 On the haunts of old romance : 
 Knovv'st thou what those shafts betoken, 
 
 Scatter'd on that tablet lone, 
 Where the ivory bow lies broken 
 
 By the monumental stone ! 
 
 When true knighthood's shield, neglected, 
 
 Moulder'd in the empty hall ; 
 When the charms that shield protected 
 
 Slept in death's eternal thrall ; 
 When chivalric glory perish'd 
 
 Like the pageant of a dream, 
 Love in vain its memory cherish'd, 
 
 Fired in vain the minstrel's theme.
 
 The Philosophy of Ballads. 95 
 
 Falsehood to an elfish minion 
 
 Did the form of Love impart ; 
 Cunning plumed its vampire pinion ; 
 
 Avarice tipp'd its golden dart. 
 Love, the hideous phantom flying, 
 
 Hither came, no more to rove : 
 There his broken bow is lying 
 
 On that stone — the tomb of Love !
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE TORRENT. 
 
 iNTHELIA did not wish to condemn her- 
 self to celibacy, but in none of her present 
 suitors could she discover any trace of 
 the character she had drawn in her mind for the 
 companion of her life : yet she was aware of the 
 rashness of precipitate judgments, and willing to 
 avail herself of this opportunity of studying the 
 kind of beings that constitute modern society. 
 She was happy in the long interval between break- 
 fast and dinner, to retire to the seclusion of 
 her favourite apartment ; whence she sometimes 
 wandered into the shades of her shrubbery : some- 
 times passing onward through a little postern door, 
 she descended a flight of rugged steps, which had 
 been cut in the solid stone, into the gloomy glen of 
 the torrent that dashed round the base of the 
 castle rock ; and following a lonely path through 
 the woods that fringed its sides, wandered into the 
 deepest recesses of mountain solitude. The sun- 
 shine of a fine autumnal day, the solemn beauty of 
 the fading woods, the thin* gray mist, that spread
 
 The Torrent. 97 
 
 waveless over the mountains, the silence of the air, 
 the deep stillness of nature, broken only by the 
 sound of the eternal streams, tempted her on one 
 occasion beyond her usual limits. 
 
 Passing over the steep and wood-fringed hills of 
 rock that formed the boundary of the valley of 
 Melincourt, she descended through a grove of 
 pines into a romantic chasm, where a foaming 
 stream was crossed by a rude and ancient bridge, 
 consisting of two distinct parts, each of which 
 rested against a columnar rock, that formed an 
 island in the roaring waters. An ash had fixed its 
 roots in the fissures of the rock, and the knotted 
 base of its aged trunk offered to the passenger a 
 natural seat, over-canopied with its beautiful 
 branches and leaves, now tinged with their 
 autumnal yellow. Anthelia rested awhile in this 
 delightful solitude. There was no breath of wind, 
 no song of birds, no humming of insects, only the 
 dashing of the waters beneath. She felt the 
 presence of the genius of the scene. She sat 
 absorbed in a train of contemplations, dimly 
 defined, but infinitely delightful : emotions 
 rather than thoughts, which attention would have 
 utterly dissipated, if it had paused to seize their 
 images. 
 
 She was roused from her reverie by sounds of 
 music, issuing from the grove of pines, through 
 which she had just passed, and which skirted the 
 hollow. The notes were wild and irregular, but 
 their effect was singular and pleasing. They
 
 98 Melincoiirt. 
 
 ceased. Anthelia looked to the spot from whence 
 they had proceeded, and saw, or thought she saw, 
 a face peeping at her through the trees ; but the 
 gUmpse was momentary. There was in the expres- 
 sion of the countenance something so extra- 
 ordinary, that she almost felt convinced her 
 imagination had created it ; yet her imagination 
 was not in the habit of creating such physiog- 
 nomies. She could not, however, apprehend that 
 this remarkable vision portended any evil to her j 
 for, if so, alone and defenceless as she was, why 
 should it be deferred ? She rose, therefore, to 
 pursue her walk, and ascended, by a narrow 
 winding path, the brow of a lofty hill, which sunk 
 precipitously on the other side, to the margin of a 
 lake, that seemed to slumber in the same eternal 
 stillness as the rocks that bordered it. The 
 murmur of the torrent was inaudible at that eleva- 
 tion. There was an almost oppressive silence in 
 the air. The motion and life of nature seemed 
 suspended. The gray mist that hung on the 
 mountains spreading its thin transparent uniform 
 veil over the whole surrounding scene, gave a 
 deeper impression to the mystery of loneliness, the 
 predominant feeHng that pressed on the mind of 
 Anthelia, to seem the only thing that lived and 
 moved in all that wide and awful scene of 
 beauty. 
 
 Suddenly the gray mist fled before the rising 
 wind, and a deep black line of clouds appeared 
 in the west, that rising rapidly, volume on volume.
 
 TJie Torrent, 99 
 
 obscured in a few minutes the whole face of the 
 heavens. There was no interval of preparation, 
 no notice for retreat. The rain burst down in a 
 sheeted cataract, comparable only to the bursting 
 of a water-spout. The sides of the mountains 
 gleamed at once with a thousand torrents. Every 
 little hollow and rain-worn channel, which but a 
 few minutes before was dry, became instantane- 
 ously the bed of a foaming stream. Every half- 
 visible rivulet swelled to a powerful and turbid 
 river. Anthelia glided down the hill like an Oread, 
 but the wet and slippery footing of the steep de- 
 scent necessarily retarded her progress. When she 
 regained the bridge, the swollen torrent had filled 
 the chasm beneath, and was still rising like a rapid 
 and impetuous tide, rushing and roaring along with 
 boihng tumult and inconceivable swiftness. She 
 had passed one half of the bridge — she had gained 
 the [insular rock — a few steps would have placed 
 her on the other side of the chasm — when a large 
 trunk of an oak, which months, perhaps years, 
 before had baffled the woodman's skill, and fallen 
 into the dingle above, now disengaged by the flood, 
 and hurled onward with irresistible strength, 
 with large and projecting boughs towering high 
 above the surface, struck the arch she had yet to 
 pass, which, shattered into instant ruin, seemed to 
 melt like snow into the torrent, leaving scarcely a 
 vestige of its place. 
 
 Anthelia followed the trunk with her eyes till it 
 disappeared among the rocks, and stood gazing on
 
 100 Melincoiirt. 
 
 the torrent with feelings of awful delight. The 
 contemplation of the mighty energies of nature, 
 energies of liberty and power which nothing could 
 resist or impede, absorbed, for a time, all con- 
 siderations of the difficulty of regaining her home. 
 The water continued to rise, but still she stood 
 rivetted to the spot, watching with breathless 
 interest its tumultuous revolutions. She dreamed 
 not, that its increasing pressure was mining the 
 foundation of the arch she had passed. She was 
 roused from her reverie only by the sound of its 
 dissolution. She looked back, and found herself 
 on the solitary rock insulated by the swelling 
 flood. 
 
 Would the flood rise above the level of the 
 rock ? The ash must in that case be her refuge. 
 Could the force of the torrent rend its massy 
 roots from the rocky fissures which grasped them 
 with giant strength? Nothing could seem less 
 likely : yet it was not impossible. But she had 
 always looked with calmness on the course of 
 necessity : she felt that she was always in the 
 order of nature. Though her life had been a 
 series of uniform prosperity, she had considered 
 deeply the changes of things, and the 7iearness of 
 the paths of 7iight and day* in every pursuit and 
 circumstance of human Hfe. She sate on the stem 
 of the ash. The torrent rolled almost at her feet. 
 Could this be the calm sweet scene of the morn- 
 ing, the ivied bridges, the romantic chasm, the 
 
 * 'E77US 70/3 pvKTos T€ /cat i]iJt.aTQS etcrt /ceXei/^ot.
 
 The Torrent. loi 
 
 stream far below, bright in its bed of rocks, 
 chequered by the pale sunbeams through the 
 leaves of the ash ? 
 
 She looked towards the pine-grove, through 
 which she had descended in the morning; she 
 thought of the wild music she had heard, and of 
 the strange face that had appeared among the 
 trees. Suddenly it appeared again: and shortly 
 after a stranger issuing from the wood, ran with 
 surprising speed to the edge of the chasm. 
 
 Anthelia had never seen so singular a physi- 
 ognomy; but there was nothing in it to cause 
 alarm. The stranger seemed interested for her 
 situation, and made gestures expressive of a design ■-, 
 to assist her. He paused a moment, as if measur- ' 
 ing with his eyes the breadth of the chasm, and 
 then, returning to the grove, proceeded very de- ./ 
 
 liberately to pull up a pine."^ Anthelia thought ^ 
 
 him mad ; but infinite was her astonishment to 
 see the tree sway and bend beneath the efforts of 
 his incredible strength, till at length he tore it from 
 the soil, and bore it on his shoulders to the chasm : 
 where placing one end on a high point of the 
 
 * "lis sont si robustes, dit le traducteur de I'Histoire 
 des Voyages, que dix hommes ne suffiroient pas pour les 
 arreter." — Rousseau. 
 
 "The oran outang is prodigiously strong." — Ancient 
 Metaphysics, vol. iv. p. 51 ; vol. v. p. 4. 
 
 " I have heard the natives say, he can throw down a 
 palm-tree, by his amazing strength, to come at the wine." 
 — Letter of a Bristol Merchant i7i a note to the Origin and 
 Progress of Language ^ book ii. chap. 4.
 
 102 Melincourt. 
 
 bank, and lowering the other on the insulated 
 rock, he ran like a flash of lightning along the 
 stem, caught Anthelia in his arms, and carried her 
 safely over in an instant : not that we should wish 
 the reader to suppose our heroine, a mountaineer 
 from her infancy, could not have crossed a pine- 
 bridge without such assistance; but the stranger 
 gave her no time to try the experiment. 
 
 The remarkable physiognomy and unparalleled 
 strength of the stranger caused much of surprise, 
 and something of apprehension to mingle with 
 Anthelia's gratitude : but the air of high fashion 
 which characterized his whole deportment, dimin- 
 ished her apprehension, while it increased her 
 surprise at the exploit he had performed. 
 
 Shouts were now heard in the wood, from 
 which shortly emerged Mr Hippy, Lord Anophel 
 Achthar, and the Reverend Mr Grovelgrub. 
 Anthelia had been missed at Melincourt at the 
 commencement of the storm, and Mr Hippy had 
 been half distracted on the occasion. The whole 
 party had in consequence dispersed in various 
 directions in search of her, and accident had 
 directed these three gentlemen to the spot where 
 Anthelia was just set down by her polite deliverer, 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton, Baronet. 
 
 Mr Hippy ran up with great alacrity to Anthelia, 
 assuring her that at the time when Miss Danaretta 
 Constantina Pin-money informed him his dear 
 niece was missing, he was suffering under a 
 complete paralysis of his right leg, and was on
 
 The Torrent. 103 
 
 the point of swallowing a potion sent to him by 
 Dr Killquick, which, on receiving the alarming 
 intelligence, he had thrown out of the window, 
 and he beHeved it had alighted on the doctor's 
 head as he was crossing the court. Anthelia 
 communicated to him the particulars of the signal 
 service she had received from the stranger, whom 
 Mr Hippy stared at heartily, and shook hands with 
 cordially. 
 
 Lord Anophel now came up, and surveyed Sir 
 ^ Oran through his quizzing-glass, who making him 
 a polite bow, took his quizzing-glass from him, and 
 examined him through it in the same manner. 
 Lord Anophel flew into a furious passion; but 
 receiving a gentle hint from Mr Hippy, that the 
 gentleman to whom he was talking had just pulled 
 up a pine, he deemed it prudent to restrain his 
 [anger within due bounds. 
 
 The Reverend Mr Grovelgrub now rolled up to 
 the party, muffled in a ponderous greatcoat, and 
 surmounted with an enormous umbrella, humbly 
 soliciting Miss Melincourt to take shelter. An- 
 thelia assured him that she was so completely wet 
 through, as to render all shelter superfluous, till 
 she could change her clothes. On this, Mr 
 Hippy, who was wet through himself, but had 
 not till that moment been aware that he was 
 so, voted for returning to Melincourt with all 
 possible expedition; adding, that he feared it 
 would be necessary, immediately on their arrival, 
 to send off an express for Dr Killquick, for his
 
 I04 Melincourt. 
 
 dear Anthelia's sake, as well as his own. Anthelia 
 disclaimed any intention or necessity on her part 
 of calling in the services of the learned doctor, 
 and, turning to Sir Oran, requested the favour of 
 his company to dinner at Melincourt. This invita- 
 tion was warmly seconded by Mr Hippy, \^ith 
 gestures as well as words. Sir Oran bowed 
 acknowledgment, but pointing in a direction 
 different from that of Melincourt, shook his 
 head, and took a respectful farewell. 
 
 " I wonder who he is," said Mr Hippy, as they 
 walked rapidly homewards : " manifestly dumD, 
 poor fellow ! a man of consequence, no doubt : no 
 great beauty, by-the-by ; but as strong as Hercules 
 — quite an Orlando Furioso. He pulled up a pine, 
 my lord, as you would a mushroom." 
 
 "Sir," said Lord Anophel, "I have nothing to 
 do with mushrooms; and as to this gentleman, 
 whoever he is, I must say, notwithstanding his 
 fashionable air, his taking my quizzing-glass was a 
 piece of impertinence, for which I shall feel 
 necessitated to require gentlemanly satisfaction." 
 , A long, toilsome, and slippery walk brought the 
 party to the castle-gate.
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 LOVE AND MARRIAGE. 
 
 iIR ORAN HAUT-TON, as we conjecture, 
 had taken a very long ramble beyond the 
 limits of Redrose Abbey, and had sat 
 do^vn in the pine-grove to solace himself with his 
 flute, when Anthelia, bursting upon him like a 
 beautiful vision, rivetted him in silent admiration 
 to the spot whence she departed, about which he 
 lingered in hopes of her re-appearance, till the 
 accident which occurred on her return enabled 
 him to exert his extraordinary physical strength 
 in a manner so remarkably advantageous to her. 
 On parting from her and her companions, he 
 ran back all the way to the Abbey, a formid- 
 able distance, and relieved the anxious appre- 
 hensions which his friend Mr Forester entertained 
 respecting him. 
 
 A few mornings after this occurrence, as Mr 
 Forester, Mr Fax, and Sir Oran were sitting at 
 breakfast, a letter was brought in, addressed to 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton^ Baronet^ Redrose Abbey ; a 
 circumstance which very much surprised Mr
 
 ^^ 
 
 ;i 
 
 1 06 Melincourt. 
 
 Forester, as he could not imagine how Sir Oran 
 had obtained a correspondent, seeing that he 
 could neither write nor read. He accordingly 
 took the liberty of opening the letter himself. 
 
 It proved to be from a limb of the law, signing 
 himself Richard Ratstail, and purporting to be a 
 notice to Sir Oran to defend himself in an action 
 brought against him by the said Richard Ratstail, 
 solicitor, in behalf of his client, Lawrence Litigate, 
 Esquire, lord of the manor of Muckwormsby, for 
 that he, the said Oran Haut-ton, did, with force 
 and arms, videlicet, sword, pistols, daggers, blud- 
 geons, and staves, break into the manor of the said 
 Lawrence Litigate, Esquire, and did then and there, 
 with malice aforethought, and against the peace of 
 our sovereign lord the King, his crown and dignity, 
 cut down, root up, hew, hack, and cut in pieces, 
 sundry and several pine-trees, of various sizes and 
 dimensions, to the utter ruin, havoc, waste, and 
 devastation of a large tract of pine-land ; and that 
 he had wilfully, maliciously, and with intent to 
 injure the said Lawrence Litigate, Esquire, carried 
 off with force and arms, namely, swords, pistols, 
 bludgeons, daggers, and staves, fifty cartloads of 
 trunks, fifty cartloads of bark, fifty cartloads of 
 loppings, and fifty cartloads of toppings. 
 
 This was a complete enigma to Mr Forester; 
 and his surprise was increased when, on reading 
 further, he found that Miss Melincourt, of Melin- 
 court Castle, was implicated in the affair, as having 
 aided and abetted Sir Oran in devastating the pine-
 
 Love and Marriage. 107 
 
 grove, and carrying it off by cart-loads with force 
 and arms. 
 
 It immediately occurred to him that the best 
 mode he could adopt of elucidating the mystery 
 would be to call on Miss Melincourt, whom, be- 
 sides, Sir Telegraph's enthusiastic description had 
 given him some curiosity to see ; and the present 
 appeared a favourable opportunity to indulge it. 
 
 He therefore asked Mr Fax if he were disposed 
 for a very long walk. Mr Fax expressed a cordial 
 assent to the proposal, and no time was lost in 
 preparation. 
 
 Mr Forester, though he had built stables for the 
 accommodation of his occasional visitors, kept no 
 horses himself, for reasons which will appear here- 
 after. 
 
 They set forth accordingly, accompanied by Sir 
 Oran, who joined them without waiting for an 
 invitation. 
 
 ** We shall see Sir Telegraph Paxarett," said Mr 
 Forester, "and, perhaps, his phoenix, Miss Melin- 
 court." 
 
 Mr Fax, — If a woman be the object, and a 
 lover's eyes the medium, I should say there is 
 nothing in nature so easily found as a phcenix. 
 
 Mr Forester. — My eyes have no such magical 
 property. I am not a lover, it is true, but it is 
 because I have never found a phoenix. 
 
 Mr Fax. — But you have one in your mind, a 
 beau ideal, I doubt not. 
 
 Mr Forester. — Not too ideal to exclude the
 
 io8 Melincourt. 
 
 possible existence of its material archetype, though 
 I have never found it yet. 
 
 Mr Fax, — You will, however, find a female who 
 has some one at least of the qualities of your 
 imaginary damsel, and that one quaUty will serve 
 as a peg on which your imagination will suspend 
 all the others. This is the usual process of mental 
 hallucination. A little truth forms the basis, and 
 the whole superstructure is falsehood. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I shall guard carefully against 
 such self-deception; though, perhaps, a beautiful 
 chimera is better than either a hideous reality or 
 a vast and formless void. 
 
