VJA / '■1 m r fei ^^*c«,/J The Duke of Reichstadt 259 Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive in 2010 witii funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/whychcotteofstjo01neal INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. While Rogers has immortalized himself in the " Pleasures of Memory," writers have not been wanting — Parr among the rest — who have dwelt on the pains of re- trospection. He remarks, in one of his letters to Bennett, Bishop of Cloyne, that " the subject of contemporaries is, at an advanced period of life, more painful than pleasing. Memory, then, presents us with a motley picture, in which there is more gloom than sunshine, more thorns than flowers." Few, who have lived long, will Vlll INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. question the justice of this sentiment. It recurred to me very painfully, as I this evening, the fifth anniversary of our part- ing, transcribed the last, the concluding paper of my old friend and fellow-student, Aylmer Whychcotte. " And of him what wouldst thou say ?" I would say, most patient reader, that he was one, who to natural powers, added in- defatigable industry — one who possessed acute discrimination and quick comparison — one whose early prospects were bright, and whose probable destiny seemed bril- liant, but whose voyage of life was beset by a waywardness of disposition, which ruined his peace, and wrecked his happi- ness. Does the conclusion appear unna- tural ? Hear his history. " What think you of my nephew Ayl- mer ?" said Colonel "Whychcotte to Mr. Gower, an old and estimable clergyman, INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. IX with whom the young hek of Swanland was placed, previous to his entrance at " I would prefer being silent," returned Gower, in his usual calm and quiet manner. *' You will be able to form an accurate idea of his character from his own conversation. He is incapable of equivocation or deceit. I would rather that he should speak for himself, and that I should abstain from ob- servation." ** When I ask a simple question," quoth the Colonel, bluntly, " I am ill satisfied with an answer that would suit a special pleader." " Since you press me," said Gower, who was too proud to flatter, and too poor to lie—he coloured deeply while he uttered the unwelcome statement, ** my opinion of Mr. Whychcotte is this ; — he has talent enough for anything; he will attain nothing." X INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. " I might have been told that sooner," and with something that somided hke a hearty blessing on " all parsons, whether bishops or beneficed,"' the old campaigner strode angrily away. Aylmer left us the next morning. I did not see him again till we met at . My heart swells within me when I think of that scene of early happiness— of our com- mon pursuits — of the friendships I there formed — of the noble, generous spirits with whom I was associated — of the ar- dour with which we each strove and sinks, when I reflect of these, how many are for ever silent, and some, alas ! in an ignoble and dishonoured grave. At the period to which I refer. Dr. presided over the interests of . It is difficult to do him justice. He was, at INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. XI that time, almost at the head of the distin- guished body of Enghlsh scholars ; emi- nently superior to many of his own age and standing, and rivalled by none that were younger than himself: of his temper, the characteristics were steadiness, uni- formity, and inflexibility; an inflexibility which would often proceed to a length that his enemies termed obstinacy. Warm was he in his attachments ; bitter in his animosities : yet would he ever soften towards a fallen adversary : and as to his friends, it w^as only on their attaining powder, and station, and eminence, that he seemed to detach himself from their side. Though an utter stranger to gentleness of voice, or mien, or manner, he possessed a large and liberal mind. As a preceptor, his diligence was unwearied : his discipline, strict as it w^as, was always maintained with, integrity and impartiality ; and no teacher Xiv INTRODUCTORY 3IEM0IR. sonal and premeditated insult he indeed was pleased to call it — came to the magnanimous *< resolution of killing the doctor's puns." It was in vain that I pointed out the cruelty of such a proceeding, or observed that the poor mis-begotten bantlings had at all times such slight signs of vitality, that it was downright barbarity to shorten their ephemeral existence.* Whychcotte was inexorable. He was bent on shewing the doctor his own littleness ; and solemnly declared that he '* should never perpetrate in peace another pun." * Now and then he stumbled upon somethhig- neat and happy. At the visitation at he had the pleasure of listening to a senous harangue of an almost unlimited length, from a very young clergyman of the ncv: school of divinity. When '• the health of the preacher, with thanks to him for his sermon/' was given after dinner, the Dr. observed, he proposed this toast with peculiar pleasure, since Mr. had been one of his own pupils. " The sermon," said he, " was a good one ; and I sincerely hope, the preacher's life may be as long !" INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. XV Upon this resolve he acted without delay. A few of the head boys dined with the doctor on the day following : among them Whychcotte was included : a fresh proof, as I observed to him, of the doctor's free- dom from ill feeling towards him ; and again did I urge him to abandon his unholy crusade '* I will, — the moment my pur- pose is effected and my humour gratified ?" and with this remark we entered the re- ception room. An opportunity was not long wanting. Aylmer was giving an account after dinner of Pentilly Castle* — of the scenery tliat surrounds it — and of the habits and opi- nions of Mr. Tilly, its former occupant. This unhappy gentleman, who is repre- * Pentilly castle will be found on the banks of the Tamar in as lovely a situation as poet ever feigned or limner painted. Xvi INTRODUCTORY MEMOIR. sented by his contemporaries as a man of weak intellect and depraved tastes, pro- fessed himself an atheist : and with a view of ridiculing the doctrine of a resurrection obliged his executors to immure his body, dressed in his usual garb, in a tower on the summit of the hill which overtops the man- sion ; — " where," said Whychcotte, "he pro- poses to wait the event. He is placed by his own express desire in his elbow chair before a favourite oak table : on which are arranged, pipes, tobacco, glasses, and some bottles of wine/' " Which would be Vhi de Grave of course' — said the doctor. '*Ho! Ho! Ho !'' and his fat sides sliook with exulta- tion at the safe delivery of his pun. " Sir" — said Whychcotte with a face of the most impenetrable stolidity — ** Sir, may I beg to be favoured with that" — INTRODUCTORY :MEM0IR. XVll *' You said, Aylmer, — '* observed the doctor good humouredly — " that Mr. Tilly was immured in a tower : and that before him were placed pipes, glasses, wine :" — and the doctor repeated his remark and laughed more loudly than before. " Oh ! Oh ! Vin de Grave. Ah !"— Whychcotte murmured slowly and gravely, as if he w^as bringing himself by degrees to the task of comprehension — " that — is — meant — for — a — pun — I — believe." The doctor's jaw sunk — his brow dark- ened — and an expression of fierce and un- equivocal anger flashed in his eye as he bent it full upon Whychcotte who looked innocence and simplicity itself. So much for the first of his sallies. Would it had been the last ! The thesis for our verses on the following Saturday was Tyre, sounded on all sides with plaudits, as if it had been a theatre ! Rousseau. — Let the reader pause before he visits at all the unhealthy region of French literature. Above all, let no man, in the absence of every thing that can mislead or inflame, surrounded by the Softening influences of domestic life, think himself safe when he ventures into the magic circle of Rous- seau. In him intelligence and insanity were united — the moralist and the logician — the master of the heart and the advocate of infidelity. His prize de- 32 BURKE— FOX. clamations against the arts and sciences — his social compact — all were artifice and inconsistencies. He pleased and disgusted ; wearied and fascinated ; was to be found ever in extremes ; at one time exaggerating the necessary evils of our condition, at another losing himself in visions of unattainable perfection. Burke.— At this period Burke produced his celebrated " Reflections." The appearance of this work was quite an era in political literature. Thirty thousand copies were sold at once. It may be styled an eloquent defence of the old opinions, and a most indignant protest and most powerful indict- ment preferred against the new. Rupture between Fox and Burke. — Sad this breaking up of tried and valued friendship ! They had fought side by side the battles of liberty ; they had together stemmed the torrent of corrup- tion, at a period when the heart is most alive to insult, and most impatient of injustice. Fox after- wards said, that he had learned from Burke every thing he supposed he knew ; and Burke, a few hours before he died, that Fox was born to be beloved. Nothing can exceed the felicity with BOLINGBROKE— FLETCHER OF SALTOUN. 33 which, in a few graphic sentences, some- times even in a few short words, Mr. Smythe sketches and presents a character to the attention of his auditors. Anne had Httle activity, and no poHtical courage. BoLiNGBROKE is one of the classics of our htera- ture. His letter to Sir William Wyndham is a model of fine writing. The charm of his style is universally acknowledged. His language is al- ways flowing, classical, and perspicuous ; and his sentences, whether the subject he grave or trifling, virtuous or objectionable, always approach with airiness and ease, and disappear from the view with grace and elegance. Fletcher of Saltoun. — Men, the same in kind, though differing in degree of talent, are al- ways to be found in society. Men of high spirit, strong feelings, and deep thought, who, brooding over the wrongs and injuries of their native soil, and warmed and exasperated even to madness by the wretchedness and poverty of the country they love, and the affluence and happiness of the country they hate, are lashed into rebellion by the neglect c 3 34 FREDERICK THE GREAT. of their rulers, and plunge into desperate projects to the accomplishment of which they dedicate every passion of their soul and every principle of their beine-. Such a man was Fletcher of Sal- toun ! FllEDERICK THE GllEAT. A pHnCC whoSC heart had withered at thirty. Frederick had no qua- lities but courage and ambition. And these, how- ever good in themselves, cannot reconcile us to a cha- racter with which we have no sympathy — a charac- ter whose middle and end, foundation and aim, was ever-acting, increasing, predominate, concentrated selfishness. To Maria Theresa a letter runs thus : " My heart'' — for at the time he ivas ivriting he thought he had one — " has no share in the miseries that will follow this measure." His military sys- tem was most despotic. His desire of empire in- satiable. He is ofteyi great hut iiever amiable. Lord Nouth was a man of public ability, the delight of every private society which he honoured with his presence, second to none in conducting the debate, possessed of an inexhaustible fund of pleasantry, and of a temper the last to be ruffled and the first to be appeased. General Washington. — In viewing the diffi- GENERAL WASHINGTON. 35 culties, the labours, the trials which Washington encountered in forming the constitution of Ame- rica, we cannot fail to be struck with republi- canism — its ridiculous jealousies — its impractica- bility — its harshness — its coarseness. He drew up a valedictory address, and it is not unworthy of him. He laid it down as impossible that national prosperity could prevail exclusive of national vir- tue. " He was not,'' he said a few hours before his dissolution, " afraid to die.'" Few men have had so few foibles as sets off to their character ; still fewer of whom so little can be related to their discredit, after twenty years of command in the cabinet and in the field. Let us reflect what it was to have had the guidance of a revolution — to have had the plaudits of his countrymen conti- nually ringing in his ears — kingdoms for a stage, and monarchs for the puppets of the scene. He led his army to battle with the enthusiasm of a hero, and disbanded them with the calm- ness of a philosopher. He had a fixed calm- ness of character which seems fitted to command our admiration, not our love. But for a ruler of mankind he may be considered as a model. FiiEDEiiicK THE First of Puussta was a man 36 FREDERICK THE FIRST. of very ordinary talents. His consort, Ciiarlotte, was a pupil of Leibnitz, and a highly intellectual woman. An anecdote will best illustrate the cha- racter of both. " I am going,'' said the queen on her death-bed ; " I am going to understand those things which Leibnitz could never explain to me." *• But the king, madam, the king ?"" " O," said she, " he w^ill be perfectly happy in conducting a royal funeral ]" Reviews. — Observe the loose and declamatory manner in which the reviewer speaks.* It is thus in this world of ours, w-here praise and censure are at random heard, that over their bottle or in their study, men attempt the lively remark, thebrilliant sally, and at hazard decide on questions which re- quire the most patient investigation, and ought to be approached with the utmost delicacy and pre- cision. Monsieur Bailly was dragged to the guillo- tine. Science had no reason to be ashamed of her son. " You tremble. Monsieur Bailly,'' said the executioner. " 'Tis the cold," replied the philo- sopher, and calmly submitted to his fate. * Edinburgh Review, October 1823. Article on French Memoirs. MARIE ANTOINETTE — VARENNES. 37 Marie Antoinette. — " No children — no chil- dren," was the cry. She conducted them back to the apartment, and stood out on the balcony alone. Her hands clasped upon her bosom— her mien so steady and composed — so dignified yet so resigned, as if she was a woman, and did not brave death : a queen— a daughter of Maria Theresa, and did not fear it ! Flight to Varennes. — Such was the position of affairs during the half hour the royal family v/ere at ^"arennes w^aiting for the relay of horses. I doubt whether the historian can point out another half hour of such intense interest in the annals of civilized Europe. M. de Beauvilliers soothed her (the queen) by his unaffected sympathy, and by the tears — he was still young — which started in his eyes. It was a wretched night wliich the royal fugitives passed at Yarennes ; and a miser- able journey — an eight day's journey, for the na- tional guard marched before them — from Varennes to Paris. The qiieeiis hair turned gray in the course of it. The king left behind him an apology for his flight. He details the situation in which he found himself — the insults he had received — and his reasons for abandoning his post. He was 3S assisted in drawing up this document by no one but the queen. To this statement the Constituent Assembly published a reply. These two state papers you will of course read attentively. They are in many respects remarkable. Richelieu cleared away the weeds around the fabric of the French monarchy, but he erected none himself. Law was* a Scotchman, and certainly possessed abilities of no ordinary cast. It does not follow because his schemes failed, that he intended to deceive. He made in France a frightful experi- ment how far paper money could be carried. Law's wish was to supersede the precious metals— to make his own paper preferable. His scheme was caught at with incredible avidity. He was fol- lowed in the gallery of the Palais Royale by dukes and peers, marshals and bishops ! Lord Stair dif- fered about him with his own court, and the result was Lord Stair's recall. The spirit of speculation had made all France run mad. A woman of fashion had her carriage purposely overturned near his house, in the hope that he would come out, * In the reign of Louis XIV. d'aRLINCOURT DE MAINTENON. 39 and that thus she should become acquainted with him ; while a lady of high rank had fire cried under his windows while she was passing, with the same end in view. A poor humpbacked man, who used to frequent the place where the bargains in this stock were made, realized a handsome com- petency by making his infirmity serve the place of a writing-desk ! Lacretelle is an author of reputation. He may be depended upon. D'Arlincourt is a gallery of portraits : some- thing appropriate is said on each, and he is dis- missed. Madame de Matntexox. — Read her memoirs and her letters. The latter, though they contain not much that is important and political, are the letters of a woman of taste, and of strong natural powers. Federation. — The scene of the Federation* was as awful and extensive an exhibition of perjury as the world ever witnessed. The French church is a splendid superstition ; the French constitution a qualified despotism ; * On the Champ de Mars, July 1 1th, 1790. 40 SATIRE. the nation itself a people never reflecting, and ever in extremes. It will now be seen how fast were collecting -f* the materials of future convulsion, around a court where graces were virtues, and elegance the ambi- tion of all. In politics, existing circumstances are every thing. Learn early to discard terms which speak to the ear, and not to the mind. Nor are his Lectures devoid of keen but quiet satire. In that on the flight to Va- rennes, speaking of the various circum- stances which impeded the royal fugitives' success, he observed — The queen had a dressing-case, without which she could neither travel nor exist ! Nothing could be more absurd than the con- duct of the women about the court. Seated in all the luxurious softness of their boudoirs, uhat a * Alluding to the scenes of the 5th and 6th of October, 1789. A complete account of these will be found in '' L'His- toire par les deux amis de la liberie." The detail is extended through six chapters. SATIRE. 41 charming thing, they cried, is a revolution ! What a charming thing to be ever in motion ; to have constant secret meetings at one's house ; to sanc- tion an edict by a smile ; to animate a patriot by a gesture ! The Archbishop of Sens was prime minister one year and a half. He employed the period for averting a revolution, in rendering a revolution inevitable ! Courtiers. — Men who are singularly careless auditors of public accounts, and by no means un- easy in the possession of sinecures. In the revolution there was the love of liberty in every mouth ; the love of rule in every heart. Again : speaking of the disputes between America and the mother country, he quietly observed — J proper spirit teas shown — that is, the breach ivas made wider ! " This day we dig — the day on which they voted the abolition of all titles — this day," they cried, " we dig the grave of vanity V It was in vain that poor Abbe Maury observed, that even the 42 THE DEPUTIES. Romans had titles of honour, and yet were free. Incidents of this kind prove how little this sensi- tive and theatric people, who far better understood fetes and dances than the nature of liberty, were fitted to undertake so momentous an enterprize as a revolution. Monsieur de Bailly, when the king was drag- ged to Paris in the midst of his assassins^, on a cold, wet, rainy day, preceded by the heads, placed on pikes, of his own body-guard, amid the shouts and yells of the populace — in the hearing of the monarch, when the king came to the barrier, called it ' a beautiful day I ' The Deputies. — With hands lifted up to hea- ven, after the theatric manner of their nation, they swore* never to adjourn their sittings till they had achieved a constitution. The oath was pronounced by the President ; heard out of doors ; echoed in the streets ; and followed, one cannot easily see why, with shouts of Vive le Roil There is sound philosophy, as well as a tone of high moral feeling, admirably be- * June 20th. ELOQUENCE. 43 fitting his situation, in each of the following observ^ations. Eloquence should attempt one great object, and entirely succeed, or entirely fail. Eloquence and wisdom are very different things. They are sometimes united^ but seldom. A command of language, retentive memory, and glowing concep- tion will make an orator, but not a wise man. Enthusiasm is the soul of the one ; deliber- ating calmness the governing principle of the other. Men may mistake the interests of their coun- try. They cannot engage to be clever — but they can to he honest. Servility is not loyalty ; nor attachment to libe- ral sentiments, republicanism. Practicability should always be considered by him who contemplates reformation. He who pro- poses a change which can never be carried into execution, does nothing — does worse than nothing; because he makes the very idea of improvement ridiculous. Clemency becomes a prince. Other qualities become other persons. 44 PLACEMEN. The Deity, even in this life, has indissolubly connected the happiness of his creatures with the exercise of their virtues, and the f ulfihnent of their duties. The cause of human nature must never be aban- doned. Toleration is the respecting of a fellow-crea- ture'^s religious opinions, be they what they may, merely because they are his religious opinions. . Men who in early life are accustomed to the petty details of office, never get beyond them. They become familiarized with corruption ; their understandino^s become narrow ; their feelino;s are blunted ; and towards the close of life they be- come the secret or avowed friends of servility, the enemies of all public sentiment, and of all advisers, the worst that a king or a country can listen to. In legislation, those who are first wrong are most wrong. To provide for events, is in some measure to controul them. Fame or praise should be the at- tendants of our actions, not the object. Violent sallies, such as catch the ear of a po- pular assembly, are to be avoided by those who mean well. GOOD GOVERNMENT. 45 Woe to the country, where the ministers do not respect popular opinion ; but woe to the king- dom — the monarchy at least — where they have no other master ! State Sycophants. — They are the deadliest enemies of the monarchy whom they flatter and pillage : of the people, whom they degrade and oppress. Government. — The great problem of govern- ment is, to make the executive power sufficiently strong to maintain and preserve peace and good order, and yet not so strong as to overthrow the liberties of the people. LiuEL. — Judges are unfavourable deciders of what is, and what is not, libel. They are accus- tomed constantly to witness the good effects of the administration of justice, — peace — public order — right of property respected — distinction of rank observed. They cannot see what good can arise from opposing the order of things. Scotland. — Its law is tedious and expensive; its representation, wretched; and its politicians remarkable for their selfishness and servility. Colonies. — The Euthanasia of the connection 46 CIVIL LIBERTY. between a mother country and her dependent co- lonies, must be the interchange of good offices. Civil Liberty is the first of national blessings. It may sometimes be endangered, not by the strength, but by the very weakness of the executive power. Civil liberty is, of all things, the most frail and perishable: arbitrary rule, the most hardy and indestructible. Ministers should be men of public views, rather than of private interests. It is most de- sirable that the king should have a minister about him, not a favourite. Members of Parliament.— There are many who are mere debaters in parliament, not states- men. Parties. — You must have parties, or there will be no freedom of thought — as in Turkey and Persia, where no parties exist. Literature and Art. — Literature and art flourished under the reignof Louis XIV., and under the reign of Augustus ; and it has thence been in- ferred, that a despotic form of government is fa- vourable to them. Literature and the arts will flourish so long as they are not opposed to the LITERATURE AND ART. 47 maxims, civil and religiouS; of the government under which they appear. The same monarch who could reward the Mantuan Bard, for his panegyric on Marcellus, could banish Ovid to the snows of Thrace, and the deserts of the Euxine, and compel him to confess that his genius had been his ruin ! THE UNEARTHLY TENANTS OP DENTON HALL. " To sum up the doctrine of supernatural appearances in a single sentence — all tradition is in favour of it, — all reason against it." — Dr. Johnson. At a little distance from Newcastle, on the Carlisle road, close upon the site of the old Roman wall, there stands, on a gentle eminence embowered in trees, a venerable collegiate-looking building, which, though comparatively unknown, possesses many VOL. I. D 50 DENTON HALL. and powerful claims to attention. It boasts a date, which its time-worn aspect amply confirms, so late, or rather so early as 1505. It is supposed to have been the country- house of the priors of Tynemouth, in days gone by : and certain writings are in exist- ence, which allude to an under-ground communication between the hall and the priory, by which the monks could quit and return to their convent, as business or plea- sure demanded, without having their move- ments exposed to public observance. In the lower garden, supposed to have been the monks' cemetery — a conclusion which its exuberant fertility corroborates — is found, at intervals, stone coffins, scapulas, and other relics of its former occupiers. Fastidious as the ghostly fathers are known to have been in their choice of resi- dence, Denton does credit to their judg- ment. Screened from the cutting blasts of the north and north-east, with a noble ex- DENTON HALL. 51 posure to the south, at a very short dis- tance from the high road — a main consider- ation with those who liad so many and stated pompous processions — within an easy distance of the very river which washed the walls of the priory, — a matter of consider- able moment at a period when there were few facilities for land-carriage^ — and looking down upon a lovely landscape, terminated by the groves of Axwell and Gibside, the choice of Denton for a country residence w^as most eligible and happy. At this hour, the gray massy walls of the venerable pile contrast finely with the beauty and fertility around it. The east side is covered with ivy, which hangs in thick luxuriance around the porch, and has nearly gained the summit of the building. The south, a noble pear-tree completely covers — describing, in fact, the whole range of the building — in summer one sheet of blossom ; in autumn loaded with fruit. It.s D 2 il OF ILL UB. 52 DEXTON HALL. massy trunk is deservedly matter of curi- osity and remark. How many generations have enjoyed its produce, cannot now be ascertained. But an old man, who died recently at the neighbouring village, at the age of eighty, declared, that when he was a boy it was considered an old tree, and was as large then as now : he saw little or no difference in its size or stem. While upon the subject of trees, it is worth while to mention, that when the pre- sent occupier of the hall was recently taking up the stumps of two very old fruit trees, he found at the bottom of each a large flat stone, evidently placed for the purpose of preventing the roots from striking down- ward into the clay, and inducing tliem to shoot laterally into the light soil. This plan of placing a large flat stone, with a layer or two of earth above it, previous to planting a young fruit tree directly over it, was not long since announced as a great MRS. MONTAGUE. 