 Mr Fax, — As an instrument of transitory' 
 pleasure, probably; but very far from it as a 
 means of permanent happiness, which is only con- 
 sistent with perfect mental tranquillity, which again 
 is only consistent with the calm and dispassionate 
 contemplation of truth. 
 
 Mr Forester. — What say you, then, to the senti- 
 ment of Voltaire ? — 
 
 Le raisonneur tristement s'accredite : 
 
 On court, dit on, apres la verite, 
 
 Ah ! croyez-moi, I'erreur a son merite. 
 
 Mr Fax. — You will scarcely coincide with such 
 a sentiment, when you consider how much this 
 doctrine of happy errors, and pleasing illusions, 
 and salutary prejudices, has tended to rivet the 
 chains of superstition on the necks of the grovelling 
 multitude. 
 
 Mr Forester. — And yet, if you take the colouring
 
 Love and Marriage. 109 
 
 of imagination from the objects of our mental per- 
 ception, and pour the full blaze of dayhght into all 
 the dark recesses of selfishness and cunning, I am 
 afraid a refined and enthusiastic benevolence will 
 find httle to interest or delight in the contempla- 
 tion of the human world. 
 
 Mr Fax. — That should rather be considered the 
 consequence of morbid feelings, and exaggerated 
 expectations of society and human nature. It is 
 the false colouring in which youthful enthusiasm 
 depicts the scenes of futurity that throws the gloom 
 of disappointment so deeply on their actual 
 presence. You have formed to yourself, as you 
 acknowledge, a visionary model of female perfec- 
 tion, which has rendered you utterly insensible to 
 the real attractions of every woman you have seen. 
 This exaggerated imagination loses more than it 
 gains. It has not made a fair calculation of the 
 mixture of good and evil in every constituent 
 portion of the world of reality. It has utterly 
 excluded the latter from the objects of its hope, 
 and has magnified the former into such gigantic 
 proportions, that the real goodness and beauty, 
 which would be visible and delightful to simpler 
 optics, vanish into imperceptibiUty in the infinity 
 of their diminution. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I desire no phantasm of abstract 
 perfection — no visionary creation of a romantic 
 philosophy : I seek no more than I know to have 
 existed — than, I doubt not, does exist, though in 
 such lamentable rarity, that the calculations of
 
 no . Melincourt. 
 
 probability make the search little better than 
 desperate. I would have a woman that can love 
 and feel poetry, not only in its harmony and 
 decorations, which limit the admiration of ordinary 
 mortals, but in the deep sources of love, and 
 liberty, and truth, which are its only legitimate 
 springs, and without which, well-turned periods 
 and glittering images are nothing more nor less 
 than the vilest and most mischievous tinsel. She 
 should be musical, but she should have music in 
 her soul as well as her fingers : her voice and her 
 touch should have no one point in common with 
 that mechanical squalling and jingling which are 
 commonly dignified with the insulted name of 
 music : they should be modes of the harmony of 
 her mind. 
 
 Mr Fax. — I do not very well understand that ; 
 but I think I have a glimpse of your meaning. 
 Pray proceed. 
 
 Mr Forester. — She should have chaiLty — not 
 penny charity — 
 
 Mr Fax. — T hope not. 
 
 Mr Forester. — But a liberal discriminating 
 practical philanthropy, that can select with justice 
 the objects of its kindness, and give that kind- 
 ness a form of permanence equally delightful and 
 useful to its object and to society, by increasing 
 the aggregate mass of intelligence and happiness. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Go on. 
 
 Mr Forester. — She should have no taste for 
 what are called public pleasures. Her pleasures
 
 Love mid Marrtas^e. in 
 
 e>' 
 
 should_ be bounded in the circle of her family, and 
 a few, a very few congenial friends, her books, her 
 music, her flowers — she should delight in flowers 
 — the uninterrupted cheerfulness of domestic con- 
 cord, the delightful effusions of unlimited confi- 
 dence. The rocks, and woods, and mountains, 
 boundaries of the valley of her dwelling, she 
 should be content to look on as the boundaries 
 of the world. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Anything more ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — She should have a clear percep- 
 tion of the beauty of truth. Every species of 
 falsehood, even in sportiveness, should be ab- 
 horrent to her. The simplicity of her thoughts 
 should shine through the ingenuousness of her 
 words. Her testimony should convey as irresist- 
 ible conviction as the voice of the personified 
 nature of things. And this ingenuousness should 
 comprise, in its fullest extent, that perfect con- 
 formity of feelings and opinions which ought to 
 be the most common, but is unfortunately the 
 most rare, of the qualities of the female mind. 
 
 Mr Fax. — You say nothing of beauty. 
 
 Mr Forester. — As to what is usually called 
 beauty, mere symmetry of form and features, it 
 would be an object with me in purchasing a 
 statue, but none whatever in choosing a wife. Let 
 her countenance be the mirror of such qualities as 
 I have described, and she cannot be otherwise 
 than beautiful. I think with the Athenians, that 
 beauty and goodness are inseparable. I need not 
 remind you of the perpetual -/.a'kog >.ayadog.
 
 112 Melincourt, 
 
 Mr Fax. — You have said nothing of the 
 principal, and, indeed, almost the only usual con- 
 sideration in marriage — fortune. 
 
 Air Forester, — I am rich enough myself to dis- 
 pense with such considerations. Even were I not 
 so, I doubt if worldly wisdom would ever influence 
 me to bend my knee with the multitude at the 
 shrine of the omnipotence of money. Nothing is 
 more uncertain, more transient, more perishable, 
 than riches. How many prudent marriages of 
 interest and convenience were broken to atoms 
 by the French revolution ! Do you think there 
 was one couple, among all those calculating 
 characters, that acted in those trying times like 
 Louvet and his Lodoiska ? * But without looking 
 to periods of public convulsion, in no state of 
 society is any individual secure against the changes 
 of fortune. What becomes of those ill-assorted 
 unions, which have no basis but money, when, 
 as is very often the case, the money departs, and 
 the persons remain? The qualities of the heart 
 and of the mind are alone out of the power of 
 accident ; and by these, and these only, shall I be 
 guided in the choice of the companion of my life. 
 
 Afr Fax. — Are there no other indispensable 
 qualities that you have omitted in your enumera- 
 tion ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — None, I think, but such as are 
 implied in those I have mentioned, and must 
 necessarily be co-existent with them : an endearing 
 * See Louvet's " Recit de mes Perils."
 
 Love and Marriage. 113 
 
 sensibility, an agreeabl£_£heerfulness, and that 
 
 serenity of temper which is truly the balm of being, ^ -"^^fU*^ 
 
 and the absence of which, in the intercourse off (^ 
 
 domestic life, obliterates all the radiance of beauty, 
 
 all the splendour of talent, and all the dignity of 
 
 virtue. 
 
 Mr Fax, — I presume, then, you seriously 
 purpose to marry, when you can find such a 
 woman as this you have described ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — Seriously I do. 
 
 Mr Fax. — And not till then ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — Certainly not. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Then your present heir presumptive 
 has nothing to fear for his reversion. 
 
 H
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 LOVE AND POVERTY. 
 
 E shall presently," said Mr Fax, as they 
 pursued their walk, " come in sight of 
 a cottage, which I remarked two years 
 ago : a deplorable habitation ! A picture of its 
 exterior and interior suspended in some public 
 place, in every town in the kingdom, with a brief 
 commentary subjoined, would operate in terrorem 
 in favour of the best interests of pohtical economy, 
 by placing before the eyes of the rising genera- 
 tion the lamentable consequences of imprudent 
 marriage, and the necessary result of attachment, 
 of which romance is the foundation, and marriage 
 the super-structure, without the only cement 
 which will make it wind and water tight — 
 money." 
 
 Mr Forester. — Nothing but money ! The 
 resemblance Fluellen found between Macedon 
 and Monmouth, because both began with an M, 
 holds equally true of money and marriage : but 
 there seems to be a much stronger connection in 
 the latter case ; for marriage is but a body, of 
 which money is the soul.
 
 Love and Poverty. 115 
 
 Mr Fax, — It is so. It must be so. The con- 
 stitution of society imperiously commands it to be 
 so. The world of reality is not the world of 
 romance. When a lover talks of lips of coral, 
 teeth of pearl, tresses of gold, and eyes of 
 diamonds, he knows all the while that he is lying 
 by wholesale ; and that no baker in England 
 would give him credit for a penny roll on all this 
 display of his Utopian treasury. All the aerial 
 castles that are founded in the contempt of worldly 
 prudence, have not half the solidity of the cloud- 
 built towers that surround the setting of the 
 autumnal sun. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I maintain, on the contrary, that, 
 let all possible calamities be accuviulated on two 
 affectionate and congenial spirits^ they will find more 
 true happifiess in weeping together thaft they would 
 have found in all the riches of the worlds poiso?ied by 
 the disunion of heart s."*" 
 
 Mr Fax. — The disunion of hearts is an evil of 
 another kind. It is not a comparison of evils I 
 wish to institute. That two rich people fettered 
 by the indissoluble bond of marriage, and hating 
 each other cordially, are two as miserable animals 
 as any on the face of the earth, is certain \ but 
 that two poor ones, let them love each other ever 
 so fondly, starving together in a garret, are there- 
 fore in a less positively wretched condition, is an 
 inference which no logic, I think, can deduce. For 
 the picture you must draw in your mind's eye, is 
 * Rosseau, Emile, liv. 5.
 
 ii6 Melincourt. 
 
 not that of a neatly-dressed, young, healthy-looking 
 couple, weeping in each other's arms in a clean, 
 however homely cottage, in a fit of tender 
 sympathy ; but you must surround them with all 
 *i^;vj^'s^v the squalid accompaniments of poverty, rags, and 
 
 ^\^ " famine, the contempt of the world, the dereliction 
 of friends, half a dozen hungry squalling children, all 
 
 •5v, clothed perhaps in the cutting up of an old blanket, 
 
 ^ duns in presence, bailiffs in prospect, and the long 
 
 ^ perspective of hopelessness closed by the work- 
 
 ^ house or the gaol. 
 
 ^, Mr Forester, — You imagine an extreme case, 
 
 which something more than the original want of 
 fortune seems requisite to produce. 
 
 •^' Mr Fax. — I have heard you declaim very 
 
 bitterly against those who maintain the necessary 
 connection between misfortune and imprudence. 
 
 Mr Forester. — Certainly. To assert that the 
 unfortunate must necessarily have been imprudent, 
 is to furnish an excuse to the cold-hearted and 
 illiberal selfishness of a state of society, which 
 needs no motive superadded to its own miserable 
 narrow-mindedness, to produce the almost total 
 extinction of benevolence and sympathy. Good 
 and evil fortune depend so much on the combina- 
 tions of external circumstances, that the utmost 
 skill and industry cannot command success ; 
 neither is the result of the most imprudent actions 
 always fatal : 
 
 Our indiscretions sometimes serve us well, 
 When our deep plots do pall.* 
 
 * "L'issue aucthorise souvent une tres-inepte conduitte.
 
 Love and Poverty. 117 
 
 Mr Fax. — Sometimes, no doubt ; but not so 
 often as to equalise the probable results of indiscre- 
 tion and prudence. "Where there is prudence," 
 says Juvenal, " fortune is powerless ; " and this 
 doctrine, though liable to exceptions, is replete 
 with general truth. We have a nice balance to 
 adjust. To check the benevolence of the rich, by 
 persuading them that all misfortune is the result of 
 imprudence, is a great evil ; but it would be a 
 much greater evil to persuade the poor, that in- 
 discretion may have a happier result than prudence ; 
 for where this appears to be true in one instance, 
 it is manifestly false in a thousand. It is certainly 
 not enough to possess industry and talent ; there 
 must be means for exerting them ; and in a re- 
 dundant population these means are often wanting, 
 even to the most skilful and the most industrious : 
 but though calamity sometimes seizes those who 
 use their best efforts to avoid her, yet she seldom 
 
 Nostra entremise n'est quasy qu'une routine, et plus com- 
 munement consideration d 'usage et d'exemple que de raison. 
 .... L'heur et la malheur sont a mon gre deux souveraines 
 puissances. C'est imprudence d'estimer que I'humaine prud- 
 ence puisse remplir le roolle de la fortune. Et vaine est 
 I'entreprinse de celuy qui presume, d'embrasser et causes et 
 consequences, et meiner par la main le progrez de son faict. 
 .... Qu'on reguarde qui sont les plus puissans aux villes, 
 et qui font mieulx leurs besongnes, on trouvera ordinairement 
 
 que ce sont les moins habiles Nous attribuons les 
 
 effects de leur bonne fortune a leur prudence Parquoy 
 
 je dy bien, en toutes famous, que les evenements sont maigres 
 tesmoings de nostre prix et capacite." — Montaigne, liv. iii. 
 chap 8.
 
 1 1 8 Melincourt. 
 
 disappoints the intentions of those who leap head- 
 long into her arms. 
 
 M?' Forester, — It seems, nevertheless, peculiarly 
 hard, that all the blessings of life should be con- 
 fined to the rich. If you banish the smiles of love 
 from the cottage of poverty what remains to cheer 
 its dreariness ? The poor man has no friends, no 
 amusements, no means of exercising benevolence, 
 nothing to fill up the gloomy and desolate vacancy 
 of his heart, if you banish love from his dwelHng. 
 "There is one alone, and there is not a second," 
 says one of the greatest poets and philosophers of 
 antiquity : " there is one alone, and there is not 
 a second : yea he hath neither child nor brother ; 
 
 yet is there no end of all his labour : 
 
 neither saith he. For whom do I labour and be- 
 reave my soul of good ? Two are better 
 
 than one for if they fall, the one will lift 
 
 up his fellow ; but woe to him that is alone when 
 he falleth, for he hath not another to help him 
 up." * Society in poverty is better than solitude 
 in wealth j but solitude and poverty together, it 
 is scarcely in human nature to tolerate. 
 
 Mr Fax. — This, if I remember rightly, is the 
 cottage of which I was speaking. 
 
 The cottage was ruined and uninhabited. The 
 roof had fallen in. The garden was choked with 
 weeds. " What," said Mr Fax, " can have become 
 of its unfortunate inhabitants ? " 
 
 Mr Forester, — What were they ? 
 * Ecclesiastes, chap. iv.
 
 Love and Poverty. 119 
 
 Mr Fax. — A couple for whom nature had done 
 much, and fortune nothing. I took shelter in their 
 cottage from a passing storm. The picture which 
 you called the imagination of an extreme case, falls 
 short of the reality of what I witnessed here. It 
 was the utmost degree of misery and destitution 
 compatible with the preservation of life. A casual 
 observer might have passed them by, as the most 
 abject of the human race. But their physiognomy 
 showed better things. It was with the utmost diffi- 
 culty I could extract a word from either of them : 
 but when I at last succeeded I was astonished, in 
 garments so mean and a dwelling so deplor- 
 able, to discover feelings so generous and minds so 
 enhghtened. The semblance of human sympathy 
 seemed strange to them ; little of it as you may 
 suppose could be discovered through my saturnine 
 complexion, and the habitual language of what 
 you call my frosty philosophy. By degrees I 
 engaged their confidence, and he related to me 
 his history, which I will tell you as nearly as I can 
 remember, in his own words.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 DESMOND. 
 
 *Y name is Desmond. My father was a 
 naval officer, who in the prime of hfe 
 was compelled by womids to retire from 
 the service on his half-pay, and a small additional 
 pension. I was his only son, and he submitted to 
 the greatest personal privations, to procure me a 
 liberal education, in the hope that by these means 
 he should live to see me making my way in the 
 world : but he always accompanied his wishes for 
 this consummation, with a hope that I should con- 
 sider money as a means, and not as an end, and 
 that I should remember the only real treasures of 
 human existence were truth, healthy and liberty. 
 You will not wonder, that, with such principles, the 
 father had been twenty years a lieutenant, and that 
 the son was looked on at College as a fellow that 
 would come to nothing. 
 
 I profited little at the University, as you will 
 easily suppose. The system of education pursued 
 there, appeared to me the result of a deep-laid 
 conspiracy against the human understanding, a
 
 Desmond. 1 2 1 
 
 mighty effort__of___pglitical and ecclesiastical 
 machiavelism, to turn the energies of enquiring 
 minds into channels, where they will either 
 stagnate in disgust, or waste themselves in nuga- 
 tory labour. To discover or even to illustrate a 
 single moral truth, to shake the empire of a single 
 prejudice, to apply a single blow of the axe of 
 philosophy to the wide-spreading roots of super- 
 stition and political imposture, is to render a real 
 service to the best hopes of mankind ; but all this 
 is diametrically opposed to the selfish interests of 
 the hired misleaders of society, the chosen few, as 
 they are called, before whom the wretched multitude 
 grovel in the dust as before 
 
 The children of a race, 
 
 Mightier than they, and wiser, and by heaven 
 
 Beloved and favoured more. 
 
 Moral science, therefore, moral improvement, 
 the doctrines of benevolence, the ameHoration of 
 the general condition of mankind, will not only 
 never form a part of any public institution, for the 
 performance of that ridiculous and mischievous 
 farce called the Fi?iishi7tg of Education ; but every 
 art of clerical chicanery and fraudulent misrepre- 
 sentation will be practised, to render odious the 
 very names of philosophy and philanthropy, and 
 to extinguish, by ridicule and persecution, that 
 enthusiastic love of truth, which never fails to 
 conduct its votaries to conclusions very little 
 compatible with the views of those who have 
 built, or intend to build, their own worldly pro-
 
 122 Melincourt. 
 
 sperity, on the foundation of hypocrisy and ser- 
 viKty in themselves, and ignorance and credulity in 
 others. 
 
 The study of morals and of mind occupied my 
 exclusive attention. I had little taste for the science 
 of lines and numbers, and still less for verbal criti- 
 cism, the pinnacle of academical glory. 
 