53 discovery, a grand improvement in horti- culture. Alas ! how largely are we in- debted to our ancestors! or, rather, how little is there new under the sun ! But to the Hall. If its claims on the ad- miration of the antiquarian and the artist are powerful, so is there also associated with it much that is calculated to interest the lover of literature. It is most clearly ascertained to have been the residence of the celebrated Mrs. Montague ; and, during her life-time, the resort of all the celebrated men of that period, by whom it was her delight to be surrounded. Johnson, and Goldsmith, and Garrick, and Sir Joshua, are all known to have sojourned here. Some of the best letters of the former bear the date of Denton. And in the ** Garrick Papers"* there is frequent allusion made to * These literary treasures contain various letters from Mrs. Montague. Two I subjoin. The first is rather laboured^ but exemplifies the bent and talent of the wri- 54f DAVID GARRICK. the array of talent often congregated within its walls. ter. The second is evidence of the terms of intimacy on which she lived with Garrick. "Denton, July 2\, 1770. " Dear Sir, " The liberty I am going to take seems to require many apologies ; at the same time, I am but too sensible that excuses are but poor alleviations of a fault. There is a certain quality, called by the gods, simplicity — by men foolishness, which sometimes betrays the owner into trans- gressions for which good-nature finds an excuse when the invention of the offender cannot frame one. Let my folly, therefore, find access to your good nature, and thus gently introduce my story. " A friend of minC; who has not a foot of land any v/here but in Parnassus, and there pretends not to more than a copyhold, showed me a comedy of his writing, which I thought, might at least vie with most of the late produc- tions in that way; but I am a very incompetent judge of this matter. All I would beg is, that you would cast your eye over the piece. If you do not approve it, no angry female muse (such as once assailed you) armed with terrors which belong rather to Tisiphone than Melpomene, will rage and foam. My friend is an honest peaceable man ; if his play desei-ves your approbation, it will be a great piece of good fortune to him to have it under your protection, and will at once realize every good wish I can form for him. Whatever you decide upon the subject, I shall know is right and just. I am not, perhaps, a judge DR. JOHNSON. 55 There is a room, too, just the sort, in size and kind, one woukl fancy the old what should please in comedy^ and have not the least guess what will please. The dialogue of this play seemed to me easy and lively, and I thought the poet touched with good- humoured raillery, the fashionable follies of the times, which, in themselves, though perhaps not in their con- sequences, appear too frivolous for severe satire. " Great physicians have transmitted to posterity, reme- dies for those disorders to which human nature is addicted in all ages and climates of the v/orld; but though an Hip- pocrates and a Galen may have assumed a perpetual authority in cases of consumption, dropsy, and malignant fevers^ the humble under-graduate doctor considers some new epidemical cold as his province ; and hastens to publish his cure for the influenza, or to offer an antidote to Hyson tea; advertises his balsam of honey when the fogs of November affect the lungs; and as spring advances, brings out his tincture of sage to purify those humours that warm weather causes to ferment. " To a Plautus, a Terence, or a Moliere, it belongs to attack the dropsy of pride, the feverish thirst of avarice, or the melajicholy madness of misanthropy. The minor poet aims no higher than to remove some incidental malady, some new disorder with which the town is infected. Even if he can take off those freckles which pollute the pure roses and lilies of youthful beauty, or can soften the wrinkles on the brow of old age ; he has his merit and de- serves encouragement. " I wish you may have reason to think my friend deserves a place in some of these humble classes. It is improper. 56 Johnson's room. moralizer to have liked ; and which I be- lieve I am warranted in calling ** Johnson's on some accounts, that his name should be known, and therefore, he desired me to send his piece without my petition to you to read it. As I endeavoured to smug a certain essay through the world, you may perhaps suspect me of having a hand in this comedy ; but I do assure you by all that is most serious, I have not therein either art or part ; I have not invented or corrected, nor knew any thing of it till it was almost finished. The author was to finish it after I came out of town, and I promised to send him a letter to you to send with it, which I did the more readily, as he will remain to you mute and invisible ; and^ therefore, you will have merely the trouble of casting your eye over the play, and when you have done so, if you will please to send the play with your opinion of it to my house in Hill Street, I shall be more obliged to you than I can express. Any alterations you should desire will certainly be made. " Upon recollection, I will beg of you not to send your letter in the packet with the play, but, indeed, to put the letter in the post directed to me at Denton, near Newcastle-iipon- Tyne ; for the person may otherwise delay my having your letter if he should not call at my house for his play. I beg my best respects to Mrs. Garrick. I live over again in imagination the charming day I passed at Hampton. May the ]\Iuses, les jeux, and les ris, as usual, keep their court there, and health and pleasure never be absent even for an hour. 'With most perfect regard, I am dear sir, " Your most obliged, most obedient humble servant, " E. Montague." Johnson's room. 57 Room.'* It is small, but on it the sun shines long and cheerily ; before it stretches a merry landscape of field and pasture, wood and water ; to the right, some gi- gantic limes throw up their green broad No. 2. " Wednesday Morning. " Dear Sir, " I have set all things right with the Veseys ; first, be- cause you ordered ; secondly, because I am determined no one shall be angry with you but myself. — Are you not a sad deceiver, to give out a comedy, and then put on Melpomene's best buskins, instead of sending forth the Muse in vulgar pattens, singing ballads. Deceived by your treachery, I asked a gentleman who lives at New- ington to dine with me to day, and he desired me to ask Mr. Earles. Mrs. Boscawen, hearing good and wise folks were to be here, desired to be of the party ; and so T am fixed down to Hill Street, and shall wish myself in Denmark. If you design to appear on the stage next Friday se'nnight, the 19th, pray give me a hint, for, if you do not forbid the baniis, I shall ask some great personages to dine here whom I cannot put off; and if I lose seeing you again, I shall be in rage and despair, and as soon as Lord Bellamont's bullet is extracted, I will get it to shoot you. Best compliments to Mrs. Garrick. I am at once, your very angry, and very affectionate, poor deluded, " But faithful humble servant, "^ E. Montague." D 3 58 DR. JOHNSON. foliage ; while in the distance, may be seen a noble fragment of the old Roman wall, with a full-grown tree rising up between the interstices of the stones, and waving as if in mockery over them. Here, then, Johnson moralized — he w^ho, with such a gigantic grasp of intellect, pos- sessed such a humbling sense of his own weakness — so fully persuaded of the im- mortality of the soul, and yet cursed with such a dread of death — he who was at once the most subtle philosopher and sincere christian — who possessed such a thrilling sense of the sublimity of nature, and the magnificence of God. What an animating retrospect must life have afforded him! How little, after a long and laborious career, must he have had to wish unwritten ! How much to rejoice over, as possessing a direct and powerful tendency to advance the best interests of mankind ! SIR JOSHUA S LETTERS. 59 A most melancholy fact remains behind. On the demise of Mrs. Montague, some large boxes were found filled with letters. She was an indefatigable correspondent : and letters were written in those days for the post — not, as in these, for the press. They were removed pro tempore to the attics — were forgotten — and, with an ex- ception or two, which I have seen — burnt! On questioning the female Vandal as to her motives for perpetrating such an atro- city, she replied, *' Indeed we found them very useful — very, — for the fires, and such like. And they could na' be very valu- able — there were too many of a sort for that! — a vast there were; a vast from one Mr. Reynolds !" In one point the Hall has lost nothing. Hospitality presides there now as formerly. It is still the abode of intelligence and worth. One winter's night in 182 — , a small Go THE NIGHTLY VISITANTS party were gathered around the cheerful hearth, and busied in imagining the tableau the old Hall would exhibit, could its former inmates again be assembled and arranged. The Prior and Monks of Tynemouth — and in later times, little Davy Garrick, with his eye of fire — and Sir Joshua, with his trum- pet—and the huge, heavy, lethargic frame of Johnson. " Oh!" said a sprightly fair, ** it is not without its visitors. I have heard — " and her eye glanced anxiously around the room, while she strove to assume a look of still higher hilarity — '' a good deal of old Bar- bery. And even you, my dear madam, I am told, have been alarmed beyond mea- sure—and — and — is it not so? — Now do tell me." ** Every old Hall," said our kind hostess, evidently avoiding the subject, " has its tale of mystery and attendant spirits \ and OF DENTON HALL. 6l Denton boasts of no exception to the popu- lar prejudice." " I abhor superstition," said a major's widow, solemnly ; '' but have my reasons for believing in the re-appearance of the dead." " For my part," said a noble looking youth who stood by her side, with a laugh and a sneer, evidently intended to provoke the military widow into farther discussion ; ** IVe lived here from childhood, and to this hour never saw any thing more wicked than myself!" *' That may well be," retorted the lady somewhat sarcastically ; *' still I know, and am sure, that" — " A ghost story ! a ghost story !" was echoed round; and at the word the guests drew closer to the blazing fire ; while, after two hems and one ha, she drew up her majestic person to its full height and began : — 62 SIR WALTER FARQUHAR. " Before I commence my narrative, it is proper you should know the source from which it is derived. Sceptics I know the most of you to be on this subject," said the widow^ bitterly ; *' but still Farquhar must be a name familiar to you as standing at one time almost at the very head of medical science ; and to his moral character for pro- bity, integrity, and veracity he was even more indebted for his situation in the royal household, than to his professional attain- ments. From him I heard this story ; and I give it as closely as may be in his own words. ''In early life, years previous to his settling in London, Dr. Farquhar made a temporary sojourn at Torquay. While there, he was summoned professionally to Berry Pomeroy. It is a noble ruin, very much dilapidated and worn away by time ; but magnificent even in decay, and an object of interest and attraction to every lover of scenery and A GHOST STORY. 63 antiquity. Here, a massy buttress, sup- ports an oak coeval with the castle itself; there, a mouldering turret is clothed with tlie most luxuriant ivy ; w^hile around it sweeps the river proudly as if it exulted in the contrast of the duration of natural ob- jects with the feebleness, and the frailty, and ephemeral existence of the edifices and efforts of man. ■ " At the time I am speaking of only one part of it was inhabited. Its occupants were the steward and his wife. The latter was seriously ill, and desired the doctor's advice. Previous to seeing his patient, he was shewn into an apartment, where he waited till the sufferer was apprized of his arrival. It w^as a large, ill proportioned room. Around it ran pannels, richly carved, of dark oak, w hich from time had assumed the hue of ebony. The only light which it admitted fell through the chec- quered panes of a gorgeously stained win- 64 A GHOST STORY. dow, on which tlie arms of the former lords of Berry Pomeroy were richly emblazoned. " In one corner to the right of the rude fire-place was a flight of dark oaken steps, forming part of a staircase leading appa- rently to some chamber above ; and on these stairs the fliding gleams of summer's twi- light shone strongly. " While Dr. Farquhar wondered, and, if truth be told, chafed at the delay whicli had been interposed between him and his patient, the door opened, and a female somewhat richly dressed, entered the apart- ment. He, supposing her to be one of the family, advanced to meet her. Unheeding him, she crossed the room with a hurried step, wringing her hands, and exhibiting in her motions the deepest distress. When she reached the foot of the stairs, she paused for an instant, and then began to ascend them with the same hasty step and agitated demeanour. As slie reached the A GHOST STORY. 65 highest stair the Hght fell strongly on her features, and displayed a countenance, — youthful indeed and beautiful, — but in which vice and despair strove for mastery. * If ever human face,' to use Sir Walter's own words, ' exhibited agony and remorse — if ever eye, that index of the soul, pour- trayed anguish uncheered by hope and suf- fering without interval — if ever features be- trayed that within the wearer's bosom there dwelt a hell, the hell of passions that have no room for exercise, and diseases that have no hope of death — those features and that being were t?ien present to me.' ** Before he could make up his mind on the nature of this strange occurrence, he was summoned to the bed-side of his pa- tient. He found the lady so ill as to re- quire his undivided attention, and had no opportunity, and in fact no wish, to ask any questions which bore on a different subject. " But on the following morning, when he 66 A GHOST STORY. repeated his visit, and found the sufferer materially better, he communicated what he had witnessed to the husband, and ex- pressed a wish for some explanation. *' The steward's countenance fell during the physician's narrative, and at its close he mournfully ejaculated, ' My poor wife ! My poor wife !' « 'Why how does this relation affect her ?' *' * Much — much,' replied the steward vehemently. * That it should have come to this ! I cannot — cannot lose her. You know not,' he continued in a milder tone, ' the strange, sad history ; and — and his lordship is extremely averse to any allusion being ever made to the circumstance, or any importance attached to it ; but I must and will out with it. The figure then which you saw, is supposed to represent the daughter of a former baron of Berry Pome- roy, who bore a child to her own father. In that chamber above us the fruit of their A GHOST STORY. 67 incestuous intercourse was strangled by its guilty mother ; and whenever death is about to visit the inmates of the castle she is seen wending her way to the scene of her former crimes, with the frenzied gestures you describe. The day my son was drowned she was observed — and now my wife !' ** ' I assure you she is better. The most alarming symptoms have given way, and all immediate danger is at an end.' " ' I have lived in and near the castle thirty years,' was the steward's desponding reply, * and never knew the omen fail.' " < Arguments on omens are absurd,' said the doctor, rising to take his leave. * A few days, however, will, I trust, verify my prognostics, and see Mrs. S recovered.' " They parted mutually dissatisfied. The lady died at noon. *'Many years intervened, and brought with them many changes. The doctor rose C8 A GHOST STORY. rapidly and deservedly into repute, became the favourite physician and even personal friend of the Regent, was created a baronet, and ranked among the highest authorities in the medical world. '' When he was in the full zenith of his professional career, a lady called on him to consult him about her sister, whom she de- scribed as sinking, overcome, and heart- broken by a supernatural appearance. ** ' I am aware of the apparent absurdity of the detail I am about to give,' the lady began, * but the case will be unintelligible to you. Sir Walter, without it. While re- siding at Torquay last summer, we drove over one evening to visit the splendid re- mains of Berry Pomeroy Castle. The steward was very ill at the time, (he died, in fact, while we were going over the ruin,) and there was some difficulty about getting the keys. While my brother and myself went in search of them, my sister was A GHOST STORY. 69 left alone for a few moments, in a large room on the ground floor ; and while there — most absurd fancy ! — she has persuaded herself she saw a female enter, and pass her in a state of the most indescribable distress. This — spectre I suppose I must call her — horribly alarmed her. Its features and gestures have made an impression, she says, which no time can efface. I am well aware of what you will say, that nothing can possibly be more preposterous. We have tried to rally her out of it, but the more heartily we laugh at her folly, the more agitated and excited does she become. In fact, I fear we have aggravated her dis- order by the scorn with which we have treated it. For my own part, I am satisfied her impressions are erroneous, and arise entirely from a depraved state of the bodily organs. We wish, however, for your opi- nion ; and are most anxious you should visit her without delay. 70 A GHOST STORY. " * Madam, I will make a point of seeing your sister immediately ; but it is no delu- sion. This I think it proper to state most positively, and previous to any interview. I myself saw the same figure, under some- what similar circumstances, and about the same hour of the day ; and I should deci- dedly oppose any further raillery or incre- dulity being expressed on the subject in your sister's presence.' "The dialogue that followed is not mate- rial. Sir Walter saw the young lady the next day, and after being under his care for a very short period, she recovered." "Ah! that's all very well,'' said one of the youngest of the cavillers, as the widow concluded her story ; "but I should like to have had the testimony of the young lady herself. The spectre might be accounted for, like that of Lord Grey and the bloody head, on the principles of hallucination. I should wish to have questioned this very SPECTRAL ATTENDANT OF EARL GREY. Jl sensitive damsel ; she might have been a somnambulist, or a simpleton." '*On that subject, put what question you will, it shall be answered. I avow myself to be that sensitive lady, or somnambulist, or simpleton," returned the widow, sharply. "But what,'' said our good-natured, hos- pitable host, wishing to break the awkward pause which this reply had created, " what of Lord Grey and the bloody head ? ' '' Simply this. A summer or two ago Earl Grey came down into Devonshire, and fixed his head-quarters at the government house in Devonport. He was declared to be very much out of health, and was in- deed afflicted with a most singular disorder ; for continually present to his mind's eye was a bloody head. Go where he would, at home or abroad, in solitude or in society, this very revolting spectacle pursued him. The features rigid in death — the lead-like, lifeless eye— the brow convulsed in agony — 72 SPECTRAL ATTENDANT OF EARL GREY. and the neck, from which drops of gore seemed to trickle — these features form no very agreeable portrait. Such, however, as it was, no art could exclude it from the Earl's presence, and it embittered every moment of his life. " Change of scene was prescribed, and his Lordship came to Devonport ; but there his enemy followed him, and confronted liim, turn where he would, with its fixed and steady gaze. He then went to Ends- leigh Cottage, a beautiful country seat of the Duke of Bedford, near Tavistock. For once he seemed to have distanced his pur- suer, and for many days enjoyed the luxury of being alone. But to a large dinner party given there, the bloody head came, unin- vited, and stationed itself opposite to its old intimate, whom it harassed and dishearten- ed with its presence, till the companionship became unbearable, and the Ear], abruptly and in disorder, quitted the table. All this THE OCEAN SPIRIT. ^S the medical men accounted for on physical grounds, and demonstrated clearly enough to his family, that it arose from hallucina- tion." "That hallucination is a deuced long word," said a smart young sailor, who had listened most attentively to the symptoms of Lord Grey's malady. " I don't think I ever met with it before. Is it confined to the land, think ye, or to be met with afloat as well as ashore ? I wonder whether it would explain what I once saw, and a dozen more besides, hour after hour, and night after night?" " Let us have it by all means," was the general cry. " You must not expect sentiment or pathos in a sailor's story. Those are mat- ters we never log. But if a plain tale, more plainly told, and whose only recommen- dation is truth, will amuse ye —here goes : — " We were coming down from London VOL. I. E 74 THE OCEAN SPIRIT. to Newcastle, in ballast. It was the last voyage I ever made in the * Eleanor,' and I have reason to remember it well. We had light but favourable breezes ; and were running through the water about seven knots an liour, when, in the twilight — I took myself the first watch on deck — I saw standing, apparently within a few paces of me, a female figure. " Unconscious that we had any woman on board, I advanced, with some surprize, to question her. She turned round as I came up, and exhibited the face of a young girl of eighteen, on whom death had stamped his never-to-be-mistaken features — her bosom covered with wounds, and her throat gashed in a manner too unsightly for description. ** I gazed on her long and intently. In the bright glow of summer's twilight, every feature was visible. Her dark hair floated wildly about her ; and her thin THE OCEAN SPIRIT. "^5 light garments seemed to flutter in the breeze. '' I turned round — walked the deck — rubbed my eyes — endeavoured to persuade myself it was illusion — and again took an- other look to larboard. " There she stood — her pale arms crossed upon her bosom— gazing, as I thought, in- tently upon me : and after an hour, passed in keen and close observation of the figure, I was compelled to come to this conclu- sion, that I was confronted by a witness from the grave. *' * I will have other testimony to the fact, however,' thought I, as, at the conclusion of my watch, I prepared to go below. * I will be silent, till the opinion of others confirms my own.' *' I went down and called the mate. He rose and went on deck. I had hardly turned in, when he came rolling down the cabin stairs head foremost. * O God, sir,' E 2 76 THE OCEAN SPIRIT. he said, * I cannot stay on deck. If a spirit was ever visible to human eye, that of a murdered woman may be seen above us at this very instant.' ** * Absurd! you're dreaming! — I will return with you— follow me.' " We ascended — he slowly and reluc- tantly — and, as he reached the deck, he pointed to the phantom, exclaiming, * There she stands! — O God, it is too horrible!' '* AVe faced out the watch together. It w^as a bright and beautiful night. The wind had fallen. The sails flapped slug- gishly against the masts. Around us shone the deep and placid sea — its waters blue as the sky itself, with myriads of stars reflected on its surface. It was an awful contrast, to turn from the repose and beauty of nature to that mysterious figure which stood beside us without motion, but appa- rently watching, with its leaden eye, our slightest movement. THE OCEAN SPIRIT. 77 "Our watch ended, we resolved that, without coinmuiiicating what we had seen to Gorbie Allan, the boldest heart in the ship, we should rouse him, and send him on deck. Gorbie Allan was a Scotchman, of Herculean form and strength — of a very daring disposition, and dauntless courage. He had headed an insurrection among the blacks — was more than suspected of having once sailed with a pirate — acknowledged to have served in a slave-ship — and was viewed by all hands as more akin to devil than man. *' V/itli a hearty curse, Gorbie Allan w^ent on deck. He rolled up the companion stoutly enough. We listened. He walked up and down for a few moments rather ir- resolutely—but on a sudden we heard a heavy fall on deck— ran up, and found Allan senseless. '* We saw her at intervals during the whole passage. She appeared about twi- 78 THE MURDERED GIRL. light, and left us before dawn. I never suffered more from anxiety, than on that miserable voyage. The sailors, at all times superstitious, became almost mutinous ; and the disasters, and losses, and mischances which, one after another, overtook us, made them view the * Eleanor' as a doomed ship, and themselves a fated crew. *' We reached port at last ; and on heav- ing out the ballast, we found, deep down in the hold, the corpse of a young girl, with her throat cut from ear to ear. " Though her death had evidently been compassed by violent means, plunder had not been the object of her assailants. Her dress was costly; her purse contained gold; and on the third and fourth finger of her right hand were two very valuable rings. On a small signet appended to a little French watch, which we found round her neck, was engraved * Fanny' ; and her handkerchief was marked in hair with the THE MURDERED GIRL. 7^ same name. But who she was — how she came by her horrid end — who perpetrated it — who conveyed her with the ballast into our vessel — were facts never ascertained. She lies buried in Tynemouth churchyard, close under the east window of the old ruin — her sole memento, a plain slab, marked with the name of Fanny. Above her the wind sighs wildly through the ruins of the old priory, as if to woo her to re- pose — the ceaseless roar of the never-silent sea makes moan below — fit resting-place for such an unfortunate!" The simple, unaffected, ingenuous man- ner in which the young sailor spun his yarn, made a sensible impression on his auditory. A feeling of credulity seemed to gain ground : or, rather, there w^as an evident inclination to hear and assent — a greater indisposition to doubt and cavil. This feeling was at its height, when an old lady who had hitherto played that most 80 A REAL GHOST. important part in a conversation piece, — the part of a patient listener, — looked up from her patch-work and remarked, *' We have all heard much of unaccountable ap- pearances, and of sights and sounds strange to mortal eye and ear ; but no one has yet alluded to the horrors of a ghostly per- secution. I was subject to one. And if it be worth your while to listen to me, these are the facts. " My father in 97 was receiver of the land-tax for a very large district. I had lost my mother and was the sole survivor of thirteen children. These bitter bereave- ments had broken my father's spirits, and it was agony to him to be alone. I was his constant companion : and it was an injunc- tion anxiously urged on his part, and im- plicitly obeyed on mine, that I was, at no time, to be absent twelve hours from home without his express knowledge, and direct permission. A REAL GHOST. 81 " I was about twenty, when a ball was given at Hatfield House, in honour of the marquis's birthday ; and at nine o'clock my father handed my chaperone and my- self into the carriage, with an intimation that he had ordered the horses at two. The night was dark and stormy ; torrents of rain fell at intervals, and the lightning was frequent and vivid. I was pressed by the marchioness to remain all night, and besought by my partners to abandon my cruel intention of depriving them of the happiness of my hand for the supper dances. It was a struggle, for our road was lonely, and wretchedly out of repair ; and the con- trast between the light and gaiety within, and the tempest that roared without, was sufficiently disheartening: but I remem- bered my father, and was firm. " I reached home with considerable difii- culty, and found my father absent, and a note to this effect : — E 3 82 A REAL GHOST. ** *Dear Fanny— There is some appre- hension of a riot in the neighbourhood, and the magistrates have required my as- sistance. Occu2)y my room to night in- stead of your own. I will explain my reasons for this request when I return.' '' Fatigued and anxious, I sought with a heavy heart a restless pillow. Aware that government money to a considerable amount had very recently been paid into the colonel's hands, and was at that moment lodged in his escrutoire, I could perfectly comprehend his wish that I should occupy his room. But his per- sonal safety appeared to be in peril, and I listened long and anxiously for the sound of his return. All was still. The storm had lulled ; and the wind moaned through the avenue at distant intervals heavily and sullenly like the few last sobbings of an angry child. I examined the escrutoire : it was locked. The large closet which fronted A REAL GHOST. 83 the fire-place, and which had been rarely opened since my mother's death, was fast- ened likewise. '' I thought of HIM who has ever promised to aid those who with humility and earnest- ness seek his throne ; and having dropped the night-bolt, had succeeded in composing my mind, and was on the very point of dropping into an uneasy slumber, when I saw, by the flickering light of the dying embers of the fire, the closet door open and a man's figure issue from it. " Frightened as I was, I had yet power to observe his movements. He went up to the escrutoire, which he examined in a quick hurried manner ; gradually approach- ed the bed ; stood by it and wrung his hands as if in deep distress ; and then, as though he had at length taken, and would abide by, his resolution, drew from his breast a large clasp-knife, and aimed it at my tliroat. 84 A REAL GHOST. ** ,Then indeed my fortitude gave way to my fears. 1 shrieked loudly for aid, and rang the bell vehemently. The house- keeper and her niece, who were sitting up in expectation of my father's return, heard my cries, and came to my assistance. They found the bed-room door as I had left it — bolted : the closet as it had been for months — locked. It was instantly and in my pre- sence broken open. It was empty. In no way were its contents deranged or dis- ordered ; nor could any trace be discovered of a recent visit to its shelves. " The whole affair appeared inexplicable. " It was impossible to keep such a strange occurrence free from comment and exagge- ration. The ghost that had appeared at Marwood Hall was the topic of the neigh- bourhood. The inquiries I had to answer, the relations, corrections, explanations, and repetitions I was obliged to give, were beyond measure annoying. A REAL GHOST. 85 *' I was quizzed— cross-questioned stared at — asked over and over again by simpering misses if I had ever seen the ghost again, and sneeringly interrogated by their gaping papas if I really believed the appearance supernatural, till it became painful to me to go into society. But I never varied my story. I declared once and always that I had seen a figure issue from the closet and return to it ; that this figure used the gestures I described, and threatened my life. *' Even my father, kind and confiding as he was, appeared sometimes shaken by the doubts of those around him. * Now may it not be possible after all, Fanny, that your anxiety for me, and the excitation consequent on over fatigue, conjured up this phantom? Did you not dream it, love? I would indeed advise — nay urge you gradually to bring yourself to view it 86 A REAL GHOST. as a creature of the fancy — as altogether matter of illusion.' '' * If I ever saw face and features, or ever understood the mute language of menace, or witnessed one human being resolved on attempting the life of another, it was, father, at that hour ; and with this belief will I go to my grave.' " Thus matters stood for five years ; I bearing and braving the laugh, and the sneer, and the incredulous remark of those who were but too hapjDy to torture me with their imaginings on the subject ; but invariably refusing to admit there was any mistake on my part, or any possibility of deception. " At the end of that period, a prisoner under sentence of death in the county gaol, desired to see my father. * You don't re- collect me, sir, I dare say,' was his salu- tation, as his visiter entered the cell. A REAL GHOST. 87 ** ' Not in the least, my man : have we ever met before ?' " * Ah, sir, I'm sadly changed : but still I thought you would not have so totally forgotten one who lived ten years in your service. My name is Robert Southern- wood.' " ' What, Southernwood ! whose wife nursed my poor boys ? I am indeed sorry it should have come to this.' '' * Keep your pity, sir, for them that de- serve it ; it is wasted on me. But I could not go up the ladder without making a clean breast, and telling you it was I who alarmed the young lady about five years ago ; and — don't start, sir, I couldn't harm you if I wished it — intended to have first murdered — curses on me for the thought, and blessings on him, who, bad as I am, has hitherto kept me from the stain of blood.' ** * But how is this ? You, Robert, you 88 A REAL GHOST. whom I ever treated with so much in- dulgence, and parted with only when re- peated warning and remonstrance were of no avail ; you plan my death — for what reason ?' " ' I did not plan it,' returned the pri- soner, with vehemence. ' That was no part of the plot. I knew well that a large sum must be, about that period, in your hands, and needed no one to tell me where to find it. AVe judged you were busy that night, in putting down the Hertford boys, and thought we might carry off an ample booty in your absence. Every passage, crook, and corner in the old hall, were fa- miliar to me ; and my access to the closet easy. What was my agony, on finding her whom I had nursed and fondled on my knee a thousand and a thousand times, guarding the spoil ; and feeling that her life must be the price of its possession, I tried, but could not, murder her. No: God be A REAL GHOST. 89 praised, I was kept from that, lost and guilty as I am ! Trembling like a child, I returned to the closet. High up, on the left hand side, quite concealed by the old 'squire's portrait, there is a small window which communicates with the leads. By this I entered, and by this I retreated. And now, sir, leave me. My time is run- ning short, and I am not worthy you should waste another word upon me.' ****** " There are some daughters here," said the old lady, ** and dutiful daughters too. They will be at no loss to understand the thrill of joy I felt, when, on my father re- lating this interview, he added, wath tears in his eyes, ' What — what do I not owe, my dear girl, to your affectionate obe- dience? For the sum of money w^as so large, and government so inexorable, that, had you, dear Fanny, proved, for once, 90 NO ghost! faithless to your promise, I should have been a beggar.' " Witli this observation, the party sepa- rated for the night. The next morning saw them gathered around the breakfast- table, with, it must be confessed, crest- fallen countenances. Each questioned his neighbour — but in vain. The universal admission seemed to be, that they had thought much — dreamt more — but heard nothing I THE CONTROVERSIALISTS, " There is no situation more great and more glorious, than when in the fulness of years and the fulness of honours, you are found defending that church which first taught you to distinguish between good and evil, and breathed into you the elements of religious life. But when you defend that church, defend it with enlarged wisdom, and with the spirit of magnanimity. Be its liberal defender, be its wise patron, be its real friend." Syd>:ey Smith. *' Hast tbou never," said the benevolent Reynolds of Bristol, to young Tobias Spark, of Exeter — a very gay spark for a Quaker he undoubtedly was — " hast thou never de- tected the irritating effect which theological asperities produce on the temper ? Tell me, 92 BISHOP MARSH. with all thy fondness for polemical dispu- tants, do their works ever improve or in- struct thee ? Think'st thou there is to a bushel of controversy one grain of truth ?" The old Quaker's query has not unfre- quently recurred to me on closing a bitter polemical volume ; and mentally agreeing with him, that the effects of controversy are hardening, I have figured to myself the crabbed, sarcastic, wiry features, which the writers of such merciless irony and stinging criticism must possess. Years and experience have enabled me to correct my mistake. Of some choice con- troversial spirits of the age, I have had personal opportunities of forming an opi- nion : its result has been the downfall of my theory. At the head of living controversialists, I should be tempted to place Marsh, the present Bishop of Peterborough. His " Comparative View of the Churches of BISHOP MARSH. 93 England and Rome ;" his ** Lectures on the Authenticity and Credibility of the Bible ;" his long and elaborate reply to the twaddle of that venerable old lady, Lord Bexley ; are models of close reasoning, critical acumen, and cutting irony. But on looking into his countenance, you search in vain for those marked, deeply indented lines, which acrimony of dispo- sition and splenetic discontent are said to leave behind them. He is a mild, gentle, happy-looking old man, very near-sighted, and somewhat bent with years ; but always ready to acknowledge any little attentions that may be paid him, accessible, and easily amused. Often have I seen him busily employed, and highly interested, in devising plans for rescuing from the encroaches of the Nen, a piece of waste land which lies at the bottom of the palace gardens at Peterborough ; and I remember to this hour the cordial, hearty 94 SIR JOHN LEACH AND laugh, with which he greeted the mention of a characteristic trait of Lord Eldon. A long, strangely worded, and compli- cated will was disputed by the heir at law, and brought into the Vice Chancellor's court. Sir John Leach, in his off-hand manner, said, " the matter was perfectly clear" — no reasonable doubt could be enter- tained as to the intention of the testator ; and in few words decided that the will was valid. Dissatisfied with Sir John's award, the heir at law removed the suit into the higher courts, and ultimately appealed to the Chancellor. Lord Eldon gave judgment in a style, even for him, unusually prolix. He began with expressing his " entire dissent from the opinion pronounced by Sir John Leach, that the matter was perfectly clear ;" and after occupying two hours and a half in putting the case in every probable and im- probable light, and calculating every pos- LORD ELDON. 95 sible and impossible contingency, ended by- pronouncing for the validity of the will ; and affirming, like Sir John, that no reason- able doubt could be entertained as to the intention of the testator. His main object was to " DISPROVE that the matter was ijer- fectly clear, ^^ But tO return to the Bishop. There is something very peculiar in the style of his conversation. It smacks of his favourite studies, and now and then his sentences flow in such close connection with, and strict dependence on each other, that they seem like so many links in the demonstration of a problem. " By some most extraordinary fatality, Mr. Archdeacon" — he was then addressing Dr. Strong — "our Society* is not called a Bible Society ; and this has led many to the erroneous conclusion that we do not * The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. 96 BISHOP MARSH. distribute the Scriptures. Hence a Society which is really and truly the original Bible Society of this country, has been considered as no Bible Society at all ; and hence, stranger still, its advocates have been repre- sented as adversaries to the distribution of the Bible : as if real Christian knowledge could be promoted where the Bible was withheld!" There are some rather curious facts, con- fidently and currently reported by those who are best able to judge of their accuracy, as having preceded his introduction into public life. Two pamphlets, one on the foreign fisheries, and another on the conduct of France rendering the continuance of war imperative on this country, both remark- able for their ingenuity and force, drew upon him the notice of Mr. Perceval, then premier. A pension was assigned the wri- ter by that amiable and enlightened states- man, '' till he could he provided for'' His BISHOP MARSH. 97 election to the office of Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity in the university of Cambridge occurred soon afterwards, and the ministry — Mr, Perceval had died in ilie m^m?/z— abruptly intimated the cessation of his pension. *' But," says the Professor, " I am not provided for. My health may fail, and my abihty to continue my lectures cease : hence my resignation of my office would be impe- rative, and hence its emoluments would determine. Again : I may not be re- elected. I am not therefore provided for ; because I am still without that which, wlie- ther health and intellect be continued to, or taken away from me, would in either case produce me permanent and comfortable support." This reasoning was not to be evaded. He was soon afterwards nominated Bishop of LlandafF, and thence translated to Peter- borough. It is a scandal to the administra- VOL. I. F 98 BISHOP MARSH. tton that he lias been allowed to remain there. If learning, talent, consistency, and charac- ter, have any share in elevating a prelate. Marsh ousrht not to have been overlooked in the numerous translations which the church has lately witnessed. Few prelates have been more constantly resident in their diocese ; still fewer who have discharged their episcopal duties with such undeviating impartiality ; none who have declined with greater constancy to purchase false and fleeting popularity, by any compromise of their principles as churchmen. Another veteran in the field of contro- versy, is the venerable Bishop of Salisbury, An accomplished Hebraist, a rapid and nervous writer, and an unflinching sup- porter of his own sentiments, his Lordship is a very formidable antagonist to those who have the misfortune to differ from him. It may be questioned whether any writer ever possessed in greater perfection the abihty to BISHOP BURGESS. 99 analyse, one by one, his opponent's argu- ments, and place them in a ridiculous light. This the Rev. Mr. (I suppress the name in mercy) will probably be the last to acknowledge. This nameless worthy, a beneficed clergyman in the metropolis, perpetrated some years since a most extra- ordinary pamphlet, which had for its object nothing less than a formal reconciliation between the Churches of England and Rome. He recommended, as the best me- thod of accomplishing this goodly project, the calling of a general council. By what authority the council was to be assembled, or where it was to meet, or by what regu- lations its sittings were to be governed, were points far beneath the consideration of such a soaring writer, and which he never stooped to determine. The drollery of this proposal, originating from a beneficed clergyman of the Church of England, and propounded with great F 2 100 BISHOP BURGESS. gravity and earnestness, astounded some, angered many, and amused more. The bishop deigned a reply to it, in a tract entitled ** Popery incapable of Union with a Protestant Church ;" in which the London clergyman was most unmercifully handled. The reconciling scheme was, it seemed, a favourite bantling with its sagacious pa- rent. He was unwilling to resign it with- out a further struggle, and actually ventured on a second encounter with the bishop. He drew up a supplement, in which he defend- ed his notion with facts, illustrations, and — shade of Locke ! — arguments, which would have chafed even thy placid spirit, and made even thee, Philip of Spain, smile ! His glorious absurdities were caught at a glance by his unrelenting antagonist, and most remorselessly lashed in a rejoinder, to which no reply was ever attempted, nor could by possibility be given. BISHOP BURGESS. 101 Then, again, the ability, dexterity, in- genuity, and perseverance, with which he has supported his view of the controverted passage, I. John, v. 7' against a host of literary assailants, stamp him, not merely a first-rate disputant, but a disputant of the most dogged and determined kind. Yet the expression of his countenance, and certainly the character of his life, is benevolence. There is a soft, subdued ex- pression in his eyes, dimmed and faded though they be by incessant study — a mild- ness if not melancholy in his smile — a kind- ness and benignity in his address and man- ner, which annihilate all one's preconceived notions of the fire, and wrath, and bitter- ness of a sworn polemic. He is still, for his years, an intense stu- dent — deeply versed in, and a devoted ad- mirer of Hebrew — unwearied in his endea- vours to promote the study of that language among ecclesiastics generally, and specially 102 BISHOP BURGESS. desirous of introducing it among the younger clergy in his own diocese. At Winston, wliere many of the earlier years of his life were spent, and where his habits of application to his professional studies were most assiduous and uninterrupted, he was known by the name of the " spare clergyman." It was here that his zealous employment of time, and rigorous adher- ence to a self-imposed system of vegetable diet, had been attended by all but fatal consequences. Evanson, the secretary to the London Hibernian Society, is understood to be under an engagement to translate for the bishop such German writers, or extracts from their works, as his lordship may find requisite for his own publications. His ardent thirst for knowledge, neither years, nor increasing cares, nor added infirmities have been able to abate. His threatened loss of vision — he neither dreads its occur- BISHOP BURGESS. 103 rence, nor shrinks from its contemplation — has never deterred him from his pursuit of information, nor induced him to circum- scribe the hmits previously laid down of personal acquirements. Energy and activity as strongly characterize him now, as they did seven-and-twenty years ago, when he was examining chaplain in that very diocese of which he is now the spiritual head. He was but very recently making many and close inquiries about Spanish ; and said gaily and cheerily to Canon Bowles, the poet, as he closed a spirited detail of some very recent acquisition, " You will grant, I think, that our nearest approach to the grave should not terminate our de- sire of improvement." With mental resources equal to those of the bishop, but possessing greater readiness in availing himself of them, and endued with singular frankness and sincerity of disposition, the Church of England claims 104 TOWXSEXD OF DURHAM. a prominent place for Townsend of Dur- liam, among lier controversial writers. Few have more staunchly maintained her claims, at a time when apostacy was pre- ferment ; and none have more nobly justi- fied the discernment of their patron. To the late Bishop Barrington belongs the praise of having selected him from tlie herd of parish curates, and of having be- stowed upon him, for the benefit of the English Church in particular, and the cause of Christianity in general, independence and learned leisure. Ably has he fulfilled that princely prelate's expectations. His most striking work, written in the short space of six weeks, and containing references to an immense mass of reading, is the " Accusations of History against the Church of Rome." His most useful pro- duction is the " Chronology of the Bible." It is not, however, merely on Mr. Towns- end's writings that his real friends would TOWNSEND OF DURHAM. 105 rest his fame. He is one of the most forcible and fearless preachers of which the Church of England has to boast. Gifted with a voice of unusual depth and compass — possessing a delivery, dignified and im- pressive— comxmanding, at will, language that arrests your attention, and argument that enchains it, few have ever heard this extraordinary man, without rendering wil- ling homage to his powers. I have already adverted to his sincerity of character as a man. He carries it with him into the pulpit as a preacher. During the period of the agitation of the Catholic Question, when attachment to Protestant principles was considered to belong exclu- sively to old women and effete chancellors, he never disguised his view of the dangers with which emancipation was fraught ; his intimate acquaintance with, and his well grounded aversion to, — the dangerous doc- trines of popery : nor has he at any time f3 106 MR. HUSKISSON. blinked the avowal, in the most uncom- promising terms, of the validity of the divine commission of the clergy ; or shrunk from combating in the clearest terms, the popular and daily progressing doctrine — that it matters not what may be a man's creed, provided he he but sincere. Conduct so manly could not pass unre- compensed. Those who differed from him the most widely were the first to admire the frankness and fearlessness of his senti- ments : and one of the many testimonies to his intrepidity may be found in a letter of the late Mr. Huskisson to one of his poli- tical friends. " 1 have just heard the pro- testant champion Townsend of Durham ; and though there was scarcely a point on which I agreed with him, still such was his sincerity, talent, and earnestness, that I left the church perfectly delighted with liim, and yet half angry with myself for being so." TOWNSEND OF DURHAM. 