 I delighted in the poets of Greece and Rome, 
 but I thought that the igneus vigor et ccelestis origo 
 of their conceptions and expressions was often 
 utterly lost sight of, in the microscopic inspection 
 of philological minuti^. I studied Greek, as the 
 means of understanding Homer and ^schylus : I 
 did not look on them as mere secondary instru- 
 ments to the attainment of a knowledge of their 
 language. I had no conception of the taste that 
 could prefer Lycophron to Sophocles, because he 
 had the singular advantage of being obscure \ and 
 should have been utterly at a loss to account for 
 such a phenomenon, if I had not seen that the 
 whole system of public education was purposely 
 calculated to make inferior minds recoil in disgust 
 and terror from the vestibule of knowledge, and 
 superior minds consume their dangerous energies 
 in the difficiles niigce and labor ineptiaruin of its 
 adytum. 
 
 I did not finish^ as it is called, my college educa- 
 tion. My father's death compelled me to leave it 
 before the expiration of the usual period, at the 
 end of which the same distinction is conferred on 
 all capacities, by the academical noometry, not of
 
 Desmond. 123 
 
 merit t^uLo f time. I found myself almost destitute ; 
 but I felt the consciousness of talents, that I 
 doubted not would amply provide for me in that 
 great centre of intellect and energy, London. To 
 London I accordingly went, and became a boarder 
 in the humble dwelling of a widow, who maintained 
 herself and an only daughter by the perilous and 
 precarious income derived from lodgers. 
 
 My first application was to a bookseller in Bond 
 Street, to whom I offered the copyright of a treatise 
 on the Elements of Morals. " My dear sir," said 
 he, with an air of supercilious politeness, " only 
 take the trouble of sitting a few hours in my shop, 
 and if you detect any one of my customers in the 
 act of pronouncing the word 7norals, I will give any 
 price you please to name for your copyright." But, 
 glancing over the manuscript, " I perceive," said 
 he, "there are some smart things here; and though 
 they are good for nothing where they are, they 
 would cut a pretty figure in a Review. My friend 
 Mr Vamp, the editor, is in want of a hand for the 
 moral department of his Review : I will give you a 
 note to him." I thanked him for his kindness, 
 and, furnished with the note, proceeded to the 
 lodgings of Mr Vamp, whom I found in an elegant 
 first floor, lounging over a large quarto, which he 
 was marking with a pencil. A number of books 
 and pamphlets, and fragments of both curiously 
 cut up, were scattered on the table before him, 
 together with a large pot of paste, and an enormous 
 pair of scissors.
 
 1 24 Melincourt. 
 
 He received me with great hauteur, read the 
 note, and said, "Mr Foolscap has told you we 
 are in want of a hand, and he thinks you have 
 a turn in the moral line : I shall not be sorry if 
 it prove so, for we have been very ill provided in 
 that way a long while; and though morals are 
 not much in demand among our patrons and 
 customers, and will not do, by any means, for a 
 standing dish, they make, nevertheless, a very 
 pretty seasoning for our politics, in cases where 
 they might otherwise be rather unpalatable and 
 hard of digestion. You see this pile of pamphlets, 
 these volumes of poetry, and this rascally quarto : 
 all these, though under very different titles, and 
 the productions of very different orders of mind, 
 have, either openly or covertly, only one object ; 
 and a most impertinent one it is. This object is 
 two-fold : first, to prove the existence, to an im- 
 mense extent, of what these writers think proper 
 to denominate political corruption; secondly, to 
 convince the public that this corruption ought to 
 be extinguished. Now, we are anxious to do 
 away the effect of all these incendiary clamours. 
 As to the existence of corruption (it is a villanous 
 word, by-the-by — we call it persuasmi in a tangible 
 shape)', as to the existence, then, oi persiiasio7i iji 
 a tangible shape, we do not wish to deny it ; on 
 the contrary, we have no hesitation in affirming 
 that it is as notorious as the sun at noonday : but 
 as to the inference that it ought to be extinguished 
 — that is the point against which we direct the
 
 Desmond. 125 
 
 full fire of our critical artillery ; we maintain that 
 it ought to exist ; and here is the leading article 
 of our next number, in which we confound in one 
 mass all these obnoxious pubHcations, putting the 
 weakest at the head of the list, that if any of our 
 readers should feel inclined to judge for them- 
 selves (I must do them the credit to say I do not 
 suspect many of them of such a democratical pro- 
 pensity), they may be stopped in lvni?te, by find- 
 ing very little temptation to proceed. The political 
 composition of this article is beautiful : it is the 
 production of a gentleman high in office, who is 
 indebted \.o persuasion i?i a tafigible shape, for his 
 present income of several thousands per annum ; 
 but it wants, as I have hinted, a little moral 
 seasoning ; and there, as ill-luck will have it, we 
 are all thrown out. We have several reverend 
 gentlemen in our corps, but morals are unluckily 
 quite out of their way. We have, on some occa- 
 sions, with their assistance, substituted theology 
 for morals : they manage this very cleverly, but I 
 am sorry to say, it only takes among the old 
 women; and though the latter are our best and 
 most numerous customers, yet we have some very 
 obstinate and hard-headed readers who will not, 
 as I have observed, swallow our politics without 
 a little moral seasoning; and, as I told Mr 
 Foolscap, if we did not contrive to pick up a 
 spice of morals somewhere or other, all the 
 eloquence of persztasion in a ta?igible shape would 
 soon become of little avail. Now, if you will
 
 1 26 Melinconrt. 
 
 undertake the seasoning of this article in such 
 a manner as to satisfy my employers, I will satisfy 
 you : you understand me." 
 
 I observed, that I hoped he would allow me 
 the free exercise of my own opinion ; and that I 
 should wish to season his article in such a manner 
 as to satisfy myself, which I candidly told him 
 would not be in such a manner as seemed likely 
 to satisfy him. 
 
 On this he flew into a rage, and vowed ven- 
 geance against Mr Foolscap for having sent him 
 a Jacobin. I strenuously disclaimed this appella- 
 tion ; and being then quite a novice in the world, 
 I actually endeavoured to reason with him, as if 
 the conviction of general right and wrong could 
 have any influence upon him. ; but he stopped me 
 short, by saying, that till I could reason him out 
 of his pension, I might spare myself the trouble 
 of interfering with his opinions ; as the logic from 
 which they were deduced had presented itself to 
 him in a much more tangible shape than any 
 abstract notions of truth and liberty. He had 
 thought, from Mr Foolscap's letter, that I had a 
 talent for moral theory, and that I was inclined to 
 turn it to account ; as for moral practice, he had 
 nothing to do with it, desired to know nothing 
 about it, and wished me a good-morning. 
 
 I was not yet discouraged, and made similar 
 applications to the editors and proprietors of 
 several daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly 
 publications, but I found everywhere the same
 
 Desmo7id. 127 
 
 indifference or aversion to general principles, the 
 same partial and perverted views : everyone was 
 the organ of some division or subdivision of a 
 faction ; and had entrenched himself in a narrow 
 circle, within the pale of which all was honour, 
 consistency, integrity, generosity, and justice; 
 while all without it was villany, hypocrisy, selfish- 
 ness, corruption, and lies. Not being inclined to 
 imprison myself in any one of these magical 
 rings, I found all my interviews terminate like 
 that with Mr Vamp. 
 
 By the advice and introduction of a college 
 acquaintance, I accepted the situation of tutor in 
 the family of Mr Dross, a wealthy citizen, who 
 had acquired a large fortune by contracts with 
 Government, in the execution of which he had not 
 forgotten to charge for his vote and interest. His 
 conscience, indeed, of all the commodities he 
 dealt in, was that which he had brought to the 
 best market ; though, among his more fair dealing, 
 and consequently poorer neighbours, it was thought 
 he had made the ministry pay too dearly for so 
 very rotten an article. They seemed not to be 
 aware that a corrupt administration estimates con- 
 science and Stilton cheese by the same criterion, 
 and that its rottenness was its recommendation. 
 
 Mr Dross was a tun of man, with the soul of a 
 hazel-nut : his wife was a tun of woman, without 
 any soul whatever. The principle that animated 
 her bulk was composed of three ingredients — 
 arrogance, ignorance, and the pride of money.
 
 128 Melincourt. 
 
 They were, in every sense of the word, what the 
 world calls respectable people. 
 
 Mrs Dross aspired to be somebody^ aped the 
 nobility, and gave magnificent routs, which were 
 attended by many noble personages, and by all 
 that portion of the fashionable world that will go 
 anywhere for a crowd and a supper. 
 
 Their idea of virtue consisted in having no 
 debts, going regularly to church, and feeding the 
 parson ; their idea of charity, in paying the poor- 
 rates, and putting down their names to public 
 subscriptions : and they had a profound contempt 
 for every species of learning, which they associated 
 indissolubly with rags and famine, and with that 
 neglect of the main chance, which they regarded 
 as the most deadly of all deadly sins. But as 
 they had several hopeful children, and as Mrs 
 Dross found it was fashionable to have a gover- 
 ness and a tiitorer, they had looked out for two 
 pieces of human furniture under these denomina- 
 tions, and my capricious destiny led me to their 
 splendid dwelling in the latter capacity. 
 
 I found the governess. Miss Pliant, very ad- 
 mirably adapted to her situation. She did not 
 presume to have a will of her own. Suspended 
 like Mahomet's coffin between the mistress and the 
 housekeeper, despising the one, and despised by 
 the other, her mind seemed unconscious of its 
 vacancy, and her heart of its lonehness. She had 
 neither feelings nor principles, either of good or 
 ill : perfectly selfish, perfectly cold-hearted, and
 
 Desmond. 129 
 
 perfectly obsequious, she was contented with her 
 situation, because it seemed likely to lead to an 
 advantageous estabUshment ; for if ever she thought 
 of marriage, it was only in the light of a system of 
 bargain, in which youth and beauty were very well 
 disposed of when bartered for age and money. 
 She was highly accomplished : a very scientific 
 musician, without any soul in her performance ; a 
 most skilful copier of landscapes, without the least 
 
 ,. taste for the beauties of nature j and a proficient 
 in French grammar, though she had read no book 
 in that language but Telemaque^ and hated the 
 names of Rousseau and Voltaire, because she had 
 heard them called rascals by her father, who had 
 taken his opinion on trust from the Reverend Mr 
 
 ■ Simony, who had never read a page of either of 
 
 (^ them. 
 
 I very soon found that I was regarded as an 
 upper servant — as a person of more pretension, 
 but less utihty, than the footman. I was expected 
 to be really more servile, in mind especially. If 
 I presumed to differ in opinion from Mr or Mrs 
 Dross, they looked at each other and at me with 
 the most profound astonishment, wondering at so 
 much audacity in one of their moveables. I really 
 envied the footman, living as he did among his 
 equals, where he might have his own opinion, as 
 far as he was capable of forming one, and express 
 it without reserve or fear; while all my thoughts 
 were to be those of a mirror, and my motions 
 those of an automaton. I soon saw that I had 
 I
 
 130 Melincotirt. 
 
 but the choice of alternatives : either to mould 
 myself into a slave, liar, and hypocrite, or to take 
 my leave of Mr Dross. I therefore embraced 
 the latter, and determined from that moment 
 never again to live under the roof of a superior, 
 if my own dwelling were to be the most humble 
 and abject of human habitations. 
 
 I returned to my old lodgings, and, after a short 
 time, procured some employment in the way of 
 copying for a lawyer. My labour was assiduous, 
 and my remuneration scanty ; but my habits were 
 simple, my evenings were free, and in the daughter 
 of the widow with whom I lodged I found a con- 
 genial mind : a desire for knowledge, an ardent 
 love of truth, and a capacity that made my volun- 
 tary office of instruction at once easy and de- 
 lightful. 
 
 The widow died embarrassed : her creditors 
 seized her effects, and her daughter was left de- 
 stitute. I was her only friend : to every other 
 human being, not only her welfare, but even her 
 existence, were matters of total indifference. The 
 course of necessity seemed to have thrown her on 
 my protection, and if I before loved her, I now 
 regarded her as a precious trust, confided to me 
 by her evil fate. Call it what you may — imprud- 
 ence, madness, frenzy — we were married. 
 
 The lawyer who employed me had chosen his 
 profession very injudiciously, for he was an honest 
 and benevolent man. Ke interested himself for 
 me, acquainted himself with my circumstances,
 
 Desmond. 131 
 
 and without informing me of his motives, increased 
 my remuneration ; though, as I afterwards found, 
 he could very ill afford to do so. By this means 
 we lived twelve months in comfort, I may say, 
 considering the simplicity of our habits, in pro- 
 sperity. The birth of our first child was an ac- 
 cession to our domestic happiness. We had no 
 pleasures beyond the limits of our humble dwell- 
 ing. Our circumstances and situation were much 
 below the ordinary level of those of well-educated 
 people : we had, therefore, no society, but we were 
 happy in each other : our evenings were conse- 
 crated to our favourite authors ; and the din of the 
 streets, the tumult of crowds and carriages thronging 
 to parties of pleasure and scenes of public amuse- 
 ment, came to us like the roar of a stormy ocean on 
 which we had neither wish nor power to embark. 
 
 One evening we were surprised by an unex- 
 pected visitor j it was the lawyer, my employer. 
 " Desmond ! " said he, " I am a ruined man. For 
 having been too scrupulous to make beggars of 
 others, I have a fair prospect of becoming one 
 myself. You are shocked and astonished. Do 
 not grieve on my account. I have neither wife 
 nor children. Very trivial and very remediable is 
 the evil that can happen to me. * The valiant by 
 himself, what can he suffer?' You will think a 
 lawyer has as little business with poetry as he has 
 with justice. Perhaps so. I have been too partial 
 to both." 
 
 I was glad to see him so cheerful, and expressed
 
 132 Melincourt. 
 
 a hope that his affairs would take a better turn 
 than he seemed to expect. " You shall know 
 more," said he, " in a few days ; in the meantime, 
 here are the arrears I owe you." 
 
 When he came again, he said : " My creditors 
 are neither numerous nor cruel. I have made 
 over to them all my property, but they allow me 
 to retain possession of a small house in Westmore- 
 land, with an annuity for my life, sufficient to 
 maintain me in competence. I could propose a 
 wild scheme to you if 1 thought you would not be 
 offended." 
 
 " That," said I, "I certainly will not, propose 
 what you may." 
 
 " Tell me," said he, " which do you think the 
 most useful and un contaminating implement, the 
 quill or the spade ? " 
 
 " The spade," said I, " generally speaking, un- 
 questionably : the quill in some most rare and 
 solitary instances." 
 
 "In the hand of Homer and Plutarch, of Seneca 
 and Tacitus, of Shakespeare and Rousseau? I 
 am not speaking of them, or of those who, how- 
 ever humbly, reflect their excellencies. But in 
 the hands of the slaves of commerce, the minions 
 of law, the venal advocates of superstition, the 
 sycophants of corruption, the turnspits of litera- 
 ture, the paragraph-mongers of prostituted journals, 
 the hireling compounders of party-praise and cen- 
 sure, under the name of periodical criticism, what 
 say you to it ? "
 
 Desmond. 133 
 
 " What can I say," said I, '•' but that it is 
 the curse of society, and the bane of the human 
 mind ? " 
 
 " And yet," said he, " in some of these ways 
 must you employ it, if you wish to hve by it. 
 Literature is not the soil in which truth and liberty 
 can flourish, unless their cultivators be independent 
 of the world. Those who are not so, whatever be 
 the promise of their beginning, will end either in 
 sycophants or beggars. As mere mechanical in- 
 struments, in pursuits unconnected with literature, 
 what say you to the comparison ? " 
 
 " What Cincinnatus would have said," I 
 answered. 
 
 " I am glad," said he, " to hear it. You are 
 not one of the multitude, neither, I believe, am 
 I. I embraced my profession, I assure you, from 
 very disinterested motives. I considered that, 
 the greater the powers of mischief with which 
 that profession is armed, and, I am sorry to add, 
 the practice of mischief in the generality of its 
 professors, the greater might be the scope of 
 philanthropy, in protecting weakness and counter- 
 acting oppression. Thus I have passed my life in 
 an attempt to reconcile philanthropy and law. I 
 had property sufficient to enable me to try the 
 experiment. The natural consequence is, my 
 property has vanished. I do not regret it, for I 
 have done some good. But I can do no more. 
 My power is annulled. I must retire from the 
 stage of life. If I retire alone, I must have
 
 1 34 Melincourt. 
 
 servants; I had much rather have friends. If you 
 will accompany me to Westmoreland, we will 
 organise a little republic of our own. Your wife 
 shall be our housekeeper. We will cultivate our-- 
 garden. We shall want little more, and that my 
 annuity will amply supply. We will select a few 
 books, and we will pronounce eternal banishment, 
 on pen and ink." — ^ 
 
 I could not help smiling at the earnestness with 
 which he pronounced the last clause. The change 
 of a lawyer into a Roman republican appeared to 
 me as miraculous as any metamorphosis in Ovid. 
 Not to weary you with details, we carried this 
 scheme into effect, and passed three years of 
 natural and healthy occupation, with perfect 
 simplicity and perfect content. They were the 
 happiest of our lives. But at the end of this 
 period our old friend died. His annuity died 
 with him. He left me his heir, but his habitation 
 and its furniture were all he had to leave. I pro- 
 cured a tenant for the house, and we removed to 
 this even yet more humble dwelling. The differ- 
 ence of the rent, a very trifling sum indeed, 
 constituted our only income. The increase of our 
 family, and the consequent pressure of necessity, 
 compelled us to sell the house. From the same 
 necessity we have become strict Pythagoreans. I 
 do not complain that we live hardly : it is almost 
 wonderful that we live at all. The produce of our 
 Httle garden preserves us from famine : but this 
 is all it does. I consider myself a mere rustic.
 
 Desmond. 135 
 
 and very willingly engage in agricultural labour, 
 when the neighbouring farmers think proper to 
 employ me : but they feel no deficiency of abler 
 hands. There are more labourers than means of 
 labour. In the cities it is the same. If all the 
 modes of human occupation in this kingdom, from 
 the highest to the lowest, were to require at once 
 a double number of persons, there would not 
 remain one of them twelve hours unfilled. 
 