107 Yet it is neither in the silent perusal of his works in the study, because they exhi- bit here and there traces of that asperity and bitterness inseparable from controversy — nor in his addresses from the pulpit, which now and then assume the tone of tlie very high churchman, and are tinged un- consciously with a slight shade of intoler- ance — that Mr. Townsend's talents can be rightly appreciated. It is in the intercourse of private life that a just estimate is to be formed of his powers, and in the social circle, that his conversational talents find their best and most appropriate arena. Coleridge — Sir Walter Scott— Lord Broug- ham — Surtees of Mainsforth, himself a splendid talker, and on points of antiquarian research gloriously eloquent — all these have I heard converse more than once, and on topics peculiarly suited to their powers ; but Townsend would bear comparison with any one of them. His learning, research, 108 BARRINGTON THE PRINCE BISHOP. and acuteness, you may gather from his works. It is in conversation you read his heart — his philanthropy — his since- rity. It was to his rare conversational powers, and tlie happy and healthful tone of the topics on which they are exercised, that he, in part, owed his intimacy with the late Bishop Barrington ; of whom he has drawn so amiable and accurate a portrait,* * The bishop had none of that apathy, which is too frequently the misfortune of the aged, when they have not devoted their minds to intellectual pursuits. Literary curiosity, the comfort and refreshment of age, was an active principle in him to the last; — and the love of lite- rary novelty, next to devotion and benevolence, his ruling passion. At eight, the bishop ended the day as he had begun it, by the perusal of devotional books, or by private medita- tion and prayer. I well remember his telling me, that he considered it to be a part of his duty to God, to devote to him the remaining strength of his intellect, by dedicating to his service those hours in which the faculties of his mind were most active ; and for that reason he never gave his restless and sleepless hours, which, at his advanced age were un- avoidably numerous, to prayer, and to devotional exer- cises. He preferred giving up the prime of his day, and the remnant of his intellect to the Almighty; and he sur- THE PRINCE BISHOP. 109 in the preface to the theological works ot the first Lord Barrington ; an mtimacy rendered the dross of his time — such was his own forcible expression, — to inferior subjects, to literary recollections, or to soothing remembrances of the friends he had lost, whose conversation he recollected with pleasure. At a quarter before ten, the family were summoned to evening prayer. A slight supper was then served, and at eleven, the bishop retired for the night. The pleasantest hours which I passed with my lamented friend, were those which elapsed between the removal of supper, and the entrance of the servant who attended him to his room. He was now ninety years of age, and he had long been accustomed to live in the constant anticipation of death- Every night he composed himself to rest, not expecting to live till the morning. The conversations, therefore, which we were accustomed to hold at this hour, were always grave and serious, though uniformly cheerful. He re- garded death as a man of sound judgment and christian principles will do, — without fear and without rapture ; with well founded hope, though with undefinable awe, as a punishment decreed by the Almighty, yet, as the intro- duction to a higher state of happiness than he could pos- sibly experience, (though he possessed every worldly en- joyment,) in this state of his being. Though our conver- sation was sometimes directed to the literary, or theolo- gical publications of the day, or to the actions, demeanour, or conduct, of his more distinguished contemporaries, of whom he related numerous and most interesting anec- dotes ; yet, the more frequent topics of our conversation were derived from the possible or probable approach of 110 TOWXSEND OF DURHAM. honourable to both parties, and termmated only by death. The following is the man- the period when the body should be committed to the ground, and the spirit return to its Maker. He delighted to dwell on these subjects. The questions which appeared to interest him more than any others, were : — whether the soul slept in the grave with the suspension of its faculties till it awoke, with the re-animated body, in the morning of the resurrection, — or whether (as he stedfastly believed) it passed in some mysterious manner into the more mani- fested presence of God immediately upon the dissolution of the body ; the nature of future happiness and future misery ; the continuance of the mental habits which are formed in this state, and which constitute, in some manner, our fu- ture condition, — the extent of redemption, and the oppo- site opinions of christians respecting the invisible state. These, and similar considerations were alternately discussed in these calm and silent hours ; and he uniformly con- cluded these discussions, by observing, " I know not, and I care not, what may be the real solution of these ques- tions ; I am in the hands of a merciful God, and I resign myself to his will with hope and patience." All our inquiries, indeed, on these subjects, though they may be very interesting, are merely speculative, and are always unsatisfactory. Yet the sight of an old man, full of days, riches, and honours, at the close of a religious and well spent life, patiently expecting his end, abounding in every virtue which can adorn mankind ; — in humility, in pa- tience, in kindness, in charity to all, — iii serene submission to expected death, in implicit dependence upon the mercy of a God, whom he believed to be his Friend and Father, TOWNSEND OF DURHAM. Ill ner in which, it is said, his prebendal stall in Durham was conferred on him. It is too characteristic of the Prince Bishop to be entirely incorrect. A vacancy occurred in the chapter, which, of course, it fell to the lot of Dr. Barrington to fill up. Ever mind- ful of his very advanced age, he judged it possible that the prebend, though vacant and at his disposal, he might not live to give away. Lest he should cause bitter disappointment in a quarter where he was anxious only to confer benefits, he scrupu- by the atonement, which had been accomplished by the Mediator of the New Testament ; the image of such a man can never be obliterated from my memory ; and the con- tinued enjoyment of his conversation, till within a few weeks of his death, while the strength of his body was gradually declining, and the intellectual, though not the spiritual powers were decaying ; that is, while he was beginning to be more averse to worldly business, and more intent upon devotional exercises, was a privilege, which I cannot too much appreciate, and which may be justly envied by all who can delight in the society of the wise and good ; or who would contemplate the triumph of the spirit of man over the weakness of the mind, and the in- firmities of the body. 112 BISHOP PHILLPOTTS. lously abstained fi'om the slightest intima- tion of his intentions, but gave private directions to his secretary to prepare the necessary instruments, and to use the ut- most possible dispatch. When the papers were completed, he summoned his chaplain, and pointing to them, said, " Providence has permitted me to carry into effect my long cherished wish respecting you. No- tliing is now wanting for the completion of this business but your signifying your ac- ceptance of the stall." A complete contrast to the preceding in mind and in manner, in person and in politics, will be found in the late Rector of Stanhope. No man ever had more of the courtier in his composition than Dr. Phill- potts. He is a clerical Chesterfield. And as to his bows — their profundity, empresse- merit, and frequency — Sir Charles Grandi- son must have been his model, and Rich- ardson alone could do them justice ! Per- BISHOP PHILLPOTTS. 113 haps his long and close intercourse with Bishop Barrington, himself a finished gen- tleman, might have contributed to throw that air of overpowering urbanity into his look and language. Of middle stature, with a keen quick eye, ready comprehension of the views of others, and a rapid response to them, he is a thorough man of business. Study, or care, or ambition, has much and deeply furrowed his countenance ; but the pliancy of his person equals the pliancy of his politics ! Yet he is an able, keen, and persuasive writer. His powers of close and conclusive reasoning his letter to Mr. Can- ning will attest ; and the ease with which he can qualify, explain, retract, and annul his assertions, let his defence of himself de- clare ! His letters to Charles Butler are now lying before me, clear, acute, forcible, and sarcastic. Alas ! alas ! that visions of preferment should ever have had power to warp a mind gifted witli an intuitive per- 114 BISHOP THILLPOTTS. ception of truth, and capable of embodying such noble sentiments. It is not for a plain man like myself to essay the task of reconciling the opinions avowed by him at different periods of his life : that I leave to more logical heads than mine. But we may surely wonder at certain discrepancies in his conduct, and marvel at the man who one week could go down to Oxford specially for the purpose of voting for Sir Robert PeeFs re-election ; and the next present, at the head of a large body of the clergy, an address to the Bishop of Durham, thanking his lordship for the manly, able, and unqualified oppo- sition he had given to the Roman Catholic claims, and this with an earnestness and gi'avity truly edifying to the bystanders. The rectory-house at Stanhope, with its conservatories, hot-walls, and forcing- houses, was built by him. It is worthy of the splendid benefice to which it is attached. BISHOP PHILLPOTTS. 1 15 In the hall is a fine Roman altar, in perfect preservation — the only appendage of which many of his brethren envy him the pos- session. It was at Stanhope that his letter to Jefiery — the shortest and smartest of all his pamphlets — w^as written: — the labour, it is affirmed — for he w^rites rapidly, and without effort -~ of a very few days. Apart from his political transgressions, he has received hard measures from the public press.* At Stanhope he preached constantly and earnestly — took his full share of the duty of that populous living — and was ever ready to perform the meanest and more laborious pastoral offices, to the humblest of his flock. This point in his * The assertion is incorrect, that his elevation to the mitre was the price of his silence on the Catholic Question, and was altogether the suggestion and act of the Duke of Wellington. Years before the "Wellington administration came into office his rise was resolved upon. Lord Liver- pool, while in power, communicated to him the decision of government, that he should, on the very first convenient opportunity, be placed on the bishop's bench. llG BISHOP PIIILLPOTTS. character, his opponents have carefully kept out of sight, and most unfairly. He was a zealous, indefatigable, and generous parish priest. That his ambition is bound- less, is the assertion of his associates. How he will distinguish himself, time will dis- close.* But those who know him, are con- vinced that he will not be silent in the upper House. He is a fearless and fluent speaker ; and can be a formidable and fierce opponent to any adversary whose argu- ments he may choose to analyse and an- swer. Those who delight in such a union, will be gladdened by the sight of an active and acute political bishop. It may be doubted whether the Church of England does not require such an one at the present crisis : and such an one, if the mitre be placed on his brow. Dr. Phillpotts will as- suredly prove. " The bishopric' seems fertile in con- * Written in 1829.— Editor. FABER OF SHERBURN. 117 troversialists. Stand forth, George Stanley Faber, leaning on thy " Difficulties of Ro- manism" — a work which the world will not willingly let die. Stand forth as thou art seen, sabbath after sabbath, in thy little sanctuary at Long Newton, doing ** the work of an evangelist," as one who feels he is amenable to no less a master than the unerring Judge of Heaven and Earth ; who neither courts the world's favour, nor fears its frown ; but is resolved firmly and un- shrinkingly to do his duty, happen what may. It is not, however, merely as a contro- versialist, though an able one, that Mr. Faber must be admired and dismissed. His ** Sacred Calendar of Prophecy" must not be forgotten in the estimate formed of him as a divine ; nor the singular dignity and disinterestedness of his character, in the opinion pronounced on him as a man. His line of preaching is a counterpart of his character. There is nothing orna- 118 FABER OF SIIERBURN. mental, flimsy, or flashy about it — no tricks to attract attention — no pretence or affec- tation. It is the simple, honest, faitliful exposition of important truths. No unpre- judiced man can listen to him without ad- mitting the consciousness of inward worth — without acknowledging that the preacher, — though grave and quiet, is deeply in ear- nest, and wishes his hearers to be so hke- wise. I hav^e hinted at his singular dignity, and disinterestedness of character. He has preserved it at no slight sacrifice.* The late Bishop of Durham collated him to the rectory of Long Newton, and subsequently offered him another living. Faber declined it, on the ground— though he expressed at the same time, in lively terms, his gratitude to the bishop, for remembering him — that * He has within the last few months been presented by the present bishop of Durham, to the mastership of Sherburn Hospital. — Note by the Editor. THE PRINCE BISHOP. 119 " HIS CONSCIENCE WOULD NOT PERMIT HIM TO BE A PLURALIST." The blsliop was at once astonished and offended. I say of- fended, because there was this pecuUarity about the great patron of the North, that he not only thought no one could form a bet- ter estimate, than himself, of the talents and usefulness of his brethren — but that he knew what was proper and suitable for each of his clergy, far better than they did themselves. That Faber then should de- cline a living after he had, with due deli- beration, offered it— when he had fully made up his mind that he ought to have it — when he knew far better than himself, whether his conscience was or was not tender — was a symptom of rebellion which his lordship could not overlook. I will not say, for I do not believe, that Faber really suffered in the bishop's estimation. But this much is clear: — stall after stall became vacant; a species of patronage open 120 THE PRINCE BISHOP. to no such objection as that alleged by Faber ; but the bishop nev^er troubled him with the offer of preferment again. This is the last time I shall have occa- sion to mention this distinguished prelate ; and I cannot quit him without placing his memory in a noble light. That he did for- give, and could forget aggressions of no common description, must be fresh in the memory of many. One instance is upper- most in my own. In the year 1806, the bishop published a charge,* entitled the ** Grounds of Sepa- * The charge contahied some very striking- passages. The two first 1 select as proofs of the bishop's discrimina- tion and acuteness ; the latter as characteristic of the prin- ciple that animated his whole life. " In the important concern of public worship, the Romish church and our dissenters have taken the opposite extremes. The Roman- ists have oppressed the simplicity of the Gospel under a load of ostentatious pageantry. They have carnalized the ordinances of God^ by impure and unauthorized admix- tures. Our dissenters, on the contrary, in reforming the reformed, have been led, by their zeal, to simplify and innovate into many indecent and unscriptural habits. They have deprived religious worship of many interesting THE PRINCE BISHOP. 121 ration between the Churches of England and Rome."* It is carefully and judiciously written, and negatives most completely the position many have assumed, that the bishop's intellect was narrow, and his attainments limited. It was assailed by many scribblers of the day, and, amongst others, with singular violence, by a Roman auxiliaries without adding any thing to its spirit and its truth." " Ho\v little the Romish church contri- butes to the cultivation of the original scriptures^ is evi- dent from the depressed state of sacred and antient litera- ture in the Romish universities ; and from this especially, that almost the whole labour of editing and illustrating the Greek text of the New Testament, has been confined to mem- bers of the Protestant church." "Be zealous^ then, in the discharge of your duty, but be charitable. Charity is certainly not incompatible with the most active zeal against erroneous and defective institutions." Upp. 8. 17. 21. * The charge, too, is remarkable for being the founda- tion of the fortunes of Dr. Phillpotts. Dr. Lingard, the his- torian, attacked it ; and Dr. P., in a masterly manner, re- plied to him. This brought him under the notice of his diocesan, and finally settled him at Stanhope. " Now that is most ungrateful," said Dr. Lingard, jocularly, as they passed without speaking, in the Strand. " I made his for- tune, ungrateful fellow! and yet he won't acknowledge his real patron !" VOL. I. G 122 THE PRINCE BISHOP. Catholic named . This gentleman fell, towards the close of his life, into cir- cumstances of extreme indigence. By some accident his situation became known to the bishop. " He is a man of learnings and must he cared for,'' was his prompt re- ply. It was no passing emotion of the moment, easily uttered and as easily for- gotten. It was acted upon : for, by the bishop's bounty (the man ivhose motives and intellect he had so grossly impugned) was Mr. supported for many years, and buried. The name of his benefactor was concealed from him to the very last ; nor did the bishop himself ever intend the cir- cumstance to be known. Yet he could mark his sense of ingrati- tude, and more than once evinced the keen- ness with which he could detect instances where his bounty had been abused. A young artist had painted for him a picture, for which he was liberally paid. He had THE PRINCE BISHOP. 123 no patron but the bishop, who, seeing indi- cations of talent about him, protected and fostered him, till he rose to considerable eminence in his profession. In the zenith of his fame, the prelate reminded him of his early effort, and expressed a wish that the artist would re-touch it, and make a trifling alteration in the fore-ground, which the bishop suggested. The artist assented, and the picture was sent to his house. When finished, it was returned to his lord- ship, with the inquiry, *' if he was satisfied with the alteration ?" *« Perfectly, Mr. . What am I in your debt?" " Twenty guineas, my lord." The original cost of the little landscape was Jive, The bishop, without a comment, wrote a cheque for the amount, and handed it in silence to the painter. " I am much obliged to you, my lord." G 2 124 FABER OF SHERBURN. " I agree with you, sir, in opinion," re- plied his lordship, with a bow, which told the painter their intimacy and intercourse were ended. But I have almost lost sight of Faber and his merits. The little tract which he put forth during the heat of the debates on the Roman Catholic Relief Bill, was quoted with marked approbation in Parliament ; and may be viewed as a manual of Protes- tant objections, based on scripture, against the impiety, idolatry, and impurity of the Popish faith. He, and such as he, are the men to fill commanding stations in tlie Es- tablishment — men who conciliate pubUc respect by their talents, and retain it by their consistency. Those are the men to govern the church, whose life bears out their declaration on entering it, that their object is usefulness, not emolument. The hour in which the church ceases to possess the affections of the people, wit- MRS. HENRY GREY. 125 nesses her fall— and that hour is hastened by every sordid act of a sordid minister. The body ought universally to be aware, that " a sort of anti-pastoi^al spirit, singu- larly characteristic of modern times, con- tinually undermines their best efforts ; nor can the enemies of religion more effectually paralyse their labours, than by endeavour- ing to dislodge them from their last hold — a hold upon the hearts and affections of the people."* And now, i^lace aux dames! Enter, fair antagonist of Andrew Thomson, and caustic author of '' Anglicanus'' — Mrs. Henry Grey. Mrs. Henry Grey is an abstruse mathema- tician, and an acute controversialist. She looks made of ** sterner stuff" than we usu- ally assign to the softer sex. Her hard, cold, blue eye —the rigid contour of her counte- nance — the ashy, changeless hue of her com- plexion — the harsh, dull tones of an inflexi- * Bishop Van Mildert. 1829. 126 MRS. HENRY GREY. ble voice— are all fitting appendages to a polemic. And a polemic she is of first- rate powers, as Andrew Thomson found to his cost. Heaven aid those — for they need it — who have to oppose her, either in con- versation or on paper. I would not wish even himself worse than a castigation from that ruthless " Female Bentley," the only literary antagonist, in the whole of Dr. Thomson's fiery career, who made him wince, and cry, " Hold, enough!" The Letters of Anglicanus, which de- lighted one half of Edinburgh, and enraged, almost to madness, the other, were written during Mr. Grey's absence in England, On his return from Monkwearmouth, where he had been engaged in opening a new chapel, " the gifted woman" submitted to the gaze of her admiring husband, the manuscript of the Letters of Anglicanus. Struck, as he could not fail to be, with tlieir point, their force, truth, and sarcasm, MRS. HENRY GREY. 127 .lie consented to their appearance. The storms that followed defy description. The genius, however, that raised them, bore her husband triumphantly through their vehe- mence ; and holding up the reverend doc- tor in one hand, and the cause of the Bible Society in the other, she dashed into the bitter billows of controversy, as if she had Noah himself for a pilot. She is a singular woman to look at, and awful indeed to converse with — being ple- nished with arguments on every probable and every improbable subject — every pos- sible and impossible topic. Yet, notwith- standing her knowledge of Locke and Des Cartes — her perfect comprehension of ab- stract ideas — her familiarity with Kant — and the smartness with which she " recals you to common sense,'' if you fail to express yourself with mathematical preciseness, — notwithstanding all these gifts and graces, let me ever be content to admire her at a 128 DR. TATHAM. distance, and to crave permission to con- sider her like snow in Italy, a phenomenon more surprising tlian agreeable. Here I ought not to pause. The Ger- man School of Divinity — the controversies that have arisen out of it — the two gifted and well- matched disputants that it has brought into collision — Rose, of Cambridge, and Canon Pusey, of Oxford — " How happy could I be with either. Were t'other dear charmer away." afford a noble and tempting arena — but I forbear. The cold, hollow, heartless aspect Ger- man theology would give to some of the most cheering doctrines of revelation, has been well and ably exposed. Canon Pusey, indeed, affirms— but I have an unmitigated horror of mysticism, and tender my cordial assent to Dr. Tatham, the friend of Pitt, and the learned President of Magdalen, who, in preaching at Oxford, before the DR. TATHAM. 129 University, undeterred by the presence of the " Heads," and the frowns of a couple of bishops, poured forth this pious ejacu- lation, and convulsed the under-graduates while he uttered it: — ** The Jarinan School of Divinity! — I wish, with all my saul, that the whole of the Jarman Divinity was at the bottom of the Jarmmi Ocean!" G 3 THE COURT OF HANOVER.* " A king- that would not feel his crown too heavy for him, must wear it every clay; but if he think it too light, he knovveth not of what metal it is made." — Lord Bacox. A WANDERER, froin cii'cumstances with which the reader need not be troubled, the summer of 182- found me domiciled at the Court of Hanover. It was a season when the political intrigues of that miniature state were peculiarly active, and its parties pre-eminently gay. The Duke of Bruns- wick had just made the notable discovery * Thisj and two other papers thus marked, have ap- peared in a popular periodical, while this volume has been passing through the press. — Ed. 132 MAJOR MULLER. that he had received mjuries from his re- lative, the King of Hanover, which called for inquiry and reparation. This was a powerful stimulus to the first. The Prin- cess Augusta, accompanied by Lady Mary Taylor, arrived on a visit to her brother, the Duke of Cambridge, — an event amply sufficient to give an additional impulse to the second. People, however, differed sadly in their estimate of the importance of these events. The ladies viewed as an occurrence of the weightiest concernment the visit of the British princess ; the gentlemen, the de- monstrations of hostility by the German duke. Major MuUer, the governor-gene- ral's aid-de-camp, military secretary, con- fidant, and comptroller, sighed and looked graver than even Germans generally do ; he whistled ; and his diplomatic cast of countenance assumed a still more severe and portentous expression when the me- GAIETY. 133 naces of the incensed Brimswicker were al- luded to; while the beautiful Baroness Leinsengen dismissed her smiles, and dropped her laughing, dark blue eyes, and screwed up her mirthful mouth into some- thing like an air of awe-stricken solemnity, when the queenly bearing of the princess was discussed, and the dignified yet distancing and distracting curtsy of her lady in wait- ing. But on one point all agreed, that gaiety should be the order of the day : and it was so : for what with reviews in the morning, and balls at night, cabinet councils and court dinners, concerts and conversaziones, every head was in a whirl ; and the little Court, with every appendage thereunto be- longing, appeared beside itself. But beyond and besides all this, Hanover then possessed for me an attraction, which kept me spell-bound to its territory, in the person of the fair girl of Devon— Harri- ETTE W TE. 134f THE ENGLISH BEAUTY. Her mother and two brothers accom- panied her. What could be the object of the old lady's visiting Hanover, puzzled the most knowing ones about court to de- cide. Harriette's beauty and fortune would have commanded a splendid match for her in her own country. " Mammciy' well as she wore, deeply as she rouged, ably as she played her rubber, and wittily as she talked over it — could scarcely be suspected of designing to take a second lord to her bosom ! And her sons, skil- fully as she manoeuvred the duke, she could hardly calculate on getting both into the Hanoverian service! But whatever was her object, she won her way into the court circle, and retained her place there. And though, at times, the amiable and gentle duchess noticed, with something like an air of quiet surprise, the predilection which the duke evinced for the gay widow's so- PRINCE GEORGE OF CAMBRIDGE. 135 ciety, and the hearty laugh with which he greeted her repartees, she nevertheless maintained to the last her position as a " woman of irreproachable character," and an ** acquisition to the court." After all, the hold which she seemed to have upon his Royal Highness's regard, might be attributed to the manner in which she had conciliated the affection of Prince George. Cold and phlegmatic, as some who were once about the Duke of Cam- bridge, have represented him, he is ardent and enthusiastic to a degree, about the mi- nutest trifle that concerns his son. Prince George of Cambridge was, about the period I refer to, a pale, grave, deli- cate-looking boy, thoughtful and intelligent beyond his years, and without any preten- sions to the light and buoyant spirits of his royal namesake and cousin of Cumberland. He seemed to inherit the delicate and di- minutive features of his mother, thou^rh 136 PRINCE GEORGE OF CAMBRIDGE. there was a striking similarity, in the upper part of his face, to his uncle, the late Duke of York ; while again, in the expression and play of his mouth, a close resemblance might be traced to the late King. Devot- edly attached to him, as the duke undoubt- edly was, his affection did not blind him to his son's true interests and real happiness. " Impress upon him," were the duke's in- structions to the prince's tutor, Mr. Harvey, *' the keenest and quickest sense of honour. Give him an inherent and unalterable love of TRUTH ; and teach him not only that a lie is criminal, but in the highest degree BASE and CONTEMPTIBLE." These lessons have not been thrown away. And if candour and frankness in the boy sometimes designate the character of the man, England may have much to hope from her future sovereign, should he ever sway, jointly with his cousin Victoria, the British sceptre. PRINCE GEORGE OF CAMBRIDGE. 137 Playing one day alone with the young Count L , in the principal drawing- room of the palace, they heedlessly upset and destroyed a very costly piece of hijou- terie, which the Duchess had expressly charged them neither to touch nor ap- proach. On her return, her Royal High- ness discovered the accident, and demanded how it had happened. " I," said Prince George, stepping boldly forward, "I did it, Mama." On being subsequently asked why he had taken the entire blame on himself, when his compa- nion was equally implicated, he replied, ** Because I was the eldest, and ought to be punished most ; and because," he added, " I looked in L— 's face, and thought he was about to deny it, and to say what was not true !" To the Duchess, should the Prince ever be the joint sovereign of this country, the British nation will owe a deep debt of gra- 138 THE DUCHESS OF CAMBRIDGE. titude. She has been unremitting in her endeavours to impress him with — the best security for a people's happiness — a keen and high sense of religious principle. The Duchess of Cambridge is little known by the Enghsh nation. Her visits to this country have been few and brief; and apart from her being many years younger than the duke, a fair and pretty-looking woman, few particulars have transpired respecting her. Boundless popularity has been in countless instances worse bestowed. To great correctness of manner, a strict and studied demeanour, disinclination from po- litics, and devoted attention to the duke's comfort and happiness — her Royal High- ness has added the most sedulous, minute, and unvarying attention to the moral pro- gress of her childi'en. Religious feelings were early awakened by her in the mind of her son. Some of his questions were more easily asked than PRINCE GEORGE OF CAMBRIDGE. 139 answered ; and the quickness and bluntness with which they were put, remind one of his royal grandfather, the good old King, as he is still affectionately termed by a grateful nation. The prince had been listening to his mo- ther's description of the dwelling-place of God — heaven ; and of the splendour and brightness which surround his seat. *' Ma- ma," said he, looking towards the west, where the sun was sinking, surrounded by all his robes of gorgeous brilliancy, and glowing in all the matchless hues of a sum- mer's sunset : " Mama, God is not invi- sible ; for I see him now !" At another time, when death had been alluded to, and the final resurrection which awaits the just, and the resumption, though in a glorified form, of our mortal bodies — " But you told me, yesterday, sir, that they will decay, and moulder, and become dust ; 140 THE BEAUTY MARRIED. and how," he mqiiired, ** will God put them together again ?" *' That is more than I can explain to you. It will be done ; but I know not how." *' You don't ? What !" says he, with great quickness, ** doesn't the Bible tell you? I thought that was God's book, and told you all and every thing He did." And he seemed disconcerted and disap- pointed, and for some time to debate the point in his own mind, as if he was endea- vouring to solve by its workings what had puzzled so many wiser heads than his own to define. Winter came on, and the princess de- parted. Mrs. W. returned a icidow into Devonshire ; her two sons accompanied her, alas ! as civilians, I was driven by the rheumatism to Spa ; and Harriette — oh ! most lame and impotent conclusion ! be- came the wife of a country attorney. WITHERSFIELD OF TRINITY HALL.* '^ There are four great cyphers in the world : he that is lame among dancers, dumb among lawyers^, dull among schoilerS;, and rude amongst courtiers." — Bishop Earle. In the old gray court, on the right of the master's lodge, not far from the rooms oc- cupied by Ebden, that merriest, though not the mildest of tutors, lived, in the year 182—, Withersfield, of Trinity Hall. He was a short, fat, thick-set man, with a round red face, fond of grog, but very averse to Greek — a naval gentleman, disguised in academicals ; and as he rode along Trump- ington-street, in his full, flowing, fellow- 142 THE NEOPHYTE. commoner's gown, with the same step and stagger with which he would have paced his own quarter-deck, was a spectacle which has been known to relax the iron muscles even of Professor Scholefield himself. But if his appearance was droll, much more were his address and dialogue. He had served many years in the navy; and having (to use his own expressions) " thrice fought a ship, was now about to work a church! No chance of promotion, now "our best friend is deposed! My father will have a vacant living very shortly; and I"— he sighed deeply— "must fill it! "—So thus he concluded, to the utter amazement of the resident fellow, " I've brought my- self up in smooth water ; and here I am, like a young bear, with all my troubles be- fore me!" Never was there a neophyte more sadly perplexed. When in his cap and gown, he always seemed doubtful of his own iden- BILLY BLUE. 143 tity. Moreover, he was perpetually puzzled between his clerical prospects and liis nau- tical retrospects. " Wind westerly! This day nine years, I was wrecked off Ushant. By-the-way, have you heard that the Bishop of Peterborough has issued a fresh code of signals — psha! — questions I mean? How on earth I'm to answer! — Mind your wea- ther-helm, madam!" he exclaimed, as the gigantic Mrs. Battle transfixed him with the point of a huge umbrella. '* You should have shortened sail in this squally weather," was his gruff observation, as he with diffi- culty disengaged himself from her drapery and apologies. Etiquette required that he should be in- troduced by the tutor to some man of his own college. Mr. C C , one of the *' exclusives," was fixed upon. " Ha ! I knew something of one of your family — old Billy Blue."* Mr. C C 's * The late Hon. Admiral Connvallis. 144 BILLY BLUE. complexion bore considerable affinity to his noble relative's nick-name at that particular instant. '' Old Billy Blue! Ah! he was not one of your psalm-singing beggars, with his hair as straight as a die. No, no ! he knew what was a midshipman's duty — and more he never required. Not like your saintly skippers of modern days, who, while they give their orders, turn up their eyes like a lady in love, and — expect impossibili- ties." " You should endeavour, sir," was the sage advice of tlie professor of civil law, " to give your mind an academical turn, while resident in this our university." But in vain. He convulsed the by-standers, by the most pertinacious adherence to his pro- fessional phraseology. He persisted in maintaining, before a horrified assembly of the " most serious young men," that Mr. Irving's action in the pulpit reminded him '' of a ship's course working to windward;" COLLEGE EXAMINATIONS. 145 and averred that Professor , while de- Hvering his lectures, resembled a *' stormy petrel on the look-out for squalls." " With ersfi eld," said the gay Sir Charles , as he rushed into his room one morn- ing, breathless and undressed — " Withers- field, shut your doors ; the bailiffs are after me, and what can I do ?" *' Do ? stand out to wind with every stitch you can crack. But stay, have a glass of grog be- fore you start. Easy, easy. Why you bellow like a bunch of boatswains!" - I feel some difficulty in stating whether it was during a college examination in Tri- nity Hall, or a criminal one before the Vice-Chancellor, that Mr. Wlthersfield*s parts shone forth with the greatest bril- liancy. The examination papers are gene- rally printed. This year they consisted of questions on one of the Gospels in tlic Greek Testament, and on, I think, the Kvpovvaihia of XcUOphoU. " Do VOU fuid VOL. I. H 146 BABBLE ! any difficulty, Mr. Withersfield?" said the examining fellow, kindly, observing he had been poring over his papers for an hour in evident perplexity. '* I shall be happy to give any explanation, or remove any ob- stacle that — " " I'm quite at sea, sir, without my sailing orders," was Withersfield's mournful reply. At one he folded up his papers with his characteristic composure, and placed them in the tutor's hands. Their contents were a simple «* Mem: — May 20th, 182—, 1 p.m. Wind westerly — dead calm. — Pored for three hours over my printed instructions — as incomprehensible as Lord Gambler's speeches. Never could understand but one chapter in the New Testament — the twenty-seventh of Acts—that not called for. As to Mr, Cyrus, 'tis all babble ! " R. W." TRAVERSE SAILING. 147 There had been a trumpery row in the university, which, magnified by maHce, was brought under the cognizance of the Vice- Chancellor. Withersfield was present ; the only individual, in fact, of the party, who was sober. His evidence was material, and both parties pressed for it proportionably. " I'll show the old lady a bit of traverse sailing," said Withersfield ; and he mystified accordingly. " But what was the origin of the fray? — who struck the first blow?" asked Mr. Vice, and asked in vain. At length the Vice drew a long breath, and began: — "Mr. Withersfield, you were present at the com- mencement of this dreadful outrage — you were an eye-witness of the whole of this flagrant proceeding — now, Mr. Withers- field, on your honour," — these words were repeated with the most appalling solemnity, — " on your honour, Mr. Withersfield, what was the first thing you saw ?" H 2 148 LORD COLLIXGWOOD. ** Mr. Vice-Chancellor," replied Withers- field, with an elongated visage, a mock so- lemnity of utterance, and a pause between each word, that gave the most farcical air to the whole proceeding, " there's no work- ing to windward of truth : — the— first — thing — I — saw — was — Mr. Augustus Fitz- clarence canting his ballast." Yet his stories were, to the full, as me- morable as his sayings. He had an inex- haustible store relative to Lord ColUng- wood, with whom lie had sailed, and his dog Bounce, which he used to detail, to the huge delight of a large, laughter-loving audience. One morceau I must here find room for, the shortest, not the best. A Jemmy Jessamy of a midshipman waited on his lordship to solicit a lieutenancy. The admiral, fixing his penetrating eye on him, surveyed him in silence for a minute, and then observed, ** That would be sporting witli men's lives, indeed! Sir, I would AN EASTERLY WIND. 149 not trust you with a ])3at in a trout- stream !" I lost sight of him for some years. At length we met again at Palace, he for institution, I for examination. It was one of our rainy, chilly summers, and the bi- shop, a thin, spare man, whom hard study and sedentary habits had evidently ener- vated, shrank from the inclemency of the season. *' The morning is cold, the wind must be easterly." ** No, my lord, not since this day week,'* said Withersfield. '' It was southerly at six ; then veered a point or two to the norrard; and is now due north." ** Indeed!*' said the bishop, who was evidently surprised at this lengthy reply, and by no means up to his man. Then addressing his secretary, who waited for liis signature, he inquired, "Is it the first or second of June, Mr. Porteus ?" " The first, my lord — the glorious first 150 LORD ROLLE. of June- Howe's victory, my lord. How I should like to have another lick at those ." The bishop stared, and turned to his secretary, who reflected his lordship's look of wonder with one of the most un- qualified bewilderment. ** Hem! — hem! — my lord, I beg pardon." ***** i^ Alas! where is the contented man? — Withersfield affirmed his forte was the pa- thetic— aline he never ventured upon, save and except when he was " a sheet or two in the wind." I resemble my near neighbour Lord Rolle. I never affect the hearts of my hearers, till I am on the point of closing my third bottle. His lordship then has a fund of pathos— so have I. — Listen: — THE PERILS PREVENTIVE SERVICE, " Come on, Sir; here's the placii : stand still : — how fearful And dizzy 'tis to cast one's eyes so low !" — Shakspeare. " Lean on my arm, sir — allow me to assist you," officiously repeated the waiter at "Wright's Ship Hotel," as late on a Saturday evening I arrived at Dover, and descended at a door most hospitable to all travellers — who pay, ** Dover — Dover," I repeated to myself; is there not some spot — some relic endeared from reminiscences of the past, to be viewed 152 shakspeare's cliff. at Dover ?" and musingly I paused at the craving portals. Before me was a dirty coal-quay, where lounged some half dozen drowsy porters, and beside which sprang a grove of masts. At a little distance, the post office, girt about with an impatient throng, afforded a scene always diversified, and sometimes amusing. Around me was a crowd of dirty boys, where many a voice was echoing *' Shakspeare's cliff — the way to Shakspeare's cliff, sir?" but not a lip uttered, " Would you see Churchill's tomb?" "Shakspeare's cliff and Churchill's tomb ! At any rate here are two objects on which to play the Englishman — but to-night —no, not to-night — too late — to-morrow with the dawn !" To-morrow came— breakfast was finished — the usual turns were taken up and down the room which travellers always take, or should take, and after the accustomed stare from the window on the aforesaid coal-quay. CHURCHILL S TOMB. loo which now enjoyed a state of repose and cleanHness — repose, from the day being Sunday, and cleanHness, from a heavy fall of snow— I sallied forth. By dint of repeated and persevering inquiries, I learnt at length from a bystander, that the churchyard, containing the object of my pilgrimage, was situated behind the market-place. Leaving, as I was directed, '* Dismal Court" on my right hand, and a large dung- hill on my left, I discovered, a few steps in advance, an ill constructed door. Thanks to its ruinous condition, I peeped through ; and to my no small satisfaction beheld those little tumuli which mark the last resting- place of mortal man. I gazed — long and ardently gazed — on those sad and inanimate moralists, and tlien drawing back, as I eyed the place once more, exclaimed — " Farewell ye gilded follies ! pleasing troubles ; Farewell ye honour'd rags, ye glorious bubbles ; H 3 154 Churchill's tomb. Fame's but a hollow echo, gold pure clay, Honour the darling but of one short day ; Beauty, the eyes' idol, but a damask'd skin. State, but a golden prison to live in. And torture free-born minds. Fame, honour, beauty, state, train, blood, and birth. Are but the fading blossoms of the earth. Sir H. Wotton. In an instant the wall was scaled. I am right : this must be the churchyard where reposes the leading poet of the age in which he lived. Here, then, the bones of the poor curate are mouldering in their native soil, and he, before whose satire the many had trembled, and beneath whose lash Ho- garth himself had writhed, is left " to dumb forgetfulness a prey," in a spot so obscure, that even in a little sea-coast town it is a matter of difficulty to discover it. Shame — shame on those who affect to uphold the literature of their country, to suffer such a Juvenal as he who wrote the Rosciad thus to be forgotten ! Surely there was some- thing wrong in his life and actions — un- Churchill's tomb. 155 questionably he must have committed some outrage against the customs of his country — are the remarks of the stranger. No : he was a poet who enUsted himself on the side of civil and religious liberty — who drew the sliarpest arrow in wit's quiver against tyranny and oppression. He was the friend of Wilkes : *' and Wilkes" — " was in the Opposition ! Now dost thou under- stand ?" Alas ! that word resolved it all. Leaping quickly from the wall into the cemetery, where the numerous graves were indicated by the rising hillocks of snow, I waded towards the quarter where I had been informed the remains of the satirist were interred. A tablet caught my eye. To this I of course made my way, as I doubted not that so poor a mark of re- spect would have been paid to him. I was deceived. Eagerly I brushed away the snow from every headstone, and as often found recorded the virtues of some deceased 156 Churchill's tomb. grocer, tallow-chandler, or baker, who had lived and died an angel in the estimation of " his numerous family and afflicted friends." Each thing that might be called a tomb I examined, but unsuccessfully. I then wandered up and down among the humbler heaps, repeating the direction which had been given to me — " near the farther end on the right hand side." Still it was not to be found. I paused. Perhaps my friendly guide had been mistaken ; perhaps this was not the burial place to which he had alluded. I was about to turn away, when my eye fell upon the following simple line — " Life to tub last enjoy'd — here Churchill lies !" This was it. Lowly among the lowliest was the Ijurrow containing relics so pre- cious, headed by no other memorial than the date of his death and the words above quoted.* vSad were the musings w^hich * Taken from one of his own poems — " The Apology." LORD BYRON. 157 occupied my mind during the twenty mi- nutes spent in contemplating the object before me. Nor were my thoughts solely given to Churchill. Beside this little heap Byron had meditated and improvised. Here passed that touching colloquy between him- self and the old sexton, " the gardener of that ground." Who can express the feel- ings that must have striven for mastery in the bosom of Byron, while contemplating the last eartlily resting-place of a kindred spirit? ** Where shall I repose when once this struggling scene be past ? When, and under what circumstances, shall I throw off this mortal coil ? What portion of this world's repute shall I have obtained — good or bad ? What boots it ? Yet, standing by the neglected grave of such a famous poet, I can scarce forbear to ask myself whether the goal be worthy of the race — whether it would not be wisdom to strive to become 158 Churchill's tomb. happy rather than famous — useful, rather than great ?" Lastly, who would not turn away, as I did, with moistened eye-lid, exclaiming, " In vain has party faction left thee to obscurity and neglect. Vain are the envi- ous attempts to shroud thy name ; for while hearts are left to seek out this poor spot, and hands are found to plant, even though unsuccessfully, the laurel beside thy mound, thy last and earliest wishes will be gratified, and verily they are."* I know not whether there be aught pe- culiarly morbid in my temperament, but I have, like " Old Mortality," a love for churchyards in general, and the feelings which they call up. No moral lesson is equal to that which is read to us by the * A wish to this effect is expressed in " The Apology;" and I was informed that an attempt had been made to realize it, by a Mr. Arthur Brooke, of Canterbury. This endeavour, though highly creditable to the parties, failed. The laurels would not grow in so poor a soil. THE MOURNER. 159 silent grave. Passionless and inanimate, it can have no interest to serve — but I forget, my business is to relate, not moralize. I was retiring slowly where I had entered, casting a casual glance at the " thick deaths of half a century," when a venerable, but blackened ruin, at the farther end of the cemetery attracted my attention. Altering my course, I moved towards it, giving a loose conjecture as to the purposes and date of its erection ; when I saw beneath one of its walls, in the corner of the ground, a female form, kneeling by a grave ; her dark habiliments of woe and mourning affording the strongest contrast to the newly fallen snow. The luxury of grief has not been alto- gether unknown to me in this our pilgrim- age of sorrow ; neither have I been quite without experience of that jealous sensation which comes over us, when intruded on by the unwelcome presence of a stranger. 1 160 THE MOURNER. therefore stopped my career, and hesitated as to whether I should retreat altogether, or wait and see the result. Dear woman stands not alone in the matter of curiosity, and in my case it pre- vailed. Ten minutes wearily stole away, but no motion was to be observed in the form of the mourner, and an additional space of time of the like duration might in all probability have followed to the same purpose, had I not risen, and with some alarm warily approached the spot. She appeared lifeless : in an instant I was at her side. Her rank was evidently that of the upper order ; her dress, the deepest mourning, devoid of ornament. Two fair and tiny hands, clasped as if in supplica- tion, contained a lock of hair ; the muscles of the arm had fallen relaxed upon the snow, and were rigid with cold : while dark tresses, straying in wild confusion, shaded her perfect, but colourless features. THE MOURNER. l6l It was a bitter day, and without the loss of another second I loosened my cloak from my neck, and swathing her fragile form within its ample folds, pressed my lovely burthen to my bosom, to restore, if not yet too late, some of that vital warmth which exposure had chilled. Casting around me an anxious glance, partly with the design of seeing if any aid were near, and partly in hesitation as to what course I should adopt, my eye fell on a tombstone at whose base we now were» The inscription ran thus : — " Sacred to the memory of Lieutenant Frederick Walden, of the Coast Guard Blockade:' " Fighting'' and " glory" were the only words which I had recognized in addition, when my attention was arrested by the sound of voices on the left. " Here she is— here is my poor Caroline" — cried an aged and lady-like female, mak- 162 THE MANIAC. ing towards us with haste and agitation, followed by two servants and a gentleman. "She's dead! — my daughter *s dead !" she added, with frantic eagerness, as she gazed on her pale features ; and throwing her arms around the insensible sufferer, the mother wept aloud. Such violent grief was not to be of long endurance : restoratives were administered, and with success. The youthful mourner gradually unclosed her eyelids, and spoke ; but in her glance, and still more plainly in her language, was evinced that most humi- liating of human woes — the aberration of the immortal mind. ** Frederick told me he would come — yet — no — it cannot be — I saw him — yes I saw him die." A convulsive shudder seemed to pass over her— the lips quivered— and her eye- lids once more sliut out the light from eyes, the wildness of whose beauty gave the be- holder pain. THE MANIAC. l63 " To the carriage," cried the elder lady, speaking rapidly ; '' bear her quick as thought. Mr. Morrison," turning to the gentleman who accompanied her, " thank this stranger for me ; I am unable to do so as I wish ; and prevail on him to let us see him at Woodlands. I leave him in your care." She curtsied and departed. Turning, I found myself alone with the gentleman to whose attentions I had been commended. " You appear ignorant of her story, Sir," he observed to me as, while standing at the entrance of the cemetery, we followed with our eyes the retreating carriage. "Your conjecture is correct: I am merely a wanderer and a traveller. They set me down last night at the Ship Hotel. This morning I strolled forth to look at Churchill's grave and Shakspeare's Cliff. Thus far had I proceeded when, as I before 164 THE COAST BLOCKADE. remarked, I found that lady lying on the grave of " ** Frederick Walden," said he, closing the sentence. *^ Poor Frederick!" he conti- nued; " a dear — an intimate friend of mine. 'Tis a sad tale — your looks, Sir, express your wish to hear it ; and if you will accept my poor services as guide to the cliff your wishes shall be gratified." I bowed in acquiescence, accepted his proffered arm, and we walked forward. It is little more than a year — nay, not so much — it was but last spring that I be- came acquainted with the deceased. He had just been appointed to the station of R , which, as you know, is one of the posts of the coast blockade ; at which billet — it is within a short distance of us— lie was to remain eighteen months for the completion of his time. At this period I was in daily expectation of being super- CAROLINE MASSINGBERD. l65 seded, my three years having just expired. As, however, is frequently the case, a delay of six months took place ; and the frequent intercourse which our duty occasioned, for my station was only a mile distant from his own, naturally established that friendship and regard of which I have spoken. But to my story. Caroline Massingberd was the only daughter of the vicar of R . Her fa- ther's church is situated close to the sea. 