 With what views could I return to London? Of 
 the throng continually pressing onward, to spring 
 into the vacancies of employment, the foremost 
 ranks are unfortunately composed of the selfish, 
 the servile, the intriguing ; of those to whose ideas 
 general justice is a chimaera, liberty an empty 
 name, and truth at best a verbal veil for the 
 sycophantic falsehood of a mercenary spirit. To 
 what end could a pupil of the ancient Romans 
 mingle with such a multitude? To cringe, to lie, 
 to flatter? To bow to the insolence of wealth, 
 the superciliousness of rank, the contumely of 
 patronage, that, while it exacts the most abject 
 mental prostration, in return for promises never ^^^ 
 meant to be performed, despises the serviHty it //j 
 fosters, and laughs at the credulity it betrays? ^J 
 
 The wheel of fortune is like a water-wheel, and / /^ 
 human beings are like the waters it disturbs. 
 Many are thrown into the channels of action, 
 many are thrown back to be lost for ever in the 
 stream. I am one of the latter : but I shall not 
 consider it disgraceful to me that I am so, till I
 
 136 
 
 Melincourt. 
 
 see that candour, simplicity, integrity, and intel- 
 lectual power, directed by benevolence and liberty, 
 have a better claim to worldly estimation, than 
 either venal talent prostituted to the wages of 
 corruption, or ignorance, meanness, and imbecility, 
 exalted by influence and interest.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE COTTAGE. 
 
 R FAX (in continuation). — "I cannot help 
 thinking," said I, when Desmond had 
 done speaking, " that you have formed too 
 hasty an estimate of the world. Mr Vamp and 
 Mr Dross are bad specimens of human nature : but 
 there are many good specimens of it in both those 
 vClasses of men. The world is, indeed, full of 
 prejudices and superstitions, which produce ample 
 profit to their venal advocates, who consequently 
 want neither the will nor the power to calumniate 
 and persecute the enlightened and the virtuous. 
 The rich, too, are usually arrogant and exacting, 
 and those feelings will never perish for want of 
 sycophants to nourish them. An ardent love of 
 truth and liberty will, therefore, always prove an 
 almost insuperable barrier to any great degree of 
 worldly advancement. A celebrated divine, who 
 turned his theological morality to very excellent 
 account, and died en bonjie odeiir, used to say, he 
 could not afford to have a conscience^ for it was the 
 most expe?iswe luxury a ma?t could indulge in. So
 
 138 Melincourt. 
 
 it certainly is : but, though a conscientious man 
 who has his own way to make in the world, will 
 very seldom flourish in the sunshine of prosperity, 
 it is not, therefore, necessary that he should sit 
 quietly down and starve." He said he would 
 think of it, and if he could find any loop-hole in 
 the great feudal fortress of society, at which 
 poverty and honesty could creep in together, he 
 would try to effect an entrance. I made more 
 particular inquiry into their circumstances, and 
 they at length communicated to me, but with 
 manifest reluctance, that they were in imminent 
 danger of being deprived of their miserable furni- 
 ture, and turned out of their wretched habitation, 
 by Lawrence Litigate, Esquire, their landlord, for 
 arrears of rent amounting to five pounds. 
 
 Mr Forester. — -Which, of course, you paid ? 
 
 Mr Fax. — I did so : but I do not see that it is 
 of course. 
 
 Mr Forester, Mr Fax, and Sir Oran were still 
 leaning over the gate of the cottage, when a peasant 
 came whistling along the road. " Pray, my honest 
 friend," said Mr Fax, " can you inform me what 
 has become of the family which inhabited this cot- 
 tage two years ago ? " — " Ye'll voind them," said 
 the peasant, " about a mile vurther an, just by the 
 lake's edge like, wi' two large elms by the door, 
 and a vir tree." He resumed his tune and his 
 way. 
 
 The philosophical trio proceeded on their walk. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You have said little of his wife.
 
 The Cottage. 139 
 
 Mr Fax. — She was an interesting creature. 
 With her the feeHngs of misfortune had subsided 
 into melancholy silence, while with him they broke 
 forth in misanthropical satire. 
 
 Mr Forester. — And their children ? 
 
 Mr Fax. — They would have been fine children, 
 if they had been better clothed and fed. 
 
 Mr Forester. — Did they seem to repent their 
 marriage ? 
 
 Mr Fax. — Not for themselves. They appeared 
 to have no wish but to live and die together. For 
 their children, indeed, I could easily perceive they 
 felt more grief than they expressed. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You have scarcely made out your 
 case. Poverty had certainly come in at the door, 
 but Love does not seem to have flown out at the 
 window. You would not have prevailed on them 
 to separate at the price of living in palaces. The 
 energy of intellect was not deadened; the inde- 
 pendence of spirit was not broken. The participa- 
 tion of love communicates a luxury to sorrow, that 
 all the splendour of selfishness can never bestow. 
 If, as has been said, a friend is more valuable than 
 the elements of fire and water, how much more 
 valuable must be the one only associate, the more 
 than friend, to him whom in affliction and in poverty 
 all other friends have abandoned ! If the sun 
 shines equally on the palace and the cottage, why 
 should not love, the sun of the intellectual world, 
 shine equally on both ? More needful, indeed, is 
 its genial light to the latter, where there is no
 
 / 
 
 X 
 
 140 Melincourt. 
 
 worldly splendour to dimmish or divide its 
 radiance. 
 
 With a sudden turn of the road, a scene of mag- 
 nificent beauty burst upon their view: the still 
 expanse of a lake, bordered with dark precipices 
 and fading woods, and mountains rising above 
 them, height on height, till the clouds rested on 
 their summits. A picturesque tourist had planted 
 his travelling-chair under the corner of a rock, and 
 was intently occupied in sketching the scene. The 
 process attracted Sir Oran's curiosity : he walked 
 up to the tourist, who was too deeply engaged to 
 notice his approach, and peeped over his shoulder. 
 Sir Oran, after looking at the picture, then at the 
 landscape, then at the picture, then at the land- 
 scape again, at length suddenly expressed his 
 delight in a very loud and very singular shout, 
 close in the painter's ear, that re-echoed from rock 
 to rock. The tourist sprang up in violent alarm, 
 and seeing the extraordinary physiognomy of the 
 personage at his elbow, drew a sudden conclu- 
 sion of evil intentions, and ran off with great 
 rapidity, leaving all his apparatus behind him. Sir 
 Oran sat down in the artist's seat, took up the 
 drawing utensils, placed the unfinished drawing on 
 his knee, and sat in an attitude of deep contempla- 
 tion, as if meditating on the means to be pursued 
 for doing the same thing himself. 
 
 The flying tourist encountered Messieurs Fax 
 and Forester, who had observed the transaction, 
 and were laughing at it as heartily as Democritus
 
 The Cottage. 141 
 
 himself could have done. They tranquillized his 
 apprehensions, and led him back to the spot. Sir 
 Oran, on a hint from his friend Mr Forester, rose, 
 made the tourist a polite bow, and restored to him 
 his beloved portfolio. They then wished him a 
 good-morning, and left him in a state of nervous 
 trepidation, which made it very obvious that he 
 would draw no more that day. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Can Sir Oran draw? 
 
 Mr Forester. — No : but I think he would easily 
 acquire the art. It is very probable that in the 
 nation of the Orans, which I take to be a barbaroics | 
 nation J that has not yet learned the use of speech^"^ J 
 drawing, as a means of communicating ideas, may 
 be in no contemptible state of fonvardness.f 
 
 * Origin and Progress of Language^ book ii. chap. 4. 
 
 t " I have endeavoured to support the ancient definition 
 of man, and to show that it belongs to the oran outang, 
 though he have not the use of speech. And indeed it 
 appears surprising to me that any man, pretending to be 
 a philosopher, should not be satisfied with the expression 
 of intelligence in the most useful way for the purposes of 
 life ; I mean by actions ; but should require likewise the 
 expression of them, by those signs of arbitrary institution 
 we call words, before they will allow an animal to deserve 
 the name of man. Suppose that, upon inquiry, it should be 
 found that the oran outangs have not only invented the art 
 of building huts, and of attacking and defending with sticks, 
 but also have contrived a way of communicating to the absent^ 
 and recording their ideas by the method of painting or draw- 
 ing, as is practised by many barbarous nations (and the 
 supposition is not at all impossible, or even improbable) ; 
 and suppose they should have contrived some form of govern- 
 ment, and should elect kings or rulers, which is possible,
 
 142 Melincourt. 
 
 Mr Fax. — He has, of course, seen many draw- 
 ings since he has been among civilized men : what 
 so pecuHarly delighted and surprised him in this ? 
 
 Mr Forester. — I suspect this is the first oppor- 
 tunity he has had of comparing the natural original 
 with the artificial copy ; and his delight was excited 
 by seeing the vast scene before him transferred so 
 accurately into so small a compass, and growing, 
 as it were, into a distinct identity under the hand 
 of the artist. 
 
 They now arrived at the elms and the fir-tree, 
 which the peasant had pointed out as the land- 
 marks of the dwelling of Desmond. They were 
 surprised to see a very pretty cottage, standing in 
 the midst of a luxuriant garden, one part of which 
 sloped down to the edge of the lake. Everything 
 bore the air of comfort and competence. They 
 almost doubted if the peasant had been correct in 
 his information. Three rosy children, plainly but 
 neatly dressed, were sitting on the edge of the 
 shallow water, watching with intense delight and 
 interest the manoeuvres of a paper flotilla, which 
 they had committed to the mercy of the waves. 
 
 Mr Fax. — What is the difference between these 
 children and Xerxes on the shores of Salamis ? 
 
 and, according to the information of the Bristol merchant 
 above mentioned, is reported to be actually the case, what 
 would Mr Buffon then say? Must they still be accounted 
 brutes, because they have not yet fallen upon the method of 
 communication by articulate sounds ? " — Origin and Progress 
 of Language^ book ii. chap. 4.
 
 The Cottage. 143 
 
 Mr Forester. — None, but that where they have 
 pure and unmingled pleasure, his feelings began 
 in selfish pride, and ended in slavish fear : their 
 amusement is natural and innocent; his was 
 unnatural, cruel, and destructive, and therefore 
 more unworthy of a rational being. Better is a 
 poor arid wise child than a foolish king that will 
 not be admonished. 
 
 A female came from the cottage. Mr Fax re- 
 cognized Mrs Desmond. He was surprised at the 
 change in her appearance. Health and content 
 animated her countenance. The simple neatness 
 of her dress derived an appearance of elegance 
 from its interesting wearer ; contrary to the fashion- 
 able process, in which dress neither neat nor simple, 
 but a heterogeneous mixture of all the fripperies of 
 Europe, gives what the world calls elegance, where 
 less partial nature has denied it. There are, in this 
 respect, two classes of human beings : Nature makes 
 the first herself, for the beauty of her own creation : 
 her journeymen cut out the second for tailors and 
 mantua-makers to finish. The first, when appar- 
 elled, may be called dressed people — the second, 
 peopled dresses : the first bear the same relation to 
 their clothes as an oak bears to its foliage — the 
 second, the same as a wig-block bears to a wig : 
 the first may be compared to cocoa-nuts, in which 
 the kernel is more valuable than the shell — the 
 second, to some varieties of the Testaceous Mollusca^ 
 where a shell of infinite value covers a stupid fish 
 that is good for nothing.
 
 1 44 Melincou rt. 
 
 Mrs Desmond recognized Mr Fax. "O Sir!" 
 said she, "I rejoice to see you." — "And I rejoice," 
 said Mr Fax, " to see you as you now are : Fortune 
 has befriended you." — "You rendered us great 
 service, sir, in our wretched condition ; but the 
 benefit, of course, was transient. With the next 
 quarter-day Mr Litigate, our landlord, resumed his 
 persecutions ; and we should have been turned out 
 of our wretched dwelling to perish in the roads, 
 had not some happy accident made Miss Mehn- 
 court acquainted with our situation. To know 
 what it was, and to make it what it is, were the 
 same thing to her. So suddenly, when the 
 extremity of evil was impending over us, to be 
 placed in this little Paradise in competence — nay, 
 to our simple habits, in affluence, and in such a 
 manner, as if we were bestowing, not receiving 
 
 favours O sir, there cannot be two Miss Melin- 
 
 courts ! But will you not walk in and take some 
 refreshment ? — we can offer you refreshment now. 
 My husband is absent at present, but he will very 
 soon return." 
 
 While she was speaking he arrived. Mr Fax 
 congratulated him. At his earnest solicitation 
 they entered the cottage, and were delighted with 
 the beautiful neatness that predominated in every 
 part of it. The three children ran in to see the 
 strangers. Mr Forester took up the little girl, Mr 
 Fax a boy, and Sir Oran Haut-ton another. The 
 latter took alarm at the physiognomy of his new 
 friend, and cried and kicked, and struggled for
 
 The Cottage. 145 
 
 release j but Sir Oran, producing a flute from his 
 pocket, struck up a lively air, which reconciled 
 the child, who then sat very quietly on his 
 knee. 
 
 Some refreshment was placed before them, and 
 Sir Oran testified, by a copious draught, that he 
 found much virtue in home-brewed ale. 
 
 " There is a farm attached to this cottage," said 
 Mr Desmond ; " and Miss Melincourt, by having 
 placed me in it, enabled me to maintain my family 
 in comfort and independence, and to educate them 
 in a free, healthy, and natural occupation. I have 
 ever thought agriculture the noblest of human 
 pursuits : to the theory and practice of it I now 
 devote my whole attention, and I am not without 
 hopes that the improvement of this part of my 
 benefactress's estate will justify her generous con- 
 fidence in a friendless stranger : but what can 
 repay her benevolence ? " 
 
 "I will answer for her," said Mr Forester, 
 " though she is as yet personally unknown to me, 
 that she loves benevolence for its own sake, and is 
 satisfied with its consummation." 
 
 After a short conversation, and a promise soon 
 to revisit the now happy family, Mr Forester, Mr 
 Fax, and Sir Oran Haut-ton resumed their walk. 
 Mr Forester, at parting, put, unobserved, into the 
 hand of the little boy, a folded paper, teUing him 
 to give it to his father. It was a leaf which he had 
 torn from his pocket-book : he had enclosed in it
 
 ^\ 146 Melincourf. 
 
 a bank-note, and had written on it with a pencil, 
 
 " Do not refuse to a stranger the happiness of 
 
 ■, ^^ reflecting that he has, however tardily and sligiitly, 
 
 "^ co-operated with Miss Melincourt in a work of 
 
 justice." 
 
 ^
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE LIBRARY. 
 
 R FORESTER, Mr Fax, and Sir Oran 
 Haut-ton arrived at Melincourt Castle. 
 They were shown into a parlour, where 
 they were left alone a few minutes; when Mr 
 Hippy made his appearance, and recognizing Sir 
 Oran, shook hands with him very cordially. Mr 
 Forester produced the letter he had received from 
 Mr Ratstail, which Mr Hippy having read, vented 
 a string of invectives against the impudent rascal, 
 and explained the mystery of the adventure, though 
 he seemed to think it strange that Sir Oran could 
 not have explained it himself Mr Forester shook 
 his head significantly ; and Mr Hippy, affecting to 
 understand the gesture, exclaimed, " Ah ! poor 
 gentleman ! " He then invited them to stay to 
 dinner. " I won't be refused," said he ; "I am 
 lord and master of this castle at present, and here 
 you shall stay till to-morrow. Anthy will be 
 delighted to see her friend here " (bowing to Sir 
 Oran, who returned it with great politeness), "and 
 we will hold a council of war, how to deal with this
 
 148 Melincourt. 
 
 pair of puppies, Lawrence Litigate, Esquire, and 
 Richard Ratstail, Solicitor. I have several visitors 
 here already : lords, baronets, and squires, all 
 Corydons, sighing for Anthy ; but it seems Loves 
 Labour Lost with all of them. However, love and 
 wine, you know ! Anthy won't give them the first, 
 so I drench them with the second : there will be 
 more bottles than hearts cracked in the business, 
 for all Anthy's beauty. Meii die and woriiis eat 
 thenij as usual, but not for love. 
 
 Mr Forester inquired for Sir Telegraph Paxarett. 
 "An excellent fellow after dinner!" exclaimed 
 Mr Hippy. "I never see him in the morning; 
 nor any one else, but my rascal, Harry Fell, and 
 now and then Harry Killquick. The moment 
 breakfast is over, one goes one way, and another 
 another. Anthy locks herself up in the library." 
 
 " Locks herself up in the library ! " said Mr 
 Fax : "a young lady, a beauty, and an heiress, in 
 the nineteenth century, think of cultivating her 
 understanding ! " 
 
 " Strange, but true," said Mr Hippy ; " and here 
 am I, a poor invalid, left alone all the morning to 
 prowl about the castle like a ghost ; that is, when 
 I am well enough to move, which is not always the 
 case. But the library is opened at four, and the 
 party assembles there before dinner ; and as it is 
 now about the time, come with me, and I will 
 introduce you." 
 
 They followed Mr Hippy to the library, where 
 they found Anthelia alone.
 
 The Library. 149 
 
 "Anthy," said Mr Hippy, after the forms of 
 introduction, "do you know you are accused of 
 laying waste a pine-grove, and carrying it off by 
 cart-loads, with force and arms ? " 
 
 Anthelia read Mr Ratstail's letter. " This is a 
 very strange piece of folly," she said : " I hope it 
 will not be a mischievous one." She then re- 
 newed the expressions of her gratitude to Sir Oran, 
 .and bade him welcome to Melincourt. Sir Oran 
 bowed in silence. 
 
 "Folly and mischief," said Mr Fax, "are very 
 nearly allied ; and nowhere more conspicuously 
 than in the forms of the law." 
 