'Walden attended it. Circumstances, too trivial to mention here, brought about an intimacy, and eventually, with the sanction of her parents, an engagement. Joyfully did the young couple look forward to the expiration of the time when he was to retire on half-pay, and enter on the new existence of a married state. It was some two months after this last arrangement had taken place between them, that we obtained information from Calais 166 THE SMUGGLER. of a boat being about to run a cargo in our neighbourhood. She was lying all ready with her contraband booty on board in the little harbour of that port, and waited only for a dark night and a favourable breeze. Day after day did we order our men to keep the sharpest possible look out; and as often as we met as anxiously did we scan the weather — but in vain. It was fine as a cloudless sky and breathless atmosphere could make it : at last, how- ever, came a dull, cold, gray morning. " Morrison, my boy, I give you joy : here we have it. Before this time to- morrow the lugger and her tubs will be ours. She sails, I'll be sworn, to-night. The wind's straight up channel — fair for her to lay over and for us to chase. It's high tide at eleven to night — no moon. What '11 be our share of the prize ? How many ankers of brandy did that fellow say ?" PREPARATIONS, iGj "Eh? — what? — what are you talking about ?" I cried, waking up at his voice. " You haven't taken the prize without me surely ? Nay, that's a breach of faith." *'Ha! ha! ha! faith, Morrison, that's good! Leave your dreams in your crib there, and turn out. It's a famous hazy, misty morning, with a stiff breeze right up channel. The night will be dark, depend on it." It needed little more to rouse me effectually, and in a few minutes we were busy planning the projected interception of the smuggler. The largest boats of our respective stations were drawn down to the sea ready for launching ; and the necessary arms, provisions, &c. were placed in due order to be handed in at a moment's notice. Wearily the day stole away ; and as Walden had predicted, there was towards evening every appearance of a dark night. Not a sail had passed in sight of the look 168 PRESENTIMENT. out, and at night we were to launch forth our boats in searcli of danger and of death. CaroUne Massingberd had, much to Wal- den's annoyance, become acquainted with the expected arrival of the contraband boat, and fearfully had she watched each coming moon, while every successive moonlit even- mg that appeared was hailed as a reprieve from some impending evil. The dreary night at length drew on, and in a note sent to Walden immediately after breakfast she expressed her gloomy forebodings and anxious wish that he would see her in the evening previous to starting. He dined with me ; and often did I remark an ex- pression of sadness stealing over his face like a cloud drifting over a harvest field ; passing rapidly, it left the surface behind illumined with its former sun — true —but the glow^ at each succession was less vivid than before. THE PARTING. l69 At the close of the meal he rose hastily, and hurried away to Woodlands. " How rejoiced I am to see you," was Caroline's welcome on his arrival. " You see I am all equipped," he re- turned, *' in expectation of the lugger's approach. Come let us walk to the sea." " And must you positively set off to- night? Cannot this perilous service pro- ceed without you ? Would to heaven you were already free from it ! An indefinable — an unaccountable dread — but I ought not — nay, I will not— attempt to seduce you from your duty. But, dearest Frederick, do take every care consistent with your honour." " Believe me, Caroline, I will," he re- plied, *' if only for my own sake ; but when that of yourself is taken into consideration, I need not say my motives for such pre- cautions are doubled. Consider how often through the course of my professional life, I VOL. I. I 170 THE PARTING. have had to hazard the result of such dangers for a comparatively trifling stake, and shall I now shrink from this ? the suc- cessful termination of which would add so greatly to our future comfort ? Be re- signed, dearest girl; your forebodings are merely such as are natural. My fate, like that of other mortals, is in the hands of surpassing wisdom, and I shall return as oft heretofore to retire from peril and hard- ship to your own soft sunny smile. And now, dearest, the night wears - farewell." Having made the final arrangements, we proceeded to our boats, each of which contained eight men independent of the officer and coxswain. We had agreed to steer straight for the middle of the channel until we arrived at the verge of our cruising distance. But during the whole of our course thither the boats were not to be far- ther than half a mile apart, thus running in two parallel lines. The weather-boat was SIGNALS. 171 to keep a look out to windward ; the lee boat to leeward ; the one observing a sail first was to hail the other ; and in case of not being heard, a light was to be hoisted at the boat's mast head. Each man was furnished with a cutlas and a brace of pis- tols; and each boat was provisioned for two days, and was armed at the bow with a brass three-pounder. It was a dark but clear night. The breeze came gallantly over the sparkling waves, as one after another they successively rolled towards the English strand. Ah, sir, a landsman is not capable of estimating that feeling which possesses a British naval officer, when, fresh from his warm mess-place, he buckles round his sword-belt, flings his cloak over his shoulder, and sits himself down in the stern-sheets of a tight galley, wdth some eight or nine stout hearts at his call, ready to do his bid- ding, and own his mastership ! 172 HEARTS OF OAK. Having rowed some thirty yards from the shore, close alongside of each other, we tossed in our oars. ** Now my men," said I, being the senior-officer, to the two boats' crews ; " shake hands before we part ; and, when the tug of war comes, don't forget the prize-money we shall have at landing ; or, if it may hap some of us to lose the number of our mess in the king's service, we've all old girls at home to whom our share will be a comfort. A steady eye, a strong arm, and the night's your own ! God bless you, Walden," said I, squeezing his hand, as we leaned over our respective boats ; " good-bye !" Both the action and the word were fol- lowed up by the rest of the boats' crews when I gave the order — ** Hoist away the lug, coxswain, keep her to," and off our ]:)oats bounded through the rushing foam, on their different courses. The breeze blew freshly in my face : scarcely could I THE LOOK OUT. 173 breathe enough of it — so delightful did it seem. Rapidly the billows came flowing aft. We were speeding through the briny element at the rate of eight knots an hour. For fifty minutes did I strain my eyes, looking anxiously to windward for the ex- pected prize ; nearly all our boat's crew did the same, with the exception of one man, who was ordered to keep sight of our fellow-boat. " I think, sir, here's a speck o' something right away on the lee-bow," said the cox- swain. " Where ?" I exclaimed. " There, sir," pointing with his finger. ** No, no, sir, that's only a wee bit of hazy cloud," said the look-out, who felt his vigilance called in question. I looked towards the spot with some in- credulity, having swept the horizon witli my night-glass but a few minutes before to no purpose. There was undoubtedly some- 171^ DOUBTS. thing ill the distance, and I was inclined to the beUef of the second speaker. It seemed a dim and indistinct flitting spot on the horizon. Once more I applied my glass. '*A mere cloud," I returned, after my examination, " I can see it lifted above the water-line." " Ah, sir," returned the coxswain : " well, surely, I thought it might be a sail." *' Has the boat to leeward made any signal yet?" I inquired. — No, she had made none. Still we held on our course ; let out a reef -, and the old coxswain, te- nacious of liis own belief, kept her a little nearer to the wind. Despite of my re- ported opinion, we all kept our eyes on the suspected spot, till it gradually grew larger, and seemingly more dense. There was no longer that mistiness about it, on the contrary, a sharp clear outline was be- ginning to be visible. THE PRIZE IN SIGHT. 175 "Well, your honour," said the cox- swain, "if so be it had been one of my messmates who had gainsayed me, I'd ha' bet a gallon of grog that 'ere wee bit of stuff's a sail after all. It's worth another look, sir!" To humour him, I raised the glass again ; when, behold ! it no longer appeared to be floating in the air, since its dark form was now much increased in size, and conti- nuous with the sea, shooting up in bold relief, against the dim sky. I kept my glass fixed upon it. Every moment it seemed to increase in bulk. Its outline had become quite sharp, and now assumed the form of a pyramid. In another instant I discovered her to be a three-masted lugger, which, on its first appearing above the horizon, had been lifted up by the refrac- tion. " Here's the prize ! Here she is !'' ran round the boat, from lip to lip. 176 AVE NEAR OUR PREY. '' Shall I hoist the light, sir ?" inquired one of the men. "No," I replied; "but, coxswain up with your helm, and run down to the boat to leeward. I want to communicate ; my men, examine your primings, and make ready." In a few minutes we had traversed the slight intervening space. The lug of our boat was hauled down, as her head luffed up in the breeze, and we were alongside Walden. He had just observed the stranger, when we altered our course to meet him. After a few minutes consulta- tion, it was agreed that w^e should make sail for the lugger till within the distance of a mile ; then, taking in our canvass, we were to make use of our oars, and board her ; — myself on the weather-beam, by crossing the bows; and Walden on the lee- quarter. Once more hoisting our sail, then, with this understanding, away we flew. THE ATTACK. 177 The proposed distance had been sped, the sail reduced, and our oars were then taken out. Nobly the gallant lugger loomed through the clear, dark night, as she came towards us like a war-horse re- joicing in its strength. Our boats were so low in the water, and every thing belonging to them of so dark a colour, that it was im- possible to discover us until very near. We were now within a quarter of a mile. Wal- den was about thirty yards astern — perhaps a little more. '' Are you all ready, my men?"' I in- quired, in a low tone. " All ready, sir." " Right ! let every other man lay in his oar, — face about towards the bow^, — and take aim with his musket at the slings of the fore-lug. When I give the word, fire, and see if we cannot bring it down for him. Now, my men, a good strong pull!" Swiftly did the two approaching bodies i3 ^78 RESISTANCE. near one another. Fifty yards barely in- tervened between us, when a voice was heard hailing us — "Boat ahoy, there! — keep out of our way, or we'll run you down !" " Shall we fire now, sir ?" said the men, addressing me. " One minute more. — Now — a steady aim. — Fire !" We were within ten yards of the bows when this order was given. On the in- stant, the four men discharged their mus- kets successively. Nor in vain. Down came the fore-lug thundering on the deck. In three strokes more we were on her wea- ther-bow. Not a man was to be seen. " She's ours," I cried triumphantly. But the words liad scarce escaped my lips, when a three pound swivel, which I had not observed, sent its murderous contents into the boat, laying the stroke-oarsman dead at my feet, THE ESCAPE. 179 wounding severely four of the men, and myself slightly on the shoulder. Furious at this resistance, I whipped out my cut- lass— " Toss in your oars — in with them — and aboard! — No quarter: down with every every mother's son of them !" At the word, the bow-man had hooked liis boat-hook on the fore-chains, and in another moment we should have been upon her decks, when a musket-shot, from some loop-hole in the bulwark, penetrated his head, and he tumbled Ufeless into the foam- ing waters. I was outrageous. Not a soul was to be seen. Revenge had no object on which to wreak itself. Scarce a sound was to be heard on board. " Seize the boat-hook in the bow, and bring us alongside," I roared out. At this moment, a run inside on the decks took place, and away went the fore- lug to the mast-head, all right once more. Her head fell off from the wind, and she 180 REVENGE. darted instantly forward on her rapid course. ** Where, in the name of fortune, is Walden," thought I. My thoughts were answ^ered ere expressed. A tremendous crash, and a cry of " We're over — we're run over — the hehn" — and some other words half uttered, half suppressed, made me turn my eye towards the bow^ of the lugger. There I saw Walden's boat under her cutwater. The men were all strug- gling and bawling — she disappeared, and was, I concluded, run over by the smug- gler. Meanwhile, my men had been firing at the lugger's spars, but in vain ; and she, much to our mortification, shot a-head. The brass bow-gun was double shotted. Springing forw^ard, I hastily took aim, and fired. To my inexpressible joy, I beheld her main-top-mast totter, and fall over to leew^ard ; while the sj^ar being struck be- RENEWED ATTACK. 181 low the cross-trees, the mainsail also fell to the deck. Nor was this all : for looking once more on the waters, there was Wal- den's boat, which, it appears, had escaped with a severe concussion, occasioned by the lugger re-hoisting her fore-sail, and paying off before he could alter his course. "Fire into her, Walden! — Hurrah! Hurrah! Pepper into her well. Give way, my boys : w^e'll soon be alongside of her once more." We now gained rapidly on the chace, encumbered with the wreck. But she had some smart hands aboard ; and in a few minutes it w^as all cut away again, and she speeding along under fore and after-sail. Presently our firing cut away the misen-top-sail. Up went a hand to re- pair damages : a shot struck him, and ove he tumbled into the waves. "Fling him a keg, my boys: we can stop for no one ! Hurrah, there, Walden, give way! We're gaining on her." But 182 DISASTERS. suddenly his oars cease. We heard some cry, " What does he say?'' In an histant liis boat appeared to settle in the water, and we plainly distinguished the words — " We're sinking!'' Pulling up to him the boat had dis- appeared. The shock had started her keel from stem to stern. Her crew were strug- gling; for life amid tlie waves. We rescued seven of the ten. Three of them being wounded had sunk to rise no more. Not- withstanding all our disasters, we allowed no time for condolence, but burning with revenge made all sail after the lugger, who was at least two miles a-head. She continued her course straight for the land where they seemed to have strand- ed her. Still we followed with both sail and oar ; for the enemy had spread suffi- cient canvass on his stump to distance a boat so overloaded as ours now was. The lugger had not been stranded more THE EVENT. 183 than half an hour hy our calculation when a lurid glare, shooting up from the very spot, reflected by the ocean, plainly proved that they had run their cargo and set the vessel on fire ! We reached her at last. Our conjectures were right. She was half burnt. Not a keg was to be seen. While conjecturing, and searching, and landing the wounded, Caroline came run- ning down to us in an agony of apprehen- sion. She scarcely seemed to be conscious of what was passing around her. The firing had reached her ears : she hurried down to the beach, observed the lugger ap- proach, and knowing it could not be our boat, had hid herself among the rocks. Thus situated, she witnessed the free- traders land their cargo, and observed their concealment of it in that cave — pointing while she spoke to some briars growing half way up the chalk cliff — assuring us at the same time that the greater part, if not the 184 THE lover's fate. whole, of the lugger's crew were concealed there at that very moment. But not to tire you — we instantly formed, stormed the cave, and succeeded with severe loss : among the fatally wounded was Walden. By his own desire he was brought out on the beach for air, and there expired — expired at the very feet of his be- trothed bride. That night w^as as the last to both of them. She never held up her head again. Both were carried to her fa- ther's house— he a corpse— herself a maniac. I said my tale was sad : it is, however, finished ; so is our walk. Yon majestic bluff before us, sir, is Shakspeare's Cliff. THE CURSE OF THE CHURCH. That which makes the clergy glorious, is to be knowing in their profession, unspotted in their lives, active and laborious in their charges, bold and resolute in opposing seducers, and daring to look vice in the face, though never so potent and illustrious." — Dr. South. To the sound churchman — to him whose early attachment to the beautiful formulary of our church has been matured and deep- ened by his thorough conviction of the scriptural foundation of her doctrines and articles — no position is more painful than that of being perpetually called upon to deny that her institutions require those 186 TITHES. sweeping measures with which the modern rage for legislation would visit them. That she has, till within a very recent period, yearly lost ground in the estimation of the people cannot with any shew of truth be denied. For this various causes have been assigned — 1. To the tithe system ; 2. To the little deference shewn to the wishes of the people, and the systematic and determin- ed manner in which their representations and entreaties with respect to the distribution of preferment have been discountenanced and defied ; and, 3. to pluralities — this in- creasing indifference has been attributed. These last I affirm are, and shall find little difficulty in proving to be. The Curse OF the Church. With respect to ** tithes." I liold that the tithes are as much the property of the clergy as the rent is the property of the landlord ; and that the title of the former can no more be destroyed than the title of TITHES. 187 the latter. The tithes do not belong to the husbandman : they can never be called his. The clergyman claims them as his right, unfettered by any conditions whatever other than those which he enters into with God and the king. It has been the fashion of late years to talk of abolishing tithes'. Those w^ho have lands would do well to consider how they would relish the abolish- ing of re?its ; for they may rest assured that the latter will never be far behind the for- mer. Those who would make a law for abolishing tithes would probably not wish to make another for abolishing rents. But they would very soon iind a set of legisla- tors to do it for them. Let us look at the question fairly. What were tithes origin- ally? Tithes were originally grants from the owners of the land,^ who had an un- * " Suppose 1 were to establish myself with all my family in America, and bring a large tract of land into cultivation, and at length build a town, and get together a 188 TITHES. doubted right to do what they would with their own. A sense of the duties which they owed to God induced them thus to make a fixed and pubUc provision for his ministers. They viewed it as an equitable return which justice challenged at their hands in behalf of the priesthood. In look- ing then at the question of tithes, it should never be forgotten that thei/ are a property multitude of people ; and suppose I should think that we might all be the better for some public visible worship of God ; should I not have a right, — a perfect right, — to devote any part of my property to such an object? No- body would presume to dispute the matter with me, but my own family ; and it is true that they might be some- what less rich. But what is that to them? The land is mine and not theirs. I bought it ; and I brought it to the state in which it now is : and if to shew my gratitude to the divine author of my prosperity, and for the spiritual benefit of the population, I give him back a part of his gift, they ought to rejoice in my determination, and pro- bably would do so." — Dr. Warton. I repeat it, tithes were originally grants from the owners of the land. For certain advantages in return, which appeared to them of great importance, they set apart for ever a tenth portion of every thing which their land produced. This is their real origin, and it extinguishes all the cant about their injustice at THE ROBBER— PARSON. 189 of much more ancient right than any man\s title to any other property in the kingdom ; that they were dedicated to the maintenance of the church long prior to the age of papal dominion in these realms ; and long, long before the most ancient families in the kingdom had name, place, or property. " But," says the advocate for their abo- lition, ** there is infinite hardship, vexation, and injustice in their exaction. The whole tithe system is a system of robbery. I plough, and manure, and sow, and reap, all at my own single expense ; another steps in, and without having contributed the smallest proportion of either labour or ca- pital, takes away one-tenth part of what I have raised by the labour of my own hands. I call that neither more nor less than a dead robbery ; and the man, whe- ther he wear a black or a blue coat, at whose feet such spoliation takes place, is a plunderer." 190 NO TITHES ! But it may be asked in return : The landlord neither ploughs nor sows — expends neither capital nor labour on the crops — but contents himself with stepping in and taking a full quarter of the produce — is he to be called a plunderer — a robber ? It is impossible to get rid of this difficulty by saying that the land is his. It is not altogether his. It is only his subject to con- ditions. It is his subject to tithe. In other words, he has only the power of appro- priating to himself nine4enths of the pro- duce. This is the tenure on which the landland holds the land. This is the tenure on which his ancestors held it ; on which it was bequeathed to him ; and this is the only tenure on which he can convey it to others. But supposing the tithes were taken away from the church and given to the nation, would the tithe-payers be benefited ? Most assuredly not. 191 It is not too much to affirm, that where the tithes are held as at present, the parson does not get a third of his legal due. In many cases it does not amount to a fourth of the real value of the tithe. Were they wrested from the clergy and transferred to the nation, they would instantly be sold to the highest bidder, or commissioners would be appointed to manage them ; and in either case no lenity would be shewn, no return granted, but the very utmost made of them as a matter of course. The best view of tithes, to my mind, is this. I have lighted upon it in the course of my reading, but when or where has escaped my recollection. '' But the tithes — the tithes— that's the great incumbrance," is the outcry now-a- days. " Let us but get rid of them, and we should then do well." Good honest men do not deceive yourselves : suppose the tithe abolished altogether, what then ? How would 192 A TITHE TAX. it benefit you ? In no way whatever. Your rent w^ould be proportionably (and often more than in proportion) increased. And if the tithes be taken from the parson, w^hat is to become of them ? Suppose they are given up to the state, will they not then be I'evied as a severe government tax to be exacted with rigour, wath no chance of abatement ; and when tithe- day comes, full and prompt payment, or an immediate execution on the the goods, will be the alternative ? In some shape or other this tax upon the soil must exist. If you do not pay in one way you must in another : and surely to pay it to the resident clergyman must be the best ; for besides that he will generally be found more willing than other men to meet us in the pressure of bad seasons and blighted crops, in reduction of his claim, from being at hand to witness and sympathize in our misfortunes — are we not, by paying him a part of our rent (for such after all it only TITHES WHERE SPENT ? 193 is), causing another respectable family to reside amongst us ? Is not the money so paid immediately laid out again in our own neighbourhood? Are not many poor re- lieved by it, many employed, and the parish altogether benefited ? Is it not much better thus to pay some portion of the rent to the parson residing in the imrisli^ than to one who may be taking your rent to spend it abroad among Frenchmen and Italians, or to pay some vile usurer and money lender in London ? Is this not the fact in a thou- sand instances ? Think well, then, before you join in the cry against tithes to the clergy. In some cases the mode of col- lecting them may be disagreeable ; butto get rid of this partial evil, which will doubt- less ere long be amended, do not aid in bringing about a greater and wdder-spread calamity." II. Nothing has alienated the affections of the people from the existing establish- VOL. I. K 194 CHURCH PATRONAGE. ment so silently and irreparably as the pertinacity with which, in times past, they have been denied a voice in the preferment of their ministers, and the sturdiness with which any representation on their part, in behalf of a valued curate, has been silenced or set at nought. I will here mention a flict which fell under my own personal observation. It shows how the system worked, and of what bitter fruits it was productive. A living became vacant on which a curate of the most blameless life and benevolent habits had been stationed eleven years. It was a " peculiar," and formed part of the patron- age of the dean of the diocese. A memo- rial was drawn up, addressed to that dig- nitary, and signed by all the principal land- owners and landholders in the parish, pray- mcf that he would take the services and character of their curate into consideration Tn disposing of the vacant vicarage. It was THE DEAN OF 195 deemed most respectful that a deputation should wait on him ; and three of the wealthiest and most respectable landed pro- prietors were fixed upon. The dean was apprized of their intention — a day was named — and an interview granted. He never asked them to sit down — never of- fered them (they had ridden thirty miles) any refreshment — never expressed any pleasure at such a compliment being paid to a brother clergyman. He contented liimself with putting two questions — *' Are these signatures genuine?" He was as- sured they were. " Is the wish this petition expresses the unanimous wish of the whole parish?" — "Unquestionably so." "Then I must tell you that I consider this a most improper interference. It is an attempt to wrest from me my right of presentation, and I shall treat it accordingly. Mr. C se has no chance of success in the present in- stance." He bowed and retired. K 2 196 THE DEAN OF Now this was the conduct, on a point of patronage, of an acute and clever man — of one who had raised himself to ecclesias- tical rank, by his own industry and exer- tions—and had exhibited, on many occa- sions, a nice sense of honour, and an ardent love of justice. Alas ! how much easier is it to feel than to think ! To the Vicarage a middle-aged gen- tleman was presented, of highly agreeable manners, and very convivial habits He was what is called " a dead shot:" and many a keenly-contested pigeon -match took place on the vicar's glebe ; and many a jovial carouse followed it. He hunted, too, occasionally with the Quorn hounds ; and was so tender of the prejudices of his pa- rishioners, that he always wore a pepper- and-salt coat till he got to cover. He was fond, too, of Cheltenham ; and had no dis- like to Bath : but his attachment to his HOW THE SYSTEM WORKED. IQ? parish prevented him, in any year, remain- ing more than two months at the one, and three at the other. But what became of the parish of R — in the interim ? That parish in which, du- ring the curate's ministry, not a dissenting chapel of any denomination was to be found, became a hot-bed of Sectarianism. In a few years it w^as dehiged with dissent. And if at this moment I wished to name a place more renowned than any other, for bitter feeling against the church, a deep- rooted dislike to her institutions, and a thorough contempt for her clergy — I should point to that hamlet. Who is to blame for this ? the patron, the people, or the pastor? III. *' The curse of the chmxh'* lies in its PLURALITIES. — Ncvcr will it thrive till this indefensible abuse of patronage is redressed. Even to the tithe system, there accrues in- creased odium and augmented harshness, from the operation of this accursed and un- 198 THAT HYDRA-HEADED MONSTER. scriptural usage. Its evils are endless. Take a few of the most aggravated. 1. Pluralities are the cause of non-resi- dence ; and non-residence is destructive of the best interests of the church, and the very bane of religion. 2. Pluralities augment the pressure and hardship of the tithe laws, and render them an hundred-fold more odious than they would otherwise become. Thus, where the incumbent is a pluralist, and of course non- resident, a middle-man is employed to levy the tithes. They are generally let to him. And the incumbent knows, or is supposed to know, nothing of the means adopted for their collection. Now what is the object and interest of this middle-man? Clearly to get all lie can. He has taken tlie tithes to make money by them. What are the interests of the church, or the affections of the people to him ? He has made a con- tract : its end is his own advantage : and PLURALITIES. 199 he is deterred by no scruples, from pursu- ing it to the very uttermost. It would be otherwise, if the incumbent were not a plu- ralist, and, consequently, a non-resident. The tithes would be paid to him : he would observe where their exaction became a real misfortune ; and mercy, and lenity, and indulgence would be shewn, where only menaces, and law proceedings, and war- rants of distress are held out in terrorem by the rapacious middle-man. 3. No parishioners can feel attached to an incumbent who spends only one-fourth of the year amongst them, and the remain- der on other livings. Nor does the incum- bent become attached to a people whom he visits for so short a period, and at such dis- tant intervals. They are cold to each other. There is no tie, no bond between them. He is a mere bird of passage, and is regarded by them as a stranger. He is a casual visiter, not their pastor. And his 200 ARGUMENTS FOR PLURALITIES. admonitions and instructions, however ably conceived and energetically delivered, fall listlessly on their ear. They cannot per- suade themselves that he really feels any cordial interest in their welfare. 4. *' The reason why pluralities are made," say the advocates of the system, in their desperate haste to seize hold of any argument, " is this : — small parishes are united, because, singly, they are unable to keep a clergyman f Divide them by all means. Disjoin them at once. Let the public see that this is really the case ; that this plea has truth for its basis ; and there is no lack of zealous and benevolent people willing to take the matter up, and wealthy people able to give to such parishes ample endowment. 5. No curate can ever possess in a parish the weight and influence which the resi- dent incumbent exercises at will. The sti- pendiary labourer is but a subaltern in the THEIR FALLACY. 201 ranks : his stay is uncertain : he is remove - able at the pleasure of another. Popular as he may be, his popularity does not pro- vide him with means. He has not the re- sources of an incumbent : he does not pos- sess the ability to remit fees, excuse or abate the payment of tithes, relieve the destitute, and supply the necessitous : pri- vileges which belong to his employer, from superior wealth. The curate then can never possess the weight and influence of an incumbent ; nor is he ever able to be as useful. 6. What parish is satisfied with the knowledge that the annual income derived from the produce of its soil is taken to London, Bath, Cheltenham, Lymington, or spent in the hospitalities of another living ? Are the parishioners not likely to say, and say justly, that the money raised from the parish, ought to be spent in the parish ? ** It is earned," would be, and is k3 Q02 PLURALITIES UNNATURAL. their language, " by the sweat of our brow, and among strangers it ought not to be circulated." Moreover the principle is utterly inde- fensible. What would be thought of that Board of Admiralty, which, by an order, should make Captain Glascock, command- ing His Majesty's ship, Orestes, in the Douro, responsible for the discipline, ser- vice, and sea-worthy condition of His Ma- jesty's ship, Samarang, lying in the Downs ? Transfer this reasoning from naval to clerical warfare, and the absurdity of plu- ralities will be instantly apparent. More- over, it is the WORKING clergy w^ho are the prop and stay of the church. And this fact is entitled to the serious consideration of those who " bear rule " in the establish- ment, and have its dignities and emolu- ments at their disposal. It is the working clergy in whose welfare the people take any degree of interest : these are the men A POPULAR PREACHER. 203 to whom they are bound in the bonds of kindness — whose services they gratefully recognize — for whose wants they are anxious to provide, and in whose sorrows they affectionately sympathize. An idea obtains — though it is difficult to say on what grounds — that the interests of the church are subserved by popular preachers. Turn to those parishes which have the least sprinkling of dissent in them — which have the strongest leaven of old Church of England feeling yet cleaving to them — which show the greatest attachment to their minister, and in v/hich the quiet, practical effects of religion are most visible, and see if these results are to be attributed to the efforts of a popular preacher ? No ! They are to be ascribed to the pains-taking curate, or to the active and constantly- resident incumbent. They are the fruits of his labours, who, by his example, preaches a daily sermon to his flock. 204 THE WORKING CLERGY. They are to be attributed to the working clergyman — to him whom the people view, Sabbath after Sabbath, in his place, ready to console, exhort, animate, and encourage them ; and whom the other days of the week find in the dweUings of the poor, and beside the beds of the dying. These are the men who bear up the Church of England. These are the men who are beloved and respected. These are the men who endure the burden and heat of the day— w^ho stand in the front, and brave the hottest fire of the battle. And these are the men who ought to be sought out, and encouraged, and preferred ; — as- sured, as the heads of the hierarchy must be, that the people would sympathize in their elevation, and the cause of the church be advanced by it. Strengthen the hands of the working clergy, and you strengthen the hands of the church. And nothing would do this A PLURALIST. Q05 SO effectually and so safely, as the imme- diate and utter abolishment of the system of pluralities. Facts have ever more weight than ar- guments. How the present system works, take the following as an instance. There is a living in the north of England, the receipts of which, during the period of high prices, fell little short of £3,000 per annum: — they at present amount, at the lowest computation, to £1,800. The liv- ing is held by a gentleman, in addition to two others, and a valuable prebendal stall. Notwithstanding his various preferments, he does not possess ubiquity ; and there- fore neither of his cures can receive a large portion of his personal attention. On the Hving to which I refer, he resides three months, and preaches, while in residence, every Sunday morning. His sermons may be summed up at thirteen : — the amount of 206 A PLURALIST. duty the parish receives from him in ex- change for the £1,800 he draws from it. To supply his lack of service, — for the place is populous, and the duty heavy, — two curates are engaged. To the senior is allotted £150 per annum as his stipend ; to the junior, £100. There were some in the parish to whom these arrangements were anything but satisfactory. Many re- membered when the rectory was inhabited ; . —when their incumbent resided regularly and constantly among them. They were entitled, they said, to have a resident rector. The population — the value — the importance of the rectory — all demanded it. It was an abuse of no trifling nature, that such a living should be bestowed on one that would not reside upon it ; that so large a sum should be abstracted from the parish, and so smaU a part of it spent in it. A year or two since, after the rector's last sermon for the season, the following ii T^T? A T, ^T AXT " DEAR MAN. 207 dialogue was overheard between two of the oldest of his hearers, as they slowly de- scended the little hill on wliich the parish church is situated. ** Well, this is number thirteen. I sup- pose, our worthy rector leaves us to- morrow, for London. He's a noble preacher !" " Humph ! I wonder which of his pre- ferments stands next in rotation for the favour of one of his angel visits." " What have his livings, pluralist as he is, to do with his preaching ? I maintain his discourses abound in sound, good doc- trines. They are valuable sermons." " Granted : nay. Til go farther, friend. I will affirm of them that they are jireciou^ sermons ; and, of our pastor, himself, that to his flock there cannot be a dearer man." " That's a sneer : explain it." " Why," remarked the other, with un- ruffled calmness, *' can there be a dearer 208 PRECIOUS SERMONS. man to the parish, when we pay him up- wards of £1,500 for condescending to re- main three months amongst us ? And his thirteen sermons, I assert them to be ^pj^e- clous,' What other epithet do they merit, when he receives exactly £lf20 a-piece for each of them T^ SKETCHES OF THE QUARTER-DECK. FROM THE JOURNAL OF A GOOD-NATURED FELLOW. '' Truth, whether in or out ot fashion is the measure of knowledge, and the business of the understanding." Locke. " WiTHERSFiELD, my good fellow," said a party of us, one evening, to the sea-mon- ster, when that worthy was far advanced into his third bottle, ** tip us a yarn" ** Drink my wine, and welcome," was our host's reply, " but don't expect me ♦ See " Withersfield of Trinity Hall." 210 THE THIRD BOTTLE. to speechify. I hate talking. Besides," pointing to a half-emptied flask which stood beside him, " this is number three, and, really, when that is the case — " *' You are so gloriously good-humoured," persisted his persecutors. '*Wine, my W., has precisely the same effect upon you, as upon the glory of Devonshire Lord . The first bottle renders him irritable and quarrelsome, ready, like your- self, to exchange cards with his grandfather. The second sees him lachrymose ; — he would weep with you over the degeneracy of the age, and the calamities of your country. The third brings him back, like yourself, to a degree of joUity and good- humour. " Which will not last long if you thus persist in baiting me. As to Lord , if you knew as much of his lordship as I do — " *' The yarn, the yarn," vociferated a dozen voices. A YARN. 211 ''Well, well," muttered Withersfield, with anything but graceful acquiescence, " if a yarn you must have, be it so : but not one of mine. There," hauling out of his drawer a huge roll of papers, and heaving them towards us, " there lies the journal of a former messmate of mine, a good-natured fellow, who, about a year ago, unexpectedly left his lodgings. Pick and choose where you will." *' Read, read," was the reply of his tor- mentors. " Read !" he repeated with a look of dis- may ; " why, surely, you don't expect me — a man in my situation — at this hour of the night, to read audibly, do you ?" '* Read, read !" was shouted in all direc- tions. " May I be—" " Begin, begin !" '« Easy, then, easy !" he exclaimed. '* I can scarcely see the characters. Push the lights this way. They don't, to my mind. 21 ^2 ** SWEET SHEERNESS." burn very steadily. Is this the place ? The table, somehow, rocks unaccountably. I — I — I wish ye all at the devil. Now for a spell." i It was in the year 182 — that I ob- tained my appointment to a ten gun brig, then lying at Sheerness. She had been stationed in the north sea, and having lost her second lieutenant, it was to his vacancy that I succeeded. I had never been afloat since my first gaining my promotion in the Medusa, a forty- two gun frigate. Despite of my having seen innumerable samples of this vile and almost useless class of vessel,* my vanity could not refrain from picturing to itself something infinitely superior to the general run. With breathless eagerness I hurried down to that middle purgatory, known to landsmen as the town of Chatham. There, wandering ghosts of naval officers, * Ten gun brig. THE MEDWAY. 213 and ill-behaved school-boys in regimentals, are eternally to be seen, slowly sauntering along ; now peeping into the windows of " tlie millinery ;" now posting the latest and most refined oaths over a strawberry ice. But simple purgatory was, it seems, too good for me. I was destined to the deepest caverns of Avernus itself; and I therefore embarked, with all my baggage, from the Sun hotel, and proceeded down the almost interminable windings of the Medway. It was one of those charming wet days, peculiar to that neighbourhood, which leaves the delighted individual in doubt as to the element in which he was intended to exist, air or water. The view, too, along this entrancing river, is seen to admirable advantage through the favourable medium of a heavy and iQi ceasing rain. Then and thus gazed upon, what can be more enchanting than the picturesque line of mud and bulrushes which ,^14 GOOD NATURE. adorn the right-hand bank, if we except the still more inviting reach of sHme and swamp which are the glory of the left ? What vivid images do they not call up in the mind of the beholder, of cheerfulness, and happiness, and fertility, and grandeur ? It is possible some mere matter-of-fact observer may entertain a different opinion. The truth is, I have been tormented through life by my happy mode of viewing things, buoyant disposition, and excessive good- nature. In my family I am the good-natured brother ; in every mess I am the good- natured fellow ; and, go where I will, I am the good-natured man. This amiable qua- lity perfectly stands in my light, and some iive-and-twenty years of my life have been passed in ceaseless efforts, by myself and others, to ruffle my good temper — but in vain. I had proceeded about four miles down the river, and was some little way GOOD NATURE. 215 past Gillinghame-reach, anticipating the exquisite thrill of being wet through, when I felt the boat suddenly strike. " You blockhead," I exclaimed to the waterman, " You have run me a-ground !" '* Anan, sir ?" ** We are aground, I say." " Anan !" he returned with the most irri- tating naivete, *' and so we be, I declare." " Declare, you old fool ! I declare this, that if you don't instantly get me oft I shall without ceremony break your head." '' Well, well, sir," he replied, " I'll get ye off again, never fear ; but don't go for to lose your temper." " Lose what?" I ejaculated in utter sur- prise at his audacity in supposing such a thing possible. " I lose my temper !" seizing at the same moment a smart bamboo, and laying it to some purpose across his shoulders. " // perhaps one of the best- tempered fellows in the universe!" 216 A SCUFFLE. " Come, come, master, two can play at that game," responded he, arming himself with a cudgel, and returning my blow." We closed : a short scuffle ensued, w^hich ended in my taking him up head and heels and tossing him into the water. Immersed a little above his knees, he, by dint of struggling, gained the shore. Midway he paused ; and shaking his fist aloft at me with incredible fury, vociferated, — " You dog-drowning villain, there's an hour's fall of tide yet. You can't get the craft off before the flood begins to make. And if I don't have you prosecuted as the law directs before that time my name's not Barney Blowem." Having finished his irascible declaration, he turned and waded off to the little village of Gillinghame. My first impulse was the enjoyment of a hearty fit of laughter at the bemuddled ap- pearance of my beaten antagonist. My next ADMIRAL HORTON. 217 was a reflection on the passing probability of Barney's realizing his threat, and coming down upon me backed by the whole con- stabulary force of the hamlet of Gilling- hame. The rain now fell more heavily than before ; and the wind shifted round from W. by N. to N. N. W. It was true that I shook like a patient in the tertian fit J but that did not at all subtract from the delight with which I removed my hose and boots, and jumped into the water to push off the boat. This was at length accomplished, and with no small effort ; and in half an hour I found myself pursuing my pleasure trip down the Medway. It was about ^we when I discovered that I had arrived at Sheer- ness, abeam of the Gloucester, then, I be- lieve, commanded by Captain, now Admiral Horton, of whose eccentricities some extra- ordinary accounts are current in the navy. "Boat a-hoy there?" said I, hailing VOL. I. L ^18 A MANOEUVRE. some fellow in a wherry. ** Can you tell me which is his Majesty's brig Alcestes ?" " That there's her, sir, what you sees hid in the fog, tripping her anchor with her foretopsail aback ready to cast to port. She's just a got flying orders for the Nore." '* The deuce she has ! I must get on board, however, at all hazards." ** Perhaps your honour belongs to her ?" " To be sure I do." " Then would your honour have the goodness to let me go in company ? I'm Dickie Tomkins the bumboat man ; and there's young Mr. Midshipman Tappit who owes me two pounds ten for soda-water and cigars, from whom I shall never see my money, because the young gentleman has paid the master-at-arms a shilling to keep my boat from coming alongside." " Is that it? Then make haste Master Dickie Tomkins, and jump in, for I've not a minute to lose." PLOT AND COUNTERPLOT. 219 " Aye, aye, sir. Here Molly, wife, take these sculls a moment, while I jump into the gentleman's boat: 111 weather that young cheat-the-gallows yet." " Now, my fine fellow, do you pull towards this said craft * what you sees hid in the fog. ^ I conclude she must be lying in that direction, for I hear the sound of a fiddle." '' Just so, sir. I'll have you on board in a crack." After a few vigorous strokes a large dark mass loomed through the fog, and we were apparently nearing it rapidly, when we heard — " Keep back, you bumboat man, keep back there." We still made way. " Back, I say," bellowed the same gruff voice, "or 111 heave a shot into your port." " Then 'vast with your heavings, master- at-arms, or youll hit his honour the officer." *' None of your gammon ! D ye think any of our officers were ever such mudlarks L 2 Q'20 THE BEST NATURED FELLOW GOING ! as that ? '' Off, I say ! What ! You will near us, eh ? Then stand from under." And down came a thirty-two pounder can- non shot from the main-chains of the brig, plunged through the thin planking of the boat, and sinking to the bottom, the water instantaneously rushed in. The bow was by this time touching the ship's side. An- other second and I had leapt into the main chains. ** You barefaced villain," said I, " ad- dressing the master-at-arms, ** though it is my misfortune to be one of the best na- tured fellows going, yet I will not see such a piece of downright rascality perpetrated before my face." Putting all my strength into motion, at one blow I sent the ag- gressor tumbling into the tides below. " Pick him up below there, bumboat man," I added, going aft to report myself to the captain. The latter officer, strange as it may ap- UNDER ARREST. 221 pear, though to be sure there is no ac- counting for the wayward and perverse conclusions of men in command, did not seem to approve of my conduct, since lie ordered me under instant arrest, and di- rected the corporal and serjeant of marines to seize Dickie Tompkins and bundle him back into his own boat. The wherry in which I came down the river was with difficulty floated until my '* traps" could be hoisted out. It was then allowed to sink in quietness to the bottom. Of the unfortunate owner I never heard again. In fact I thought the best mode of managing the matter was to forget it alto- gether. This was easily accomplished, for within twenty-four hours after my release from arrest I found that we were bound for the Mediterranean. During my period of durance vile I had leisure to bewail the unfortunate feature in my character — my inexhaustible good nature. But on board — 222 ADMIRAL SIR GEORGE COCKBURN. ship topic succeeds topic too rapidly to permit any one remaining long on the tapis. By the following day the '* skip- per's" anger had subsided. I assured him that I was a most good-natured fellow — too much so for my own comfort — and that if I occasionally knocked a man down, or breathed out a hasty expression, it was only to deter mankind from taking an ungene- rous advantage of my hereditary good tem- per. I was then restored to my duty, kept the afternoon watch, and dined in the cabin at its close. Admu'al Sir George, then Captain Cock- burn, was at this period taking a passage with us as far as Port louth ; and it was at Cnptain L 's table that I first met him. The character always given of him was somewhat eccentric, and unequivocally smart and severe. Such might be the fact ; but of the first I saw little. The second he is well known to be, and the third I should ADMIRAL SIR GEORGE COCKBURN. QQ3 say depended upon chance. He is one of those people who are perfect unicorns to run against, and yet not so very difficult to comprehend. It certainly required some tact and judgment to sail it smoothly with him, for he was rigid in exacting the defe- rence, both to his person and opinions, which he deemed his due ; and he whose object it becomes to sail in his wake, must be content implicitly to give way to him in matters of mere professional minutiae ; satisfied, by so doing, to retain some influ- ence over him in points of major import- ance. I'm by no means sure I was a favour- ite ; nevertheless, he certainly possessed in my eyes many and ^.riking qualities. In person, he seems purposely moulded for the Captain of a British man-of-war ; of middle height, strongly made, with a deter- mined and somewhat severe cast of coun- tenance. He had early in life distinguished 224 LADY DASHWOOD. himself in a single action ; but you will listen long and wearily to him before you hear his own deeds even remotely alluded to by himself. For his solicitude respect- ing his youngsters he is much and deserv- edly commended. He was always most careful that they should be taught their profession, and for this end, kept a hull on board his frigate, which it was their duty to rig and unrig at pleasure. To him am I indebted for an introduc- tion to one who has figured ably and ad- mirably on the *' quarter-deck" — Lady Dashwood. While Sir Charles commanded the Windsor Castle^ her ladyship, to the joy of both officers and men, was seldom ashore. A kinder, franker, happier spirit, never dwelt in a human form. To the youngsters she was habitually and invariably a cordial and generous friend ; while the men hailed her arrival on board with the most heartfelt satisfaction. "Jack" knew well LADY DASHWOOD. 