 Mr Forester. — You have an admirable library, 
 Miss Melincourt : and I judge from the great 
 number of Italian books, you are justly partial to 
 the poets of that exquisite language. The apart- 
 ment itself seems singularly adapted to the genius 
 of their poetry, which combines the magnificent 
 simplicity of ancient Greece with the mysterious 
 grandeur of the feudal ages. Those windows of 
 stained glass would recall to an enthusiastic mind 
 the attendant spirit of Tasso ; and the waving of 
 the cedars beyond, when the wind makes music in 
 their boughs, with the birds singing in their shades 
 and the softened dash of the torrent from the 
 dingle below, might with little aid from fancy, 
 be modulated into that exquisite combination of 
 melody which flowed from the enchanted wood at 
 the entrance of Rinaldo, and which Tasso has 
 painted with a degree of harmony not less magical
 
 150 Melincourt, 
 
 than the music he describes. Italian poetry is all 
 fairyland : I know not any description of literature 
 so congenial to the tenderness and delicacy of the 
 female mind, which, however opposite may be the 
 tendency of modern education. Nature has most 
 preeminently adapted to be "a mansion for all 
 lovely forms : a dwelling-place for all sweet sounds 
 and harmonies."* Of these, Italian poetry is a 
 most inexhaustible fountain ; and for that reason 
 I could wish it to be generally acknowledged a point 
 of the very first importance in female education. 
 
 Anthelia. — You have a better opinion of the 
 understandings of women, sir, than the generaHty 
 of your lordly sex seems disposed to entertain. 
 
 Mr Forester. — The conduct of men, in this 
 respect, is much like that of a gardener who should 
 plant a plot of ground with merely ornamental 
 flowers, and then pass sentence on the soil for not 
 bearing substantial fruit. If women are treated 
 only as pretty dolls, and dressed in all the fripperies 
 of irrational education; if the vanity of personal 
 adornment and superficial accomplishments be 
 made from their very earliest years to suppress 
 all mental aspirations, and to supersede all thoughts 
 of intellectual beauty, is it to be inferred that they 
 are incapable of better things ? But such is the 
 usual logic of tyranny, which first places its ex- 
 tinguisher on the flame, and then argues that it 
 cannot burn. 
 
 Mr Fax. — Your remark is not totally just : for 
 * Woodsworth's Tintern Abbey.
 
 The Library. 1 5 1 
 
 though custom, how justly I will not say, banishes 
 women from the fields of classical literature, yet 
 the study of Italian poetry, of which you think so 
 highly, is very much encouraged among them. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You should rather say it is not 
 discouraged. They are permitted to know it : but 
 in very few instances is the permission accompanied 
 by any practical aid. The only points practically 
 enforced in female education are sound, colour,, 
 and form, — music, dress, drawing, and dancing./ 
 The min^is left to take care of itself. 
 
 Mr Fax. — And has as much chance of doing so 
 as a horse in a pound, circumscribed in the 
 narrowest limits, and studiously deprived of, 
 nourishment. 
 
 Anthelia. — The simile is, I fear, too just. To 
 think is one of the most unpardonable errors a 
 woman can commit in the eyes of society. In 
 our sex a taste for intellectual pleasures is almost 
 equivalent to taking the veil ; and though not 
 absolutely a vow of perpetual celibacy, it has 
 almost always the same practical tendency. In 
 that universal system of superficial education which 
 so studiously depresses the mind of women, a 
 female who aspires to mental improvement will 
 scarcely find in her own sex a congenial associate ; 
 and the other will regard her as an intruder on its 
 prescriptive authority, its legitimate and divine 
 right over the dominion of thought and reason : 
 and the general consequence is, that she remains 
 insulated between both, in more than cloistered 
 
 '^■.
 
 152 Melincourt. 
 
 loneliness. Even in its effect on herself, the ideal 
 beauty which she studies will make her fastidious, 
 too fastidious, perhaps, to the world of realities, 
 and deprive her of the happiness that might be her 
 portion, by fixing her imagination on chimseras of 
 unattainable excellence. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I can answer for men. Miss 
 Melincourt, that there are some, many I hope, who 
 can appreciate justly that most heavenly of earthly 
 things, an enlightened female mind ; whatever may 
 be thought by the pedantry that envies, the fopp- 
 ery that fears, the folly that ridicules, or the wilful 
 blindness that will not see its loveliness. I am 
 afraid your last observation approaches most nearly 
 \ to the truth, and that it is owing more to their own 
 '• fastidiousness than to the want of friends and 
 I admirers, that intelligent women are so often alone 
 ]in the world. But were it otherwise, the objection 
 will not apply to Italian poetry, a field of luxuriant 
 beauty, from which women are not interdicted even 
 by the most intolerant prejudice of mascuHne 
 usurpation. 
 
 Aiithelia. — They are not interdicted^ certainly ; 
 but they are seldom encouraged to enter it. Perhaps 
 it is feared, that, having gone thus far, they might 
 be tempted to go farther : that the friend of Tasso 
 might aspire to the acquaintance of Virgil, or even 
 to an introduction to Homer and Sophocles. 
 
 Mr Forester. — And why should she not ? Far 
 from desiring to suppress such a noble ambition, 
 how delightful should I think the task of conducting
 
 The Library. I53 
 
 the lovely aspirant through the treasures of Grecian 
 genius ! — to wander hand-in-hand with such a 
 companion among the valleys and fountains of 
 Ida, and by the banks of the eddying Scamander f 
 through the island of Calypso, and the gardens of 
 Alcinous ;t to the rocks of the Scythian desert :{ 
 to the caverned shores of the solitary Lemnos ; § 
 and to the fatal sands of Troezene ;|1 to kindle in 
 such scenes the enthusiasm of such a mind, and 
 to see the eyes of love and beauty beaming with 
 their reflected inspiration ! Miserably perverted, 
 indeed, must be the selfishness of him who, having 
 such happiness in his power, would, 
 
 Like the base Indian, throw a pearl away, 
 Richer than all his tribe. 
 
 Mr Fax. — My friend's enthusiasm, Miss 
 Melincourt, usually runs away with him when 
 any allusion is made to ancient Greece. 
 
 Mr Forester had spoken with ardour and anima- 
 tion ; for the scenes of which he spoke rose upon 
 his mind and depicted in the incomparable poetry 
 to which he had alluded ; the figurative idea of 
 wandering among them with a young and beautiful 
 female aspirant, assumed for a moment a visionary 
 reality ; and when he subsequently reflected on it 
 it appeared to him very singular that the female 
 
 * The Iliad. t The Odyssey. 
 
 X The Prometheus of /Eschylus. 
 § The Philoctetes of Sophocles. 
 II The Hippolytus of Euripides.
 
 1 54 Melincourt. 
 
 figure in the mental picture had assumed the form 
 and features of AntheUa Melincourt 
 
 Anthelia, too, saw in the animated countenance 
 of Sylvan Forester traces of more than common 
 feehng, generosity, and intelligence : his imaginary 
 wanderings through the classic scenes of antiquity 
 assumed in her congenial mind the brightest 
 colours of intellectual beauty ; and she could 
 not help thinking that if he were what he ap- 
 peared, such wanderings, with such a guide, would 
 not be the most unenviable of earthly destinies. 
 
 The other guests dropped in by ones and twos. 
 Sir Telegraph was agreeably surprised to see Mr 
 Forester • " By-the-by," said he, " have you heard 
 that a general election is to take place immedi- 
 ately ? " 
 
 " I have," said Mr Forester, " and was thinking 
 of putting you and your barouche in requisition 
 very shortly." 
 
 " As soon as you please," said Sir Telegraph. 
 
 The Honourable Mrs Pinmoney took Sir Tele- 
 graph aside, to make inquiry concerning the new- 
 comers. 
 
 The Ho7i. Mrs Pin77ioney. — Who is that very 
 bright-eyed, wild-looking young man ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxareit. — That is my old ac- 
 quaintance and fellow-collegian. Sylvan Forester 
 now of Redrose Abbey, in this county. 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Pinmoney. — Is he respectable ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — He has a good estate, 
 if you mean that.
 
 ■1^ 
 
 
 T/ie Library. 155 
 
 The Ho7t. Mrs Piiunoney. — To be sure I mean 
 that. And who is that tall thin saturnine per- 
 sonage ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — I know nothing of 
 him but that his name is Fax, and that he is now 
 on a visit to Mr Forester at Redrose Abbey. 
 
 The Hon. Airs Pinmoney. — And who is that 
 very tall and remarkably ugly gentleman ? ^- 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — That is Sir Oran Haut- •'/ 
 
 ton, Baronet ; to which designation you may 
 shortly add M.P. for the ancient and honourable 
 borough of Onevote. !^J 
 
 The Hon. Mrs Piiunoney. — A Baronet ! and {«, A 
 M.P. ! Well, now I look at him again, I certainly \ t^ 
 do not think him so very plain : he has a very ji 
 
 fashionable air. Haut-ton ! French extraction, no 
 doubt. And now I think of it, there is something 1 
 very French in his physiognomy."^ 
 
 Dinner was announced, and the party adjourned 
 to the dining-room. Mr Forester offered his hand 
 to AntheHa ; and Sir Oran Haut-ton, following the 
 example, presented his to the Honourable Mrs 
 Pinmoney.f 
 
 * It would be interesting to know whether this remark 
 was rendered by the French translator. — G. 
 
 t " Je I'ai vu presenter sa main pour reconduire les gens 
 qui venoient le visiter ; se promener gravement avec eux 
 et comme de compagnie, &c." — BuFFON. H. N. de 
 V Oran-Outang. 
 
 '■'H
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE SYMPOSIUM. 
 
 HE dinner passed off with great harmony. 
 The ladies withdrew. The bottle re- 
 volved with celerity, under the pfesiH^ 
 ency of Mr Hippy, and the vice-presidency of 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. The Reverend Mr Port- 
 pipe, who was that day of the party, pronounced 
 an eulogium on the wine, which was echoed by 
 the Reverend Mr Grovelgrub, Mr O'Scarum, Lord 
 Anophel Achthar, Mr Feathernest, and Mr Derry- 
 down. Mr Forester and Mr Fax showed no 
 disposition to destroy the unanimity of opinion 
 on this interesting subject. Sir Oran Haut-ton 
 maintained a grave and dignified silence, but de- 
 monstrated by his practice that his taste was 
 orthodox. Mr O'Scarum sat between Sir Oran 
 and the Reverend Mr Portpipe, and kept a sharp 
 look-out on both sides of him ; but did not, 
 during the whole course of the sitting, detect 
 either of his supporters in the heinous fact of a 
 heeltap.
 
 The Symposium. 157 
 
 Mr Hippy. — Dr Killquick may say what he 
 pleases. 
 
 Of mithridate, cordials, and elixirs ; 
 
 But from my youth this was my only physic. — 
 
 Here's a colour ! what lady's cheek comes near it ? 
 
 It sparkles, hangs out diamonds ! O my sweet heart ! 
 
 Mistress of merry hearts ! they are not worth thy favours 
 
 Who number thy moist kisses in these crystals ! * 
 
 The Rev. Mr Portpipe. — An excellent text ! — 
 sound doctrine, plain and practical. When I 
 open the bottle, I shut the book of Numbers. 
 There are two reasons for drinking: one is, 
 when you are thirsty, to cure it ; the other, 
 when you are not thirsty, to prevent it. The first 
 is obvious, mechanical, and plebeian ; the second 
 is most refined, abstract, prospicient, and canonical. 
 I drink by anticipation of thirst that may be. Pre- 
 vention is better than cure. Wine is the elixir of 
 life. " The soul," says St Augustine, "cannot live 
 in drought"! What is death ? Dust and ashes. 
 There is nothing so dry. Wliat is hfe? Spirit. 
 What is Spirit ? Wine. 
 
 Mr C Scarum. — And whisky. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Portpipe. — Whisky is hepatic, 
 phlogistic, and exanthematous. Wine is the hier- 
 archical and archiepiscopal fluid. Bacchus is said 
 to have conquered the East, and to have returned 
 loaded with its spoils. " Marry how ? tropically." 
 
 * Fletcher's ** Sea Voyage." 
 
 t Anima certe, quia spiritus est, in sicco habitare non 
 potest.
 
 
 158 Melincourt. 
 
 The conquests of Bacchus are the victories of im- 
 agination, which, sublimated by wine, put to rout 
 care, fear, and poverty, and revels in the treasures 
 of Utopia. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — The juice of the grape is the 
 liquid quintessence of concentrated sunbeams. 
 Man is an exotic, in this northern climate, and 
 must be nourished like a hot-house plant, by the 
 perpetual adhibition of artificial heat. 
 
 Lord A7iophel Achthar. — You were not always so 
 fond of wine, Feathernest ? 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — Oh, my lord ! no allusion, I 
 beseech you, to my youthful errors. Demosthenes 
 being asked what wine he liked best, answered, 
 / that which he drank at the expense of others. 
 ^ The Rev. Mr Portpipe. — Demosthenes was right. 
 His circumstance, or qualification, is an accompani- 
 ment of better relish than a devilled biscuit or an 
 anchovy toast. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — In former days, my lord, I had 
 no experience that way ; therefore I drank water 
 against my will. 
 
 Lord A?tophel Achthar. — And wrote Odes upon 
 it, to Truth and Liberty. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — "Ah, no more of that, an' thou 
 lovest me." Now that I can get it for a song, I 
 take my pipe of wine a year : and what is the 
 effect? Not cold phlegmatic lamentations over 
 the sufferings of the poor, but high-flown, jovial, 
 reeling dithyrambics " to all the crowned heads in 
 Europe." I had then a vague notion that all was
 
 The Symposium. 1 59 
 
 wrong. Persuasion has since appeared to me in a 
 tangible shape, and convinced me that all is right, 
 especially at court. Then I saw darkly through a 
 glass — of water. Now I see clearly through a glass 
 of wine. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Portpipe {looking through his glass 
 at the light), — An infallible telescope ! 
 
 Mr Forester. — I am unfortunately one of those, 
 sir, who very much admired your Odes to Truth 
 and Liberty, and read your royal lyrics with very 
 different sensations. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — I presume, sir, every man has 
 a right to change his opinions. 
 
 Mr Forester. — From disinterested conviction un- 
 doubtedly : but when it is obviously from mercenary 
 motives, the apostasy of a public man is a public 
 calamity. It is not his single loss to the cause he 
 supported, that is alone to be lamented : the deep 
 shade of mistrust which his conduct throws on that 
 of all others who embark in the same career, tends 
 to destroy all sympathy with the enthusiasm of 
 genius, all admiration for the intrepidity of truth, 
 all belief in the sincerity of zeal for public liberty : 
 if their advocates drop one by one into the vortex 
 of courtly patronage, every new one that arises will 
 be more and more regarded as a hollow-hearted 
 hypocrite, a false and venal angler for pension and 
 place ; for there is in these cases no criterion by 
 which the world can distinguish the baying of a 
 noble dog that will defend his trust till death, from 
 the yelping of a political cur, that only infests the
 
 i6o Melincourt. 
 
 heels of power to be silenced with the offals of 
 corruption. 
 
 Lord Anophel Achthar. — Cursed severe, Feather- 
 nest, 'pon honour. 
 
 Mr Fax. — The gradual falling off of prudent men 
 from unprofitable virtues, is perhaps too common an 
 occurrence to deserve much 7iotice, or justify much 
 reprobation. * 
 
 Mr Forester. — If it were not common, it would 
 not need reprobation. Vices of unfrequent occur- 
 rence stand sufficiently self-exposed in the insulation 
 of their own deformity. The vices that call for the 
 scourge of satire, are those which pervade the whole 
 frame of society, and which, under some specious 
 pretence of private duty, or the sanction of custom 
 and precedent, are almost permitted to assume the 
 semblance of virtue, or at least to pass unstigma- 
 tized in the crowd of congenial transgressions. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — You may say what you please, 
 sir. I am accustomed to this language, and am 
 quite callous to it, I assure you. I am in good 
 odour at court, sir; and you know, Non cuivis 
 homini contingit adire Corinthum. While I was 
 out, sir, I made a great noise till I was let in. 
 There was a pack of us, sir, to keep up your 
 canine metaphor : two or three others got in at the 
 same time : we knew very well that those who 
 were shut out, would raise a hue and cry after us : 
 it was perfectly natural : we should have done the 
 same in their place : mere envy and malice, 
 * Edinburgh Review, No. liii. p. lO.
 
 The Symposium. i6i 
 
 nothing more. Let them bark on : when they are 
 either wanted or troublesome, they will be let in, in 
 their turn. If there be any man who prefers a 
 crust and water, to venison and sack, I am not 
 of his mind. It is pretty and politic to make a 
 virtue of necessity : but when there is an end 
 of the necessity I am very willing that there 
 should be an end of the virtue. If you could live 
 on roots^ said Diogenes to Aristippus, you would 
 have ?iothing to do with kings. — If you could live on 
 kings, replied Aristippus, you would have nothing to 
 do with roots. — Every man for himself, sir, and God 
 for us all. 
 
 Mr Derrydown. — The truth of things on this 
 subject is contained in the following stave : 
 
 This world is a well-furnish'd table, 
 Where guests are promiscuously set : 
 We all fare as well as we're able. 
 And scramble for what we can get. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — Buz the bottle. 
 
 Air O'ScarujH. — Over, by Jupiter ! 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — No. 
 
 Mr O^Scarum. — Yes. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Portpipe. — No. The baronet has 
 a most mathematical eye. Buzzed to a drop ! 
 
 Mr Forester. — Fortunately, sir, for the hopes of 
 mankind, every man does not bring his honour 
 and conscience to market, though I admit the 
 majority do : there are some who dare be honest 
 in the worst of times. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — Perhaps, sir, you are one of
 
 1 6 2 Melincou rt. 
 
 those who can afford to ham a conscience^ and are 
 therefore under no necessity of bringing it to 
 market. If so, you should "give God thanks, and 
 make no boast of it." It is a great luxury certainly, 
 and well worth keeping, coeteris paribus. But it is 
 neither meat, clothes, nor fire. It becomes a good 
 coat well ; but it will never make one. Poets are 
 verbal musicians, and, like other musicians, they 
 have a right to sing and play, where they can be 
 best paid for their music. 
 
 Mr Forester. — There could be no objection to 
 that, if they would be content to announce them- 
 selves as dealers and chapmen : but the poetical 
 character is too frequently a combination of the 
 most arrogant and exclusive assumption of freedom 
 and independence in theory, with the most abject 
 and unqualified venality, servility, and sycophancy 
 in practice. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — It is as notorious^ sir, as the 
 sun at noofiday, that theory and practice are never 
 expected to coincide. If a West Indian planter 
 declaims against the Algerines, do you expect him 
 to lose any favourable opportunity of increasing 
 the number of his own slaves? If an invaded 
 country cries out against spoliation, do you suppose, 
 if the tables were turned, it would show its weaker 
 neighbours the forbearance it required? If an 
 Opposition orator clamours for a reform in Parlia- 
 ment, does any one dream that, if he gets into 
 office, he will ever say another word about it ? If 
 one of your reverend friends should display his
 
 The Symposium. 163 
 
 touching eloquence on the subject of temperance, 
 would you therefore have the barbarity to curtail 
 him of one drop of his three bottles ? Truth and 
 liberty, sir, are pretty words, very pretty words — a 
 few years ago they were the gods of the day — they 
 superseded in poetry the agency of mythology and 
 magic : they were the only passports into the 
 poetical market : I acted accordingly the part of a 
 prudent man : I took my station, became my own 
 crier, and vociferated Truth and Liberty, till the 
 noise I made brought people about me, to bid for 
 me : and to the highest bidder I knocked myself 
 down, at less than I am worth certainly ; but when 
 an article is not likely to keep, it is by no means 
 prudent to postpone the sale. 
 
 What makes all doctrines plain and clear ? 
 About two hundred pounds a year. — 
 And that which was proved true before, 
 Prove false again ? — Two hundred more. 
 
 Mr Hippy. — A dry_discussion ! Pass the bottle, 
 and moisten it. 
 
 Mr b'Scariwi, — Here's half of us fast asleep. 
 Let us make a little noise to wake us. A glee 
 now : I'll be one ; who'll join? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — I. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Portpipe.—hn^ I. 
 
 Mr Hippy. — Strike up then. Silence ! 
 
 Glee— THE GHOSTS. 
 
 In life three ghostly friars were we, 
 And now three friarly ghosts we be.
 
 1 64 Melin court. 
 
 Around our shadowy table placed, 
 
 The spectral bowl before us floats : 
 
 With wine that none but ghosts can taste, 
 
 We wash our unsubstantial throats. 
 
 Three merry ghosts — three merry ghosts — three merry 
 
 ghosts are M'e : 
 Let the ocean be Port, and we'll think it good sport 
 To be laid in that Red Sea. 
 
 With songs that jovial spectres chaunt, 
 
 Our old refectory still we haunt. 
 
 The traveller hears our midnight mirth : 
 
 " O list ! " he cries, " the haunted choir ! 
 
 The merriest ghost that walks the earth, 
 
 Is sure the ghost of a ghostly friar." 
 
 Three merry ghosts — three merry ghosts — three merry 
 
 ghosts are we : 
 Let the ocean be Port, and we'll think it good sport 
 To be laid in that Red Sea. 
 
 Mr Hippy. — Bravo ! I should like to have my 
 house so haunted. The deuce is in it, if three 
 such ghosts would not keep the blue devils at 
 bay. Come, we'll lay them in a bumper of claret. 
 
 {Sir Oran Haut-ton took his flute from his 
 pocket, and played over the air of the glee. The 
 company was at first extre??iely surprised, and then 
 joined in applauding his perfor7)iance. Sir Oran 
 bowed acknoiuledgment, and returned his flute to 
 his pocket.) 
 
 Mr Forester. — It is, perhaps, happy for your- 
 self, Mr Feathernest, that you can treat with so 
 much levity a subject that fills me with the deepest 
 grief. Man under the influence of civilisation has 
 fearfully diminished in size and deteriorated in
 
 TJte Symposium. 165 
 
 strength, /xhe intellectual are confessedly nour- 
 ished at the expense of the physical faculties. Air, 
 the great source and fountain of health and life, can 
 scarcely find access to civilised man, muffled as he 
 is in clothes, pent in houses, smoke-dried in cities, 
 half-roasted by artificial fire, and parboiled in the 
 hydrogen of crowded apartments. Diseases multi- 
 ply upon him in compound proportion. Even if the 
 prosperous among us enjoy some comforts un- 
 known to the natural man, yet what is the poverty 
 of the savage, compared with that of the lowest 
 classes in civilised nations ? The specious aspect 
 of luxury and abundance in one is counterbalanced 
 by the abject penury and circumscription of hun- 
 dreds. Commercial prosperity is a golden surface, 
 but all beneath it is rags and wretchedness. It is 
 not in the splendid bustle of our principal streets 
 — in the villas and mansions that sprinkle our 
 valleys — for those who enjoy these things (even if 
 they did enjoy them — even if they had health and 
 happiness — and the rich have seldom either), bear 
 but a small proportion to the whole population : — 
 but it is in the mud hovel of the labourer — in the 
 cellar of the artisan — in our crowded prisons — our 
 swarming hospitals — our overcharged workhouses 
 — in those narrow districts of our overgrown cities, 
 which the affluent never see — where thousands 
 and thousands of families are compressed within 
 limits not sufficient for the pleasure-ground of a 
 simple squire, — that we must study the true 
 mechanism of political society. When the philo-
 
 1 66 Melincourt. 
 
 sopher turns away in despair from this dreadful 
 accumulation of moral and physical evil, where is 
 he to look for consolation, if not in the progress of 
 science, in the enlargement of mind, in the diffu- 
 sion of philosophical truth ? But if truth is a 
 chimaera — if virtue is a name — if science is not 
 the handmaid of moral improvement, but the ob- 
 sequious minister of recondite luxury, the specious 
 appendage of vanity and power — then indeed, that 
 man has fallen never to rise again* is as much the 
 cry of nature as the dream of superstition. 
 
 The Rev. Mr Portpipe. — Man has fallen, cer- 
 tainly, by the fruit of the tree of knowledge : which 
 shows that human learning is vanity and a great 
 evil, and therefore very properly discountenanced 
 Cby all bishops, priests, and deacons. 
 
 Mr Fax. — The picture which you have drawn of 
 poverty is not very tempting ; and you must ac- 
 knowledge that it is most galling to the most refined 
 feelings. You must not, therefore, wonder that it 
 is peculiarly obnoxious to the practical notions of 
 poets. If the radiance of gold and silver gleam 
 not through the foliage of the Pierian laurel, there 
 is something to be said in their excuse if they 
 carry their chaplet to those who will gild its 
 leaves ; and in that case they will find their best 
 customers and patrons among those who are 
 ambitious of acquiring panegyric by a more com- 
 
 * See the preface to the third volume of the Ancient 
 Metaphysics. See also Rousseau's Discourse on Inequality 
 and that on the Arts and Sciences.
 
 The Symposium. 167 
 
 pendious method than the troublesome practice of 
 the virtues that deserve it. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You have quoted Juvenal, but 
 you should have completed the sentence: "If you 
 see no glimpse of coin in the Pierian shade, you 
 will prefer the name and occupation of a barber 
 or an auctioneer."* This is most just: if the 
 pursuits of literature conscientiously conducted, 
 condemn their votary to famine, let him live by 
 more humble, but at least by honest, and there- 
 fore honourable occupations : he may still devote 
 his leisure to his favourite pursuits. If he produce 
 but a single volume consecrated to moral truth, 
 its effect must be good as far as it goes ; but if he 
 purchase leisure and luxury by the prostitution of 
 talent to the cause of superstition and tyranny, 
 every new exertion of his powers is a new outrage 
 to reason and virtue, and in precise proportion to 
 those powers is he a curse to his country, and a 
 traitor to mankind. 
 
 Mr Feather 7iest. — A barber, sir! — a man of 
 genius turn barber I 
 
 Mr GScariim. — Troth, sir, and I think it is 
 better he should be in the suds himself, than help 
 to bring his country into that situation. 
 
 Mr Forester. — I can perceive, sir, in your excla- 
 mation the principle that has caused so enormous a 
 superabundance in the number of bad books over 
 that of good ones. The objects of the majority 
 
 * Nam si Pieria quadrans tibi nullus in umbra 
 Ostendatur, ames nomen victumque Machjerae, 
 Et vendas potius commissa quod auctio vendit, &c. — Juv.
 
 1 68 Mdinconrt. 
 
 of men of talent seem to be exclusively two : the 
 first, to convince the world of their transcendent 
 abilities; the second, to convert that conviction 
 into a source of the greatest possible pecuniary 
 benefit to themselves. But there is no class of 
 men more resolutely indifferent to the moral 
 tendency of the means by which their ends are 
 accomplished. Yet this is the most extensively 
 pernicious of all modes of dishonesty ; for that of 
 a private man can only injure the pockets of a few 
 individuals (a great evil, certainly, but light in 
 comparison); while that of a public writer, who 
 has previously taught the multitude to respect his 
 talents, perverts w^hat is much more valuable, the 
 mental progress of thousands ; misleading, on the 
 one hand, the shallow believers in his sincerity ; 
 and on the other, stigmatizing the whole literary 
 character in the opinions of all who see through 
 the veil of his venality. 
 
 Mr Feathernest. — All this is no reason, sir, why 
 a man of genius should condescend to be a barber. 
 
 Mr Forester. — He condescends much more in 
 being a sycophant. The poorest barber in the 
 poorest borough in England, who will not sell his 
 vote, is a much more honourable character in the 
 estimate of moral comparison than the most self- 
 satisfied dealer in courtly poetry, whose well-paid 
 eulogiums of licentiousness and corruption were 
 ever re-echoed by the "most sweet voices" of 
 hireling gazetteers and pensioned reviewers. 
 
 The summons to tea and coffee put a stop to 
 the conversation.
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 MUSIC AND DISCORD. 
 
 HE evenings were beginning to give 
 symptoms of winter, and a large fire was 
 blazing in the library. Mr Forester took 
 the opportunity of stigmatizing the use of sugar, 
 and had the pleasure of observing that th£.^i:actice 
 nf A nth el ia. in this respect was the same as his 
 own. He mentioned his intention of giving an 
 anti-saccharine festival at Redrose Abbey, and 
 invited all the party at Melincourt to attend it. 
 He observed that his aunt, Miss Evergreen, who 
 would be there at the time, would send an invita- 
 tion in due form to the ladies, to remove all 
 scruples on the score of propriety ; and added, 
 that if he could hope for the attendance of half 
 as much moral feeling as he was sure there would 
 be of beauty and fashion, he should be satisfied 
 that a great step would be made towards ac- 
 complishing the object of the Anti-saccharine 
 Society. 
 
 The Reverend Mr Grovelgrub felt extremely 
 indignant at Mr Forester's notion " of every real
 
 1 70 Melincourt. 
 
 enemy to slavery being bound by the strictest 
 moral duty to practical abstinence from the luxury 
 which slavery acquires ; " but when he found that 
 the notion was to be developed in the shape of a 
 festiyal, he determined to suspend his judgment 
 till he had digested the solid arguments that were 
 to be brought forward on the occasion. 
 
 Mr O'Scarum was, as usual, very clamorous for 
 music, and was seconded by the unanimous wish 
 of the company, with which Anthelia readily com- 
 pHed, and sung as follows : 
 
 THE FLOWER OF LOVE. 
 
 'Tis said the rose is Love's own flower, 
 Its blush so bright, its thorns so many ; 
 And winter on its bloom has power, 
 But has not on its sweetness any. 
 For though young Love's ethereal rose 
 Will droop on Age's wintry bosom, 
 Yet still its faded leaves disclose 
 The fragrance of their earliest blossom. 
 
 But ah ! the fragrance lingering there 
 Is like the sweets that mournful duty 
 Bestows with sadly-soothing care. 
 To deck the grave of bloom and beauty. 
 For when its leaves are shrunk and dry, 
 Its blush extinct, to kindle never, 
 That fragrance is but Memory's sigh, 
 That breathes of pleasures past for ever. 
 
 Why did not Love the amaranth choose, 
 That bears no thorns, and cannot perish? 
 Alas ! no sweets its flowers diffuse, 
 And only sweets Love's life can cherish.
 
 Music and Discord. 171 
 
 But he the rose and amaranth twined, 
 And Love, their mingled powers assuming, 
 Shall round his brows a chaplet bind, 
 For ever sweet, for ever blooming. 
 
 " I am afraid," said Mr Derrydown, " the flower 
 of modern love is neither the rose nor the amaranth, 
 but the chrysanthemum^ or gold-flower. If Miss 
 Danaretta and Mr O'Scarum will accompany me, 
 we will sing a little harmonized ballad, something 
 in point, and rather more conformable to the truth 
 of things." Mr O'Scarum and Miss Danaretta 
 consented, and they accordingly sung the follow- 
 ing :— 
 
 Ballad Terzetto— THE LADY, THE KNIGHT, AND 
 THE FRIAR. 
 
 THE LADY. 
 
 O cavalier ! what dost thou here, 
 
 Thy tuneful vigils keeping ; 
 
 While the northern star looks cold from far, 
 
 And half the world is sleeping ? 
 
 THE KNIGHT. 
 
 O lady ! here, for seven long year. 
 Have I been nightly sighing, 
 Without the hope of a single tear 
 To pity me were I dying. 
 
 THE LADY. 
 
 Should I take thee to have and to hold, 
 Who hast nor lands nor money ? 
 Alas ! 'tis only in flowers of gold 
 That married bees find honey.
 
 172 Melincourt. 
 
 THE KNIGHT. 
 
 O lady fair ! to my constant prayer 
 Fate proves at last propitious : 
 And bags of gold in my hand I bear, 
 And parchment scrolls delicious. 
 
 THE LADY. 
 
 INIy maid the door shall open throw, 
 For we too long have tarried : 
 The friar keeps watch in the cellar below, 
 And we will at once be married. 
 
 THE FRIAR. 
 
 My children ! great is Fortune's power ; 
 And plain this truth appears, 
 That gold thrives more in a single hour, 
 Than love in seven long years. 
 
 During this terzetto, the Reverend Mr Portpipe 
 fell asleep, and accompanied the performance with 
 rather a deeper bass than was generally deemed 
 harmonious. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett took Mr Forester aside, 
 to consult him on the subject of the journey to 
 Onevote. 
 
 " I have asked," said he, " my aunt and cousin, 
 Mrs and Miss Pinmoney, to join the party, and 
 have requested them to exert their influence with 
 Miss Melincourt to induce her to accompany 
 them." 
 
 " That would make it a delightful expedition, 
 indeed," said Mr Forester, " if Miss Melincourt 
 could be prevailed on to comply." 
 
 " Nil desperanduvi^'' said Sir Telegraph.
 
 Music and Discord. 173 
 
 The Honourable Mrs Pinmoney drew Anthelia 
 into a corner, and developed all her eloquence in 
 enforcing the proposition. Miss Danaretta joined 
 in it with great earnestness ; and they kept up the 
 fire of their importunity till they extorted from 
 Anthelia a promise that she would consider of it. 
 
 Mr Forester took down a splendid edition of 
 Tasso, printed by Bodoni at Parma, and found it 
 ornamented with Anthelia's drawings. In the 
 magic of her pencil, the wild and wonderful scenes 
 of Tasso seemed to live under his eyes : he could 
 not forbear expressing to her the delight he ex- 
 perienced from these new proofs of her sensibility 
 and genius, and entered into a conversation with 
 her concerning her favourite poet, in which the 
 congeniality of their tastes and feelings became 
 more and more manifest to each other. 
 
 Mr Feathernest and Mr Derrydown got into a 
 hot dispute over Chapman's Homer and Jeremy 
 Taylor's Holy Living : Mr Derrydown maintaining 
 that the ballad metre which Chapman had so 
 judiciously chosen, rendered his volume the most 
 divine poem in the world ; Mr Feathernest assert- 
 ing that Chapman's verses were mere doggerel : 
 which vile aspersion Mr Derrydown revenged by 
 depreciating Mr Feathernest's favourite Jeremy. 
 Mr Feathernest said he could expect no better 
 judgment from a man who was mad enough to 
 prefer Chevy Chase to Paradise Lost ; and Mr 
 Derrydown retorted, that it was idle to expect 
 either taste or justice from one who had thought
 
 1 74 Melincourt. 
 
 fit to unite in himself two characters so anomalous 
 as those of a poet and a critic, in which duplex 
 capacity he had first deluged the world with tor- 
 rents of execrable verses, and then written anony- 
 mous-criticisms to prove them divine. " Do you 
 think, sir," he continued, "that it is possible for 
 the same man to be both Homer and Aristotle ? 
 No, sir ; but it is very possible to be both Dennis 
 and Colley Gibber, as in the melancholy example 
 before me." 
 
 At this all the blood of the goiiis irritabile boiled 
 in Mr Feathernest's veins, and uplifting the ponder- 
 ous folio, he seemed inclined to bury his antagonist 
 under Jeremy's weight of words, by applying them 
 in a tangible shape; but wisely recollecting that 
 this was not the time and place 
 
 To prove his doctrine orthodox, « 
 
 By apostolic blows and knocks, 
 
 he contented himself with a point-blank denial of 
 the charge that he wrote critiques on his own 
 works, protesting that all the articles on his poems 
 were written either by his friend Mr Mystic, of 
 Cimmerian Lodge, or by Mr Vamp, the amiable 
 editor of the Legitimate Review. " Yes," said Mr 
 Derrydown, " on the ' Tickle me, Mr Hay ley ' 
 principle ; by which a miserable cabal of doggerel 
 rhymesters and worn-out paragraph-mongers of 
 bankrupt gazettes ring the eternal changes of 
 panegyric on each other, and on everything else 
 that is either rich enough to buy their praise, or 
 vile enough to deserve it : like a gang in a country
 
 Music and Discord. 175 
 
 steeple, paid for being a public nuisance, and 
 maintaining that noise is melody." 
 
 Mr Feathernest on this became perfectly out- 
 rageous; and waving Jeremy Taylor in the air, 
 exclaimed, " Oh that mine enemy had written a 
 book! Horrible should be the vengeance of the 
 Legitimate Review ! " 
 
 Mr Hippy now deemed it expedient to in- 
 terpose for the restoration of order, and en- 
 treated Anthelia to throw in a little musical har- 
 mony as a sedative to the ebullitions of a poetical 
 discord. At the sound of the harp the antagonists 
 turned away, the one flourishing his Chapman and 
 the other his Jeremy with looks of lofty defiance.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 THE STRATAGEM. 
 
 ^l^*.5j5fHE Reverend Mr Grovelgrub, who had 
 acquired a great proficiency in the art of 
 hearing without seeming to hsten, had 
 overheard Mrs Pinmoney's request to Antheha ; 
 and, notwithstanding the young lady's hesitation, 
 he very much feared she would ultimately comply. 
 He had seen, much against his will, a great con- 
 geniality in feelings and opinions between her and 
 Mr Forester, and had noticed some unconscious 
 external manifestations of the interior mind on 
 both sides, some outward and visible signs of the 
 inward and spiritual sentiment, which convinced 
 him that a more intimate acquaintance with each 
 other would lead them to a conclusion, which, for 
 the reasons we have given in the ninth chapter, he 
 had no wish to see estabhshed. After long and 
 mature deliberation, he determined to rouse Lord 
 Anophel to a sense of his danger, and spirit him 
 up to an immediate coup-de-main. He calculated 
 that, as the young Lord was a spoiled child, 
 immoderately vain, passably foolish, and totally 
 unused to contradiction, he should have little
 
 The Stratagem. 177 
 
 difficulty in moulding him to his views. His plan 
 was, that Lord Anophel, with two or three con- 
 fidential fellows, should lie in ambush for Anthelia 
 in one of her solitary rambles, and convey her to 
 a lonely castle of his Lordship's on the sea-coast, 
 with a view of keeping her in close custody, till 
 fair means or foul should induce her to regain her 
 liberty, in the character of Lady Achthar. This 
 was to be Lord Anophel's view of the subject ; 
 but the Reverend Mr Grovelgrub had in the inner 
 cave of his perceptions a very promising image of 
 a different result. As he would have free access 
 to AntheUa in her confinement, he intended to 
 worm himself into her favour, under the cover of 
 friendship and sympathy, with the most ardent 
 professions of devotion to her cause and promises 
 of endeavours to effect her emancipation, involv- 
 ing the accomplishment of this object in a multi- 
 tude of imaginary difficulties, which it should be 
 his professed study to vanquish. He deemed it 
 very probable, that, by a skilful adoperation of 
 these means, and by moulding Lord Anophel, at 
 the same time, into a system of conduct as dis- 
 agreeable as possible to Anthelia, he might himself 
 become the lord and master of the lands and 
 castle of Melincourt, when he would edify the 
 country with the example of his truly orthodox 
 life, faring sumptuously every day, raising the 
 rents of his tenants, turning out all who were in 
 arrear, and occasionally treating the rest with dis- 
 courses on temperance and charity. 
 
 M
 
 178 Melincou rt. 
 
 With these ideas in his head, he went in search 
 of Lord Anophel, and proceeding pedetentim^ and 
 opening the subject peirastically^ he managed so 
 skilfully, that his Lordship became himself the 
 proposer of the scheme, with which the Reverend 
 Mr Grovelgrub seemed unwillingly to acquiesce. 
 
 Mr Forester, Mr Fax, and Sir Oran Haut-ton 
 took leave of the party at Melincourt Castle ; the 
 former having arranged with Sir Telegraph Pax- 
 arett, that he was to call for them at Redrose 
 Abbey in the course of three days, and reiterated 
 his earnest hopes that Anthelia would be persuaded 
 to accompany Mrs Pinmoney and her beautiful 
 daughter, in the expedition to Onevote. 
 
 Lord Anophel Achthar and the Reverend Mr 
 Grovelgrub also took leave, as a matter of policy, 
 that their disappearance at the same time with 
 Anthelia might not excite surprise. They pre- 
 tended a pressing temporary engagement in a 
 distant part of the country, and carried off with 
 them Mr Feathernest the poet, whom, neverthe- 
 less, they did not deem it prudent to let into the 
 secret of their scheme. 
 
 The next day Anthelia, still undecided on this 
 subject, wandered alone to the ruined bridge, to 
 contemplate the scene of her former misadventure. 
 As she ascended the hill that bounded the valley 
 of Melincourt, a countryman crossed her path, and 
 touching his hat passed on. She thought there 
 was something peculiar in his look, but had quite 
 forgotten him, when, on looking back as she de-
 
 The Stratagem. 179 
 
 scended on the other side, she observed him 
 making signs, as if to some one at a distance : 
 she could not, however, consider that they had 
 any relation to her. The day was clear and 
 sunny ; and when she entered the pine-grove, the 
 gloom of its tufted foliage, with the sunbeams 
 chequering the dark-red soil, formed a grateful 
 contrast to the naked rocks and heathy mountains 
 that lay around it, in the full blaze of daylight. 
 In many parts of the grove was a luxuriant laurel 
 underwood, ghttering like silver in the partial sun- 
 beams that penetrated the interstices of the pines. 
 Few scenes in nature have a more mysterious 
 solemnity than such a scene as this. Anthelia 
 paused a moment. She thought she heard a 
 rustling in the laurels, but all was again still. She 
 proceeded : the rustling was renewed. She felt 
 alarmed, yet she knew not why, and reproached 
 herself for such idle and unaccustomed appre- 
 hensions. She paused again to listen; the soft 
 tones of a flute sounded from a distance : these 
 gave her confidence, and she again proceeded. 
 She passed by the tuft of laurels in which she 
 had heard the rustling. Suddenly a mantle was 
 thrown over her. She was wrapped in dark- 
 ness, and felt that she was forcibly seized by 
 several persons, who carried her rapidly along. 
 She screamed, but the mantle was immediately 
 pressed on her mouth, and she was hurried on- 
 ward. After a time the party stopped : a tumult 
 ensued : she found herself at liberty, and threw
 
 J 
 
 i>^ 
 
 xX 
 
 I 
 
 1 80 Melincourt. 
 
 the mantle from her head. She was on a road 
 at the verge of the pine-grove : a chaise-and-four 
 was waiting. Two men were running away in 
 the distance : two others, muffled and masked, 
 were rolHng on the ground, and roaring for mercy, 
 while Sir Oran Haut-ton was standing over them 
 with a stick,"* and treating them as if he were a 
 thresher, and they were sheaves of corn. By 
 her side was Mr Forester, who, taking her hand, 
 assured her that she was in safety, while at the 
 same time he endeavoured to assuage Sir Oran's 
 wrath, that he might raise and unmask the fallen 
 foes. Sir Oran, however, proceeded in his sum- 
 mary administration of natural justice till he had 
 dispensed what was to his notion a quatiiiim siifficit 
 of the appHcation : then throwing his stick aside, 
 he caught them both up, one under each arm, 
 and climbing with great dexterity a high and pre- 
 cipitous rock, left them perched upon its summit, 
 bringing away their masks in his hand, and 
 making them a profound bow at taking leave.! 
 
 * " They use an artificial weapon for attack and defence, 
 viz., a stick, which no animal meiely brute is known to do." 
 — Origin and Progress of Language^ book ii. chap. 4. 
 
 t ' ' There is a story of one of them, which seems to show 
 they have a sense of justice as well as honour. For a negro 
 having shot a female of this kind, that was feeding among 
 his Indian corn, the male, whom our author calls the 
 husband of this female, pursued the negro into his house, 
 of which having forced open the door, he seized the negro 
 and dragged him out of the house to the place where his 
 wife lay dead or wounded, and the people of the neighbour- 
 hood could not rescue the negro, nor force the oran to quit
 
 The Stratagem. i8i 
 
 Mr Forester was anxious to follow them to their 
 aerial seat, that he might ascertain who they were, 
 which Sir Oran's precipitation had put it out of 
 his power to do ; but Anthelia begged him to 
 return with her immediately to the Castle, assuring 
 him that she thought them already sufficiently 
 punished, and had no apprehension that they 
 would feel tempted again to molest her. 
 
 Sir Oran now opened the chaise-door, and drew 
 out the post-boys by the leg, who, at the be- 
 ginning of the fray, had concealed themselves 
 from his fury under the seat. Mr Forester suc- 
 ceeded in rescuing them from Sir Oran, and en- 
 deavoured to extract from them information as to 
 their employers : but the boys declared that they 
 knew nothing of them, the chaise having been 
 ordered by a strange man to be in waiting at that 
 place, and the hire paid in advance. 
 
 Anthelia, as she walked homeward, leaning on 
 Mr Forester's ar<n, inquired to what happy accident 
 she was indebted for the timely intervention of 
 himself and Sir Oran Haut-ton. Mr Forester 
 informed her, that having a great wish to visit 
 the scene which had been the means of intro- 
 ducing him to her acquaintance, he had made 
 Sir Oran understand his desire, and they had 
 accordingly set out together, leaving Mr Fax at 
 Redrose Abbey, deeply engaged in the solution 
 of a problem in political arithmetic. 
 
 his hold of him, till they shot him likewise." — Origin and 
 Progress of Language^ book ii. chap. 4.
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 THE EXCURSION. 
 
 ;NTHELIA found, from what Mr Forester 
 had said, that she had excited a much 
 greater interest in his mind than she had 
 previously supposed ; and she did not dissemble 
 to herself that the interest was reciprocal. The 
 occurrence of the morning, by taking the feeling 
 of safety from her solitary walks, and unhinging 
 her long associations with the freedom and security 
 of her native mountains, gave her an inclination 
 to depart for a time at least from Mehncourt 
 Castle; and this inclination, combining with the 
 wish to see more of one who appeared to possess 
 so much intellectual superiority to the generality 
 of mankind, rendered her very flexible to Mrs 
 Pinmoney's wishes, when that honourable lady 
 renewed her solicitations to her to join the ex- 
 pedition to Onevote. Anthelia, however, desired 
 that Mr Hippy might be of the party, and that 
 her going in Sir Telegraph's carriage should not 
 be construed in any degree into a reception of 
 his addresses. The Honourable Mrs Pinmoney, 
 
 iBRARY
 
 The Excursion. 183 
 
 delighted to carry her point, readily complied 
 with the condition, trusting to the influence of 
 time and intimacy to promote her own wishes, 
 and the happiness of her dear nephew. 
 
 Mr Hippy was so overjoyed at the project, that, 
 in the first ebullitions of his transport, meeting 
 Harry Fell on the landing-place, with a packet of 
 medicine from Dr Killquick, he seized him by the 
 arm, and made him dance a pas de deux: the 
 packet fell to the earth, and Mr Hippy, as he 
 whirled old Harry round to the tune of La Belle 
 Laitiere, danced over that which, but for this timely 
 demolition, might have given his heir an opportun- 
 ity of dancing over him. 
 
 It was accordingly arranged that Sir Telegraph 
 Paxarett, with the ladies and Mr Hippy, should 
 call on the appointed day at Redrose Abbey for 
 Mr Forester, Mr Fax, and Sir Oran Haut-ton. 
 
 Mr Derrydown and Mr O'Scarum were incon- 
 solable on .the occasion, notwithstanding Mr 
 Hippy's assurance that they should very soon 
 return, and that the hospitality of Melincourt Castle 
 should then be resumed under his supreme juris- 
 diction. Mr Derrydown determined to consume 
 the interval at Keswick, in the composition of 
 dismal ballads ; and Mr O'Scarum to proceed to 
 Low-wood Inn, and drown his cares in claret with 
 Major O'Dogskin. 
 
 We shall pass over the interval till the arrival of 
 the eventful day on which Mr Forester, from the 
 windows of Redrose Abbey, watched the approach
 
 1 84 Melinconrt. 
 
 of Sir Telegraph's barouche. The party from 
 Melincourt arrived, as had been concerted, to 
 breakfast : after which, they surveyed the Abbey, v 
 and perambulated the grounds. Mr Forester? . 
 produced the Abbot's skull,"^ and took occasiom^^ 
 to expatiate very largely on the diminution oC^ 
 the size of mankind ; illustrating his theory b)?i^ 
 quotations and anecdotes from Homer,t Herodo- 
 
 * See Chap. IV. 
 
 t " Homer has said nothing, positively, of the size of any 
 of his heroes, but only comparatively, as I shall presently 
 observe : nor is this to be wondered at ; for I know no 
 historian, ancient or modern, that says anything of the size of 
 the men of his own nation, except comparatively with that of 
 other nations. But in that fine episode of his, called by the 
 ancient critics the Tetxo(r/co7rta or Prospect from the Walls, 
 he has given us a very accurate description of the persons of 
 several of the Greek heroes"; which I am persuaded he had 
 from very good information. Tn this description he tells us, 
 that Ulysses was shorter than Agamemnon by the head, 
 shorter than Menelaus by the head and shoulders, and 
 that Ajax was taller than any of the Greeks by the head and 
 shoulders ; consequently, Ulysses was shorter than Ajax by 
 two heads and shoulders, which we cannot reckon less than 
 four feet. Now, if we suppose these heroes to have been no 
 bigger than we, then Ajax must have been a man about six 
 feet and a half, or at most seven feet ; and if so Ulysses must 
 have been most contemptibly short, not more than three feet, 
 which is certainly not the truth, but a most absurd and 
 ridiculous fiction, such as we cannot suppose in Homer : 
 whereas, if we allow Ajax to have been twelve or thirteen 
 feet high, and, much more, if we suppose him to have been 
 eleven cubits, as Philostratus makes him, Ulysses, though 
 four feet short of him, would have been of a good size, and, 
 with the extraordinary breadth which Homer observes he
 
 The Excursion. 185 
 
 tus,*Arrian, Plutarch, Philostratus, Pausanias, and 
 Solinus Polyhistor. He asked if it were possible 
 
 had, may have been as strong a man as Ajax." — Ancient 
 Metaphysics, vol. iii. p. 146. 
 
 * *' It was only in after-ages, when the size of men was 
 greatly decreased, that the bodies of those heroes, if they 
 happened to be discovered, were, as was natural, admired 
 and exactly measured. Such a thing happened in Laconia, 
 where the body of Orestes was discovered, and found to be of 
 length seven cubits, that is, ten feet and a half. The story is 
 most pleasantly told by Herodotus, and is to this effect : The 
 Lacedemonians were engaged in a war with the Tegeatoe, a 
 people of Arcadia, in which they were unsuccessful. They 
 consulted the oracle at Delphi, what they should do in order 
 to be more successful. The oracle answered, ' That they 
 must bring to Sparta the bones of Orestes, the son of Aga- 
 memnon.' But these bones they could not find, and there- 
 fore they sent again to the oracle to inquire where Orestes 
 lay buried. The god answered in hexameter verse, but so 
 obscurely and enigmatically, that they could not understand 
 what he meant. They went about inquiring everywhere for 
 the bones of Orestes, till at last a wise man among them, 
 called by Herodotus Liches, found them out, partly by good 
 fortune, and partly by good understanding ; for, happening 
 to come one day to a smith's shop in the country of the 
 Tegeatse, with whom at that time there was a truce and 
 intercourse betwixt the two nations, he looked at the opera- 
 tions of the smith, and seemed to admire them very much ; 
 which the smith observing, stopped his work, and, 
 ' Stranger,' says he, * you that seem to admire so much the 
 working of iron, would have wondered much more if you had 
 seen what I saw lately ; for, as I was digging for a well in 
 this court here, I fell upon a coffin that was seven cubits 
 long ; but believing that there never were at any time bigger 
 v?en than the present, I opened the coffin, and found there a 
 dead body as long as the coffin, which having measured I
 
 I S6 Melincourt. 
 
 that men of such a stature, as they have dwindled 
 to in the present age, could have erected that 
 
 again buried.' Hearing this, the Spartan conjectured that 
 the words of the oracle would apply to a smith's shop, and 
 to the operations there performed ; but taking care not to 
 make this discovery to the smith, he prevailed on him, with 
 much difficulty, to give him a lease of the court ; which 
 having obtained, he opened the coffin, and carried the bones 
 to Sparta. After which, says our author, the Spartans were 
 upon every occasion superior in fight to the Tegeatse." — 
 Ancient Metaphysics, vol. iii. p. 146. 
 
 " The most of our philosophers at present are, I beheve, 
 of the opinion of the smith in Herodotus, who might be 
 excused for having that opinion at a time when perhaps no 
 other heroic body had been discovered. But in later times, 
 I believe there was not the most vulgar man in Greece, who 
 did not believe that those heroes were very much superior, 
 both in mind and body, to the men of after-times. Indeed, 
 they were not considered as mere men, but as something 
 betwixt gods and men, and had heroic honours paid them, 
 which were next to the divine. On the stage they were 
 represented as of extraordinary size, both as to length and 
 breadth ; for the actor was not only raised upon very high 
 shoes, which they called cothurns, but he was put into a 
 case that swelled his size prodigiously (and I have some- 
 where read a very ridiculous story of one of them, who, 
 coming upon the stage, fell and broke his case, so that all 
 the trash with which it was stuffed, came out and was scat- 
 tered upon the stage in the view of the whole people). 
 This accounts for the high style of ancient tragedy, in which 
 the heroes speak a language so uncommon, that, if I con- 
 sidered them as men nowise superior to us, I should think 
 it little better than fustian, and should be apt to apply to 
 it what Falstaff says to Pistol : ' Pr'ythee, Pistol, speak like 
 a man of this world.' And I apply the same observation to 
 Homer's poems. If I considered his heroes as no more
 
 The Excursion. 187 
 
 stupendous monument of human strength, Stone- 
 henge? in the vicinity of which, he said, a body 
 had been dug up, measuring fourteen feet ten 
 inches in length.* 
 
 than men of this world, I should consider the things he 
 relates of them as quite ridiculous ; but believing them to 
 be men very much superior to us, I read Homer with the 
 highest admiration, not only as a poet, but as the historian 
 of the noblest race of men that ever existed. Thus, by 
 having right notions of the superiority of men in former 
 times, we both improve our philosophy of man, and our 
 taste in poetry." — Ancient Metaphysics, vol. iii. p. 150. 
 
 * " But though we should give no credit to those ancient 
 authors, there are monuments still extant, one particularly 
 to be seen in our own island, which I think ought to con- 
 vince every man that the men of ancient times were much 
 superior to us, at least in the powers of the body. The 
 monument I mean is well known by the name of Stone- 
 henge, and there are several of the same kind to be seen in 
 Denmark and Germany. I desire to know where are the 
 arms now, that, with so little help of machinery as they 
 must have had, could have raised and set up on end such a 
 number of prodigious stones, and put others on the top of 
 them, likewise of very great size ? Such works are said by 
 the peasants in Germany to be the works of giants, and I 
 think they must have been giants compared with us. And, 
 indeed, the men who erected Stonehenge could not, I 
 imagine, be of size inferior to that man whose body was 
 found in a quarry near to Salisbury, within a mile of which 
 Stonehenge stands. The body of that man was fourteen 
 feet ten inches. The fact is attested by an eye-witness, one 
 Elyote, who writes, I believe, the first English-Latin Dic- 
 tionary that ever was published. It is printed in London 
 in 1542, in folio, and has, under the word Gigas, the follow- 
 ing passage : ' About thirty years past and somewhat more, 
 I myself beynge with my father Syr Rycharde Elyote, at a
 
 1 88 Melincourt. 
 
 The barouche bowled off from the Abbey gates, 
 carrying four inside, and eight out ; videUcet, the 
 
 monastery of regular canons, called Juy Churche, two myles 
 from the citie of Sarisburye, beholde the bones of a deade 
 man founde deep in the grounde, where they dygged stone, 
 which being joined togyther, was in length xiiii feet and 
 ten ynches, there beynge mette ; whereof one of the teethe 
 my father hadde, whych was of the quantytie of a great 
 walnutte. This have I wrytten, because some menne wylle 
 believe nothynge that is out of the com passe of they re owne 
 knowledge, and yet some of them presume to have know- 
 ledge, above any other, contempnynge all men but themselfes 
 or suche as they favour.' It is for the reason mentioned by 
 this author, that I have given so many examples of the 
 greater size of men than is to be seen in our day, to which 
 I could add several others concerning bodies that have been 
 found in this our island, particularly one mentioned by 
 Hector Boece in his Description of Scotland, prefixed to 
 his Scotch History, where he tells us that in a certain 
 church which he names in the shire of Murray, the bones 
 of a man of much the same size as those of the man men- 
 tioned by Elyote, viz., fourteen feel, were preserved. One 
 of these bones Boece himself saw, and has particularly 
 described." — Ancient Metaphysics, vol. iii. p. 156. 
 
 *' But without having recourse to bones or monuments 
 of any kind, if a man has looked upon the world as long 
 as I have done with any observation he must be convinced 
 that the size of man is diminishing. I have seen such 
 bodies of men, as are not now to be seen : I have observed 
 in families, of which I have known three generations, a 
 gradual decline in that, and I am afraid in other respects. 
 Others may think otherwise ; but for my part I have so 
 great a veneration for our ancestors, that I have much in- 
 dulgence for that ancient superstition among the Etrurians, 
 and from them derived to the Romans, of worshipping the 
 manes of their ancestors under the names of Lares or
 
 The Excursion. 189 
 
 Honourable Mrs Pinmoney, Miss Danaretta, Mr 
 Hippy, and Anthelia, inside ; Sir Telegraph Pax- 
 arett and Sir Oran Haut-ton on the box, the former 
 with his whip, and the latter with his French horn, 
 in the characters of coachman and guard ; Mr 
 Forester and Mr Fax in the front of the roof; and 
 Sir Telegraph's two grooms, with Peter Gray and 
 Harry Fell, behind. Sir Telegraph's coachman, 
 as the inside of the carriage was occupied, had been 
 left at Melincourt. 
 
 In addition to Sir Telegraph's travelling library 
 — (which consisted of a single quarto volume, 
 magnificently bound : videlicet, a Greek Pindar, 
 which Sir Telegraph always carried with him ; not 
 
 domestic gods, which undoubtedly proceeded upon the 
 supposition that they were men superior to themselves, 
 and their departed souls such genii as Hesiod has de- 
 scribed, 
 
 'Ecr^Xoi, dXe^t/ca/cot, (pvXaKes dvTjTuv avdpwwuv. 
 
 And if antiquity and the universal consent of nations can 
 give a sanction to any opinion, it is to this, that our fore- 
 fathers were better men than we. Even as far back as 
 the Trojan war, the best age of men, of which we have 
 any particular account, Homer has said that few men were 
 better than their fathers, and the greater part worse : 
 
 Oi TrXeoj'es /ca/ctovs, iravpOL 5e re irarpos apeLOVs. 
 
 And this he puts into the mouth of the Goddess of Wisdom 
 
 But when I speak of the universal consent of 
 
 nations, I ought to except the men, and particularly the 
 young men, of this age, who generally believe themselves to 
 be better men than their fathers, or than any of their pre- 
 decessors." — Ancient Metaphysics, vol. iii. p. i6i.
 
 190 Melincourt. 
 
 that he ever read a page of it, but that he thought 
 such a classical inside passenger would be a per- 
 petual vindication of his tethrippharmatelasipedi- 
 oploctypophilous pursuits), Anthelia and Mr 
 Forester had taken with them a few of their 
 favourite authors ; for, as the ancient and honour- 
 able borough of Onevote was situated almost at the 
 extremity of the kingdom,"^ and as Sir Telegraph's 
 diurnal stages were necessarily limited, they had 
 both conjectured that 
 
 the poet's page, by one 
 Made vocal for the amusement of the rest, 
 
 might furnish an agreeable evening employment in 
 the dearth of conversation. Anthelia also, in com- 
 pliance with the general desire, had taken her lyre, 
 by which the reader may understand, if he pleases, 
 the harp-lute-giiitar ; which, whatever be its merit 
 as an instrument, has so unfortunate an appella- 
 tion, that we cannot think of dislocating our pages 
 with such a cacophonous compound. 
 
 They made but a short stage from Redrose 
 Abbey, and stopped for the first evening at Low- 
 wood Inn, to the great joy of Mr O'Scarum and 
 Major O'Dogskin. Mr O'Scarum introduced the 
 Major; and both offered their services to assist Mr 
 Hippy and Sir Telegraph Paxarett in the council 
 they were holding with the landlady on the event- 
 ful subject of dinner. This being arranged, and 
 
 * The point of departure being Westmoreland, this is an 
 allusion to the number of rotten boroughs in Cornwall. — G.
 
 The Excursion. 191 
 
 the hour and minute punctually specified, it was 
 proposed to employ the interval in a little excursion 
 on the lake. The party was distributed in two 
 boats : Sir Telegraph's grooms rowing the one, and 
 Peter Gray and Harry Fell the other. They rowed 
 to the middle of the lake, and rested on their oars. 
 The sun sunk behind the summits of the western 
 mountains : the clouds that, like other mountains, 
 rested motionless above them, crested with the 
 towers and battlements of aerial castles,* changed 
 by degrees from fleecy whiteness to the deepest 
 hues of crimson. A solitary cloud, resting on an 
 eastern pinnacle, became tinged with the reflected 
 splendour of the west : the clouds overhead spread- 
 ing, like a uniform veil of network, through the 
 interstices of which the sky was visible, caught in 
 their turn the radiance, and reflected it on the lake, 
 that lay in its calm expanse like a mirror, imaging 
 with such stillness and accuracy the forms and 
 colours of all around and above it, that it seemed 
 as if the waters were withdrawn by magic, and the 
 boats floated in crimson light between the moun- 
 tains and the sky. 
 
 The whole party was silent, even the Honourable 
 Mrs Pinmoney, till Mr OScarum entreated An- 
 thelia to sing "something neat and characteristic ; 
 or a harmony now for three voices, would be the 
 kiUing thing; eh! Major?" — "Indeed and it 
 
 * The same simile occurs in "Redgauntlet," where a 
 gigantic cloud at sunset is compared to "a Gothic fortress, 
 into which the Lord of Day was descending." — G.
 
 192 Melincourt. 
 
 would," said Major O'Dogskin; "there's some- 
 thing very soft and pathetic in a cool evening on 
 the water, to sit still doing nothing at all but lis- 
 tening to pretty words and tender melodies." And 
 lest the sincerity of his opinion should be ques- 
 tioned, he accompanied it with an emphatical oath, 
 to show that he was in earnest; for which the 
 Honourable Mrs Pinmoney called him to order. 
 
 Major O'Dogskin explained. 
 
 Anthelia, accompanied by Miss Danaretta and 
 Mr O'Scarum, sung the following 
 
 TERZETTO. 
 
 1. Hark ! o'er the silent waters stealing, 
 
 The dash of oars sounds soft and clear : 
 Through night's deep veil, all forms concealing, 
 Nearer it comes, and yet more near. 
 
 2. See ! where the long reflection glistens, 
 
 In yon lone tower her watch-light burns : 
 
 3. To hear our distant oars she listens, 
 
 And, hstening, strikes the harp by turns. 
 
 1. The stars are bright, the skies unclouded ; 
 
 No moonbeam shines ; no breezes wake. 
 Is it my love, in darkness shrouded. 
 Whose dashing oar disturbs the lake ? 
 
 2. O haste, sweet maid, the cords unrolling ; 
 i_ The holy hermit chides our stay ! 
 
 2. 3. Hark 1 from his lonely islet tolling, 
 
 His midnight bell shall guide our way. 
 
 Sir Oran Haut-ton now produced his flute, and 
 treated the company with a solo. Another pause
 
 The Excursio7z. 193 
 
 succeeded. The contemplative silence was broken 
 by Major O'Dogskin, who began to fidget about 
 in the boat, and drawing his watch from his fob 
 held it up to Mr Hippy, and asked him if he did 
 not think the partridges would be spoiled? "To 
 be sure they will," said Mr Hippy, '* unless we 
 make the best of our way. Cold comfort this, 
 after all : sharp air and water : — give me a roaring 
 fire and a six-bottle cooper of claret." 
 
 The oars were dashed into the water, and the 
 fairy reflections of clouds, rocks, woods, and moun- 
 tains were mingled in the confusion of chaos. 
 The reader will naturally expect that, having two 
 lovers on a lake, we shall not lose the opportunity 
 of throwing the lady into the water, and making 
 the gentlemen fish her out ; but whether that our 
 Thalia is too veridicous to permit this distortion 
 of facts, or that we think it the more original in- 
 cident to return them to the shore as dry as they 
 left it, the reader must submit to the disappoint- 
 ment, and be content to see the whole party 
 comfortably seated, without let, hindrance, or 
 molestation, at a very excellent dinner, served up 
 under the judicious inspection of mine hostess of 
 Low- wood. 
 
 The heroes and heroines of Homer used to eat 
 and drink all day till the setting sun;* and by 
 dint of industry, contrived to finish that important 
 business by the usual period at which modern 
 
 * H/ieis fiiev irpoirav rjfiap, es rjeXiov Karadwra, 
 T3./jLe6a, 5atPVfJi€P0i Kpea t' aaTreroi Kai ftedv r}bv k.t.X. 
 I. N
 
 194 Melincourt, 
 
 ibeaux and belles begin it — who are, therefore, 
 hecessitated, like Penelope, to sit up all night : 
 not, indeed, to destroy the works of the day, for 
 how can nothing be annihilated ? This does not 
 apply to all our party, and we hope not to many 
 of our readers.
 
 ^_i_^^^^^ 
 
 CHAPTER X X. 
 
 THE SEA-SHORE. 
 
 HEY Stopped the next evening at a village 
 on the sea-shore. The wind rose in the 
 night, but without rain. Mr Forester 
 was up before the sun, and descending to the 
 beach, found Anthelia there before him, sitting on 
 a rock, and listening to the dash of the waves, 
 like a Nereid to Triton's shell. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You are an early riser. Miss 
 Melincourt 
 
 Anthelia. — I always was so. The morning is 
 the infancy of the day, and, like the infancy of 
 life, has health and bloom, and cheerfulness and 
 purit}', in a degree unknown to the busy noon, 
 which is the season of care, or the languid evening, 
 which is the harbinger of repose. Perhaps the 
 song of the nightingale is not in itself less cheerful 
 than that of the lark : it is the season of her song 
 that invests it with the character of melancholy.* 
 
 * The nightingale is gay, 
 
 For she can vanquish night, 
 Dreaming, she sings of day, 
 
 Notes that make darkness bright-
 
 196 Melincourt. 
 
 it is the same with the associations of infancy : it 
 is all cheerfulness, all hope : its path is on the 
 flowers of an untried world. The daisy has more 
 beauty in the eye of childhood than the rose in 
 that of maturer life. The spring is the infancy of 
 the year : its flowers are the flowers of promise 
 and the darlings of poetry. The autumn too has 
 its flowers; but they are little loved, and little 
 praised : for the associations of autumn are not 
 with ideas of cheerfulness, but with yellow leaves 
 and hollow winds, heralds of winter, and emblems 
 of dissolution. 
 
 Mr Forester. — These reflections have more in 
 them of the autumn than of the morning. But the 
 mornings of autumn participate in the character of 
 the season. 
 
 Atithelia. — They do so : yet even in mists and 
 stonns the opening must be always more cheerful 
 than the closing day. 
 
 Mr Forester. — But this morning is fine and 
 clear, and the wind blows over the sea. Yet this, 
 to me at least, is not a cheerful scene. 
 
 Anthelia. — Nor to me. But our long habits of 
 association with the sound of the winds and the 
 waters, have given them to us a voice of melan- 
 choly majesty : a voice not audible by those little 
 children who are playing yonder on the shore. 
 
 But when the refluent gloom 
 
 Saddens the gaps of song, 
 We charge on her the dolefuhaess, 
 
 And call her crazed with wrong. — Patmore.
 
 The Sea-shore. 197 
 
 To them all scenes are cheerful. It is the morn- 
 ing of life : it is infancy that makes them so. 
 
 Mr Forester. — Fresh air and liberty are all that 
 is necessary to the happiness of children. In that 
 blissful age " when nature's self is new," the bloom 
 of interest and beauty is found alike in every object 
 of perception — in the grass of the meadow, the 
 moss on the rock, and the seaweed on the sand. 
 They find gems and treasures in shells and pebbles ; 
 and the gardens of fairyland in the simplest flowers. 
 They have no melancholy associations with autumn 
 or with evening. The falling leaves are their 
 playthings ; and the setting sun only tells them 
 that they must go to rest as he does, and that he 
 will light them to their sports in the mofning. It 
 is this bloom of novelty, and the pure, unclouded, 
 unvitiated feelings with which it is contemplated, 
 that throw such an unearthly radiance on the 
 scenes of our infancy, however humble in them- 
 selves, and give a charm to their recollections 
 which not even Tempe can compensate. It is the 
 force of first impressions. The first meadow in 
 which we gather cowslips, the first stream on which 
 we sail, the first home in which we awake to the 
 sense of human sympathy, have all a peculiar and 
 exclusive charm, which we shall never find again in 
 richer meadows, mightier rivers, and more magnifi- 
 cent dwellings ; nor even in themselves, when we 
 revisit them after the lapse of years, and the sad 
 realities of noon have dissipated the illusions of 
 sunrise. It is the same, too, with first love, what-
 
 igS Melincoiirt. 
 
 ever be the causes that render it unsuccessful : 
 the second choice may have just preponderance 
 in the balance of moral estimation : but the object 
 of first affection, of all the perceptions of our being, 
 will be most divested of the attributes of mortality. 
 The magical associations of infancy are revived 
 with double power in the feelings of first love ; but 
 when they too have departed, then, indeed, the 
 light of the morning is gone. 
 
 Pensa che questo di mai non raggiorna ! 
 
 Aiithelia. — If this be so let me never be the 
 object of a second choice : let me never love, or 
 \ love but once. 
 
 Mr Forester. — The object of a second choice 
 you cannot be with any one who will deserve your 
 love : for to have loved any other woman, would 
 show a heart too lightly captivated to be worthy of 
 yours. The only mind that can deserve to love 
 you, is one that would never have known love, if 
 it never had known you. 
 
 Anthelia and Mr Forester were both so un- 
 fashionably sincere, that they would probably, in 
 a very few minutes, have confessed to each other 
 more than they had till that morning, perhaps, 
 confessed to themselves, but that their conversa- 
 tion was interrupted by the appearance of Mr 
 Hippy fuming for his breakfast, accompanied by 
 Sir Telegraph cracking his whip, and Sir Oran 
 blowing the Reveillee on his French horn. 
 
 " So ho ! " exclaimed Sir Telegraph ; " Achilles
 
 TJie Sea-shoTe. 199 
 
 and Thetis, I protest, consulting on the sea- 
 shore." 
 
 Anthelia, — Do you mean to say, Sir Telegraph, 
 that I am old enough to be Mr Forester's mother ? 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — No, no ; that is no 
 part of the comparison : but we are the ambassadors 
 of Agamemnon (videlicet, Mr Fax, whom we felt 
 very busily arranging the urns, not of lots by the 
 by, but of tea and coffee) : here is old Phoenix on 
 one side of me, and Ajax on the other. 
 
 Mr Forester. — And you of course are the wise 
 Ulysses. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — There the simile fails 
 again. Comparitio non urgenda, as I think Heyne 
 used to say, before I was laughed out of reading 
 at college. 
 
 Mr Forester. — You should have found me too, 
 if you call me Achilles, solacing my mind with 
 music, ^^£^a rsp'rofj.svov (pop/xr/yi "kiyiir, \ but, to 
 make amends for the deficiency, you have brought 
 me a musical Ajax. 
 
 Sir Telegraph Paxarett. — You have no reason 
 to wish even for the golden lyre of my old friend 
 Pindar him.self: you have been listening to the 
 music of the winds and the waters, and to what is 
 more than music, the voice of Miss Melincourt. 
 
 Mr Hippy. — And there is a very pretty concert / .^ V 
 waiting for you at the inn — the tinkling of cups i^ 
 
 and spoons, and the divine song of the tea-urn.
 
 TURNBULL AND SPEARS, 
 PRINTERS, 
 EDINBURGH.
 
 
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 )^^^-^ 
 
 TSC 
 
 
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 N-i=J
 
 UNIVERSITY OF II-UN0I9-URBANA