225 the benefit of her presence. — No punish- ment during the period of her stay : that she invariably warded off from him during the time she was aboard. Nay, further, she has been known, more than once, singu- larly and unaccountably to divine the pre- cise hour when the cat was to be exhibited, and by her unexpected arrival alongside, to defer its appearance sine die. What won- der, then, that by the men, one and all, she was worshipped ? " May" her " shadow never be less !" as the Persians have it. But to revert. At Portsmouth we land- ed our passenger, and in the space of a fortnight sailed for the Mediterranean. Within ten days we were lying in the Bay of Gibraltar, just inside Point Europa. The view from this bay alone would well repay any modern tourist for tlie voyage. Having taken in a supply of fresh meat and vegetables, we sailed for Malta, which pleasant island we made in six weeks. I l3 •^226 MALTA. know few places more delightful to a sailor than this famed resort of the Knights Tem^ plar. If you do not happen to be over- burdened with gold, you have the consola- tion of finding many comforts within your leach ; if, on the contrary, you are passably provided with the precious metals, every luxury is at your command. You have all the delights and delicacies of a warm cli- mate, without its distressing accompani- ments. There is very little disease in Malta ; and, with the exception of mos- quitoes, none of the annoyances of a south- ern clime. For him whose feelings can be raised and excited by viewing the wreck of ancient grandeur, and the remains of ex- quisite beauty and matchless strength, Malta is stored with delight. The noble and impregnable fortresses which frown upon its bays, are those which the despe- rate valour of the Knights of St. John defended against the combined hosts of the HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. 227 Infidel. Their power, it is true, has passed away ; but the record of their prowess survives : and vivid is that magic beauty which fame sheds over the memory of va- lour, and which now mantles every stone and turret of Valetta. Again, the depopulated hamlets, and even towns, which present themselves in various directions, all convey sad, but stir- ring images to the heart ; partly the effects of war, and partly the results of an equally merciless scourge — the plague ; of whicli Sir Arthur Brooke Faulkner has given as namby-pamby and silly an account, as any full-grown baby could indite. We made the island early in the morning, and drew near to it under the influence of a gentle breeze. When distant about two miles, the Naiad, commanded by tlic late Hon. Sir Robert Spencer, made a signal for a boat. She was on our weather bow, and had, it appeared, just left the haven 228 HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. which we were so anxious to gain. I was ordered off to communicate, and Sir Ro- bert threw his main topsail aback, to allow of my coming alongside. " Main top there, Mr. Robb ! Come down on deck, directly, sir. You think yourself a mighty higli officer up there, I imagine." I fancy I still hear him giving utterance to this sentence, w^hich was leaving his lips as I reached the deck. Sir Robert was standing on a carronade-slide, with his glass extended in his hand, pointing to the main- top, where the said officer was superintend- ing the operation of making sail — now in- terrupted by my arrival. " I have come on board, sir, to answer signal," said I, going up to him with the accustomed salute. " You, sir, what the devil do I want with ?/ou, sir," he replied, tartly. *' When I make a signal for a boat, I expect to see HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. 229 the captain, himself, come on board : go back and send him here." I moved to depart. "Stay, sir. Carry my orders to him. Tve no particular wish^'^ this was said slowly, and with that exquisitely su- percilious curl of the lip, which all his fa- mily possess, with the exception of Lord Althorp — ^^ for the honour of his visit ! Where were you going ?" " We expected to bring up in Malta harbour, to-night, sir. " Then thafs just what you ivonH do ! So, take my compliments to your captain, and tell him I shall be very happy of his company as far as Milo ; and that I want him on particular service." His expressive, glancing eyes flashed with pleasure, as he uttered this provoking order. *'Very well, sir," I replied, turning back. As I moved off, anything but con- tent with the issue of my embassy, I heard 230 HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. him utter, in an under-tone of the most measureless satisfaction : — " Ha ! ha ! Ill teach him to send me a lieutenant when he ought to come him- self." On my return, I detailed the interview to my commander. He swore most lustily at the idea of being taken up the Archi- pelago, instead of enjoying a short respite at Malta. The necessity of the case, how- ever, admitted of no delay. I prevailed upon him *' to take info consideration my suggestions,^^ and, repairing on board the Naiad, he found means to pacify her sin- gular captain. It was afterwards my lot to fall in with him under better auspices ; and, despite of the unfavoui'able circumstances of our first acquaintance, there was, ulti- mately, no captain on the Mediterranean station for whom I had a higher degree of esteem. It is true that he was very cho- leric, and that his temper was the chief HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. 231 source of his uneasiness. But, then, his was a strongly marked character, and if his aberrations were violent, his virtues were great. Commanding abilities, considerable ge- nerosity, and unfailing faithfulness to his word, were ever to be observed in him. Moreover, he was remarkable for the care and solicitude with which he watched over and aided the fortunes of those who had served under him with credit. Their wel- fare he then identified with his own. This last feature in his character is indeed de- serving of the highest eulogium ; both for its rarity, and the good effects which it produces. He was aware of the defects in his temper, and strove to correct them ; though I am not prepared to deny, that in the heat of the moment, they sometimes led him into the commission of acts barely capable of defence. These outbreakings of temper, it is clear. dp 232 THE KING. could be effectually curbed and smothered : for, during the period he was about the Kmg, (to whom, when Lord High Admiral, he was private secretary), his unruffled equanimity w^as matter of marked obser- vation in the household. To his faithful confidant, his Majesty was much and deeply attached. On re- signing the post of Lord High Admiral, he is known to have observed, " Nothing in this matter causes me more pain, than the knowledge, that the moment which sees me quit office, severs me from Spencer. He must go on active service — and at once. I will not hear of a mind like his being cramped and fettered at home." When intelligence of Sir Robert's de- mise was communicated to the Sovereign, he heard it with extreme emotion. " How his family," he remarked, ** will bear the blow, I know not. I feel it as a personal calamity." The tears started into his eyes. THE KING. ^33 " I have lost one whom I loved as my own son !" In person, Sir Robert Spencer was of somewhat more than middle stature, in- clining to be robust; his hair of a light colour, and complexion florid. When once admitted into his confidence, his intimates were agreeably surprised to find that he possessed a fund of information and humour with which to amuse and delight. He was no mean linguist — had a decided turn for mechanics — and no man ever possessed, in greater perfection, an intuitive insight into the characters of those around him, their follies, their weaknesses, their prejudices. Of these last he delighted to avail himself. It was his habit, whenever he felt more than usually exasperated, to smoke cigars without number. Their sedative qualities, he was accustomed to avow, had invariably the power of allaying his emotion. There was one property he possessed too noble to be ':234f FLOGGfXG. omitted. If at any time he had to choose between the indulgence of his officers or of his ineUy he unalterahly gave the latter the pre- ference. He had one mistaken idea; and his adherence to it forms, perhaps, the most serious charge that can be brought against him. He considered his youngsters as school-boys entrusted to his charge ; and on their committing any extraordinary of- fence, stretched his commission to the extent of flogging them. Such a puerile mode of punishment was unworthy the scope and calibre of a mind like Spencer's. In every sense it is erroneous. Inflicted on the vicious, tli ^ it can only harden. The lad who is wavering, it must render desperate ; while the infliction of such deep disgrace on the silly or the weak, is abso- lute barbarity. I would abstain from touching on such a subject in connection with the character of a gallant and accom- plished officer, were it not from a conviction HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. 235 of the pernicious tendency of this practice in our naval service. Such a punishment, more or less, eradicates the chivah'ous sense of honour from the mind of the young man who is made to undergo it : and an officer without honour is like " salt which has lost its savour." Few as were the opportunities afforded to officers, at this period, to distinguish themselves, Sir Robert nevertheless ma- naged to effect it ; and the highest compli- ments were paid to his abilities by the ad- miral, Sir Harry Neale, as well for his general services, as those in particular at Algiers, and at a subsequent period, when sent on a mission of importance to Ibrahim Pacha, in the Morea. After all, let his impetuosity and irrita- bility have been what they may, he must surely have been possessed of no common virtues, when his men adored, and his officers admired him. 236 HON. SIR ROBERT SPENCER. The service has since lost him : a far heavier loss than may at first appear : since, with his energy of character, general abili- ties, turn for the dry details of business, and almost unequalled naval interest, it is not too much to affirm, that he might and would have contributed mightily, and man- fully to the comfort and independence of his profession -, points which loudly call for, and urgently demand, revision and reform- ation. His death occurred on board the Mada- gascar frigate ; the command of which he had accepted shortly after his resignation as private secretary to the Lord High Ad- miral. Having felt himself for a few days out of health, he retired to lie down in his cot. He had just given some directions to his first lieutenant about watering the ship, when, on raising his head to speak to his steward, he fell back, and suddenly expired. By those who sailed with him, his death SIR SAMUEL PECHt:LL. 237 was deeply regretted ; and they testified their respect for his memory, by subscrib- mg to a monument — a bust — now placed, or about to be placed, in Westminster Abbey. Thus prematurely closed the career of the Honourable Captain Sir Robert Caven- dish Spencer! Though it is rather difficult, in a time of such complete inactivity, actually to " dis- tinguish one's self,'' yet it is somewhat sin- gular, that more marked and decisive cha- racters should not display themselves on the arena of a large station such as the Medi- terranean. On looking back to those most prominent at this period, there were few who stood forth in any particular position which pointed them out from the general run of their profession. Sir Samuel, then Captain, Pechell, of the Sibyl, was among the few — nay, lie was almost the sole ex- ception. He was on intimate terms with 238 SIR SAMUEL PECHELL. Sir Robert Spencer, whose character his own somewhat resembled. Like Sir Ro- bert, he had his caprices and prejudices ; and, like St. Vincent, he could shew the wrong side of his tongue occasionally; but he was noted for being a smart officer, and having his crew under admirable discipline. Add to this, the gunnery of the Naiad and of the Sihijl were among the boasts of the station. Sir Samuel had some fantastic notions about the aristocracy of naval officers, but this did not prevent him from giving a severe lesson to a certain Captain , son of Sir T. B , then serving on board his ship as a junior lieutenant, who had been promoted, while a beardless boy, over the heads of many old and experienced officers, through the overwhelming interest of his indefatigable parent. As the story then ran, it appeared that this youth was as ignorant of his profession and as unequal SIR SAMUEL PECHELL. 239 to his duty as any young gentleman " pro- moted through friendship" could possibly desire. Sir Samuel, justly indignant, re- fused to allow the lieutenant to take charge of the watch, which it was his proper office to keep, and promoted to the trust the mate of the lower deck, a passed midship- man ; while the lieutenant received orders to carry into execution a subordinate task. Nor was this all. Strange to say, Mr. was compelled to sign a written bulletin, declaring himself, by his own admission, to be utterly incapable of performing the du- ties of a lieutenant. This was rigorous it must be acknowledged. TVas it not also justf Sir Samuel, like his brother, Captain Sir Robert, chiefly exercised his industry in reaping the scanty laurels of his profession among the pirates of the Archipelago. Of several rencontres one, in the island of Can- dia, became noted. It was a brave action, 240 GREEK PIRATES. but unfortunate in its issue. Some pirates having taken refuge in one of the bays of the island, and estabUshed themselves in a se- cure position on the shore, Sir Samuel sent in his boats manned and armed to the at- tack. The Greek pilot who belonged to the SihyU declined accompanying the party, aware of the desperate character of the de- fendants, and the inaccessible nature of their position. He very sagaciously ob- served that *' he had nothing whatever to do with the fighting of the ship ; and that if he foW-^or few icould escape ~ government would never trouble themselves about se- curing from starvation his wife and family." The boats started under the command of Lieutenant Tupper. On their approaching within shot of the Greeks, who were hidden by the rocks, the murderous aim of the Candian rifles made itself apparent. Four shots had not been fired by their deter- mined antagonists before the lieutenant THE AFFRAY. 241 and coxswain were for ever dismissed from mortal struggle, and five others severely wounded. Enraged to absolute fury by their loss, the men cheered, pulled in with redoubled quickness, and landed. A fatal affray took place. It ended in their being obliged to retreat, leaving a prisoner in the hands of the pirates. Not one escaped uninjured ; and the ablest man among them in the barge had to row off to the frigate, by shifting his oar from one side to the other, and stooping down at intervals, to escape the shot fired at him by the ruffians on shore. Their prisoner the pirates threatened with instant immolation before the eyes of his shipmates, unless certain conditions of non-molestation were conceded by Sir Sa- muel. The latter rightly estimated the Hfe of his marine far higher than the grati- fication of any petty feelings of vengeance, VOL. I. M 242 SIR SAMUEL PECHELL. and sending on shore a flag of truce, reco- vered his man. Such, as nearly as I can recollect at this distance of time, were the heads of an affair which then excited no slight feeling on the station. The SibyVs time having expired, she was soon afterwards ordered home, in- spected at Spithead, and great praise awarded to Sir Samuel Pechell for the high state of excellence to which he had raised the science of gunnery on board his frigate. I have only one observation to add, which is this : that Sir Samuel, on more than one occasion, played me a very scrubby trick ; and therefore, my having said so much in his favour, proves incontestibly that I really am, and must be, a — good-natured fellow. THE MASSINGERS, " Poets make characters^ as salesmen clothes ; ^Ve take no measure of your fops and beaux ; But here all sizes and all shapes we meet, And fit yourselves — like chaps m Monmouth street." Prologue to Three Hours after Marriage. — Pope. About six years since there lived at Sid- mouth — perhaps they may do so still — a family of the name of Massinger. They were lineal descendants of the celebrated dramatic writer so designated, and valued themselves accordingly. No one ever dreamt of disputing their genealogy : and it was the main business of their lives to M 2 244 POETS BY WHOLESALE. vindicate it. Versification was the employ- ment of their existence. The gods had made them, — eleven in nmnber, — poetical! From the father a rich, roly-poly, retired sugar-baker who wrote tragedies which he could prevail on no manager to accept, down to Mr. Beaumont Massinger the Etonian, w^ho spun epigrams for w^hich no periodical *' could afford space," the af- flatus was the same ! The youngest Imp, Sappho, a little fair haired girl of eleven years old was particularly happy in design- ing a death scene and embodying it after- wards ; and deemed, poor little overworked animal ! she had had a light day's work of it when she had only died five times in the course of the morning : while rosy Mrs Massinger wlio was surprisingly stout, suffered greatly from obesity, and liad very indolent habits, resorted, — when the din- ner bell was ringing, — to the dregs of some cloudy ink, half dried up in the bottom of LONGS AND SHORTS. 245 a cracked egg cup — all the inkstands of a better description being monopolized by her daughters — and with a discarded stump of a pen which no other member of the family would condescend to touch, managed to concoct a creaking stanza. A certain quota of verse before the dinner hour each individual of the household was bound by compact to manufacture ! If ever there was an instance of family union — of a family all of one mind— it was the Massingers. Strangers who heard them talk of '* longs'' and " shorts'' were shocked at such young girls betraying such an intense admiration of whist. Out upon it ! They would have scorned to waste their precious hours in taking up and laying down bits of painted paper. " When" — as Miss Rowe Massin- ficer observed — " did whist confer immorta- lity? " With the vulgar herd they had no 24:6 SERMONS VERSIFIED. sympathy — with the mass of society not one single idea in common. '* They held high converse with the illustrious dead." They " lived for posterity." And they might have added, they wrote for posterity : for I m forsworn if the present generation would have any thing at all to say to them. '' A world without souls" was Eury- dice's reply, when her mother whispered something about the usages of society: and old Massinger when he desired to be par- ticularly bitter — when he wished to floor a customer completely — to hake him in the opinion of the by-standers — was accustomed to remark. '^ Ah ! a worthy man perhaps, but — irretrievably prosaic !" There was nothing they did not versify. Mr. Jenkins's sermons, learned man, did not escape them. Some of his metaphors were deemed " worth preserving.'' So one sister took his exhortations down in short hand: and another versified them. MR. JENKINS. 247 They chose for their model ** Man is born to trouble," in Dr. Syntax.* And thus dressed and decorated, a highly re- spectable appearance did Mr. Jenkins un- doubtedly cut. Nothing came amiss to them. They were open to all subjects and gravelled by none. Miss Wrighte's death and Kitty Clutterbuck's marriage — Miss Newsam's legacy and Mr. Moody's lawsuit — the Duke of Kents' arrival and the Marquiss Wellesley's departure — alike furnished ma- terials for long or short metre. The reams of paper that were consumed in that house! Well might the village stationer bow to the very dust when the family passed him. They lived not for society but for sense verses. During the morning tliey were * Some of my readers may perhaps remember the ex- quisite sermon in verse, from the lips of the accomplished Dr. Syntax, in the Tour of that popular clergyman in search of the Picturesque. 24S VERSES BY A CORrULEXT WOMAN. invisible — for then they were composing. And at the conclusion of dinner which they ate in haste and silence, they hurriedly quitted the table for their study — for then they commenced revising. When people wrote so much it would be strange indeed if some fragments of their labours were not to be met with. The folio wins: is from the pen of Mrs Mas- '& pen singer. Now for a very corpulent woman of fifty-five — who liked good eating and drank brown stout — was the mother of nine likely children — and a total stranger to the Spenserian stanza, till one fine spring morn- ing she found herself metamorphosed into Mrs Massinger-— 'I do contend it is a vastly respectable production ! — MAMMA MASSINGER. 249 TO THE PROVENCE ROSE. Sweet rose of Provence ! thou to me Art dearer far than all the flow'rs. That bloom and breathe their odours free And fresh^ from Flora's lap^ who pours Delighted in the sunny smile Of Heav'n — those brilliant hues and dyes ; So lovely that they seem the while As dropp'd from parterres in the skies ! Ah ! sure the Persian nightingale Would leave his favourite rose,* and rest His weary wing, and breathe his tale. Delighted on thy snowy breast: And many a tender tale he'd tell Of youth and hope to prove thee fairer — His happy strain w^ould show full well. Thou wert in all his joys a sharer. Mr. Herrick Massinger, the eldest son, * Alluding to the v.'cll known fable of Shiraz, of the loves of the Nightingale and the Rose. M 3 ^50 herrick's sonnet. liad met ^vith what is termed a disappoint- ment. He proposed to an eaiTs daughter who actually declined his addresses ! She died soon afterwards. Mr Herrick heard of it — he was a hearty, uproarious, jovial young gentleman who looked as if he had never known care in his life — he sighed and then hemmed — called for a sheet of gilt paper and a patent pen — and over a bottle of claret thus vented his feelings. TO THE LADY EMMA C N. I dare not sigh — I should not weep To think, fair maid, that thou art gone ! Since now the tomb's eternal sleep Bestows a bliss, more pure, more deep. Than loving him thou leav'st alone ! Tho' snatch'd from all the hopes of life With beauty's damask on thy cheek. Thy bosom with affections rife, Unchilled by age, unchanged by strife, Earth's wayward changelings seek. THE DYING SAPPHO. 251 'Twere better that my heart should know Thy soul secure from blight or change. Than view thee struggling here below, A fellow sharer in the woe. Of one thou might'st estrange. Yet, — what to me the worldling's pride ? Life's race — ambition's care ? If once I strove, 'tv/as at thy side. Now dull and cold my thoughts deride, The joys thou canst not share! Ah, subtle reason ! Empty name ! What calm can'st thou impart ? Delusion ! tell me, can'st thou tame Or soothe the passions maddening flame. Or lacerated heart. I have already mentioned the little dying girl Sappho. The following is from lier pen. As the veritable production of a girl of eleven years old it may not be judged unworthy of a moment's attention. 2o2 PAPA MASSINGER. SUNSET. 1. I saw the sim descend upon the sea : — With fading fervour yet with radiance bright Flashed his warm rays along the rippling lea. Then gave the universe to peace and night. 2. Soon twilight fell and o'er the dark'ning deep. The queen of heav'n^ — majestic^ — rose to view — Sparkled each dew-drop that the night flow'rs weep. As tho' their spirits mourned but slumbered too. 3. Thus in undying splendour sets the soul. Till freed — refined — from every taint of crime. Supreme it soars disdainful of control. Fiery no more, but calm and all sublime ! The next is from the pen of papa Mas- singer himself. It was written, unhappy old gentleman, on the rejection of his fiftli A DEEP TRAGEDY. Q53 tragedy at Covent garden, (with the thanks and compliments of the management) as '* entirely unfit for scenic representation." '* Unfit indeed," said the v/orthy sugar- baker, '' it was the very thing to have moved an audience." And he luas right. The fifth act was read by Mr. Terry in the green room and was received with peals of laughter. A more bloody conclusion it was impos- sible to devise. The curtain was to fall on seven dead bodies. A deadly killing affair as Terry observed on folding up the ma- nuscript. ON THE INUTILITY OF DISCONTENT. 1. How vain to sigh ! — more vain to grieve Since life so soon fiitspast; The flowers that scent the breath of eve Survive no ruder blast ! '254f APHUA. 2. The joyous fly first-born of morHj No morrow's sun may see : Yet neither feels he grief nor scorn. That such his lot should be. 3. Shall man^ proud man, alone possest Of reason ; — heaven's heir ! Display less fitness to be blest. Than weeds or things of air ? 4. Race of an hour — O ! let us sport Its petty cycle round ; Nor mar a space all — all — too short For sorrow thus profound. There was one of the Massingers, Aphra the second girl, who to a stranger appeared sedulously slighted both by parents and brethren. She was a square, hard, marble featured girl with a stern and most impassive counte- nance. She seemed dead to all emotion. Yet such was not the case. APHRA. 255 *' Aphra has never recovered her brother's loss'' said Sacharissa the eldest girl one evening. ** Loss?" " Yes that of my brother Fletcher who perished with all his crew in the Alci- biades. He and Aphra vvere twins ; and she was devotedly attached to him." " You must all have felt his death se- verely" observed some blunderer. *' Less than you would suppose. We considered him a kind of alien. He had none of the Massinger blood about him — alas 1 not a notion of poetry. He hated it, Aphra shares his incapacity to a lamentable extent." The little maiden listened with her usual imperturbable gravity. " Yes : Aphra composes with difficulty. Verse is as it were wrung out of her. She has no poetic fervour." Aphra looked as though she heard not. Q56 A GIRL WITHOUT FEELING. " One being she certainly loved— her brother Fletcher." There was slight con- vulsive movement about the muscles near the mouth of the motionless maiden. " For him she would have toiled — and w^atched — and laboured — and died'"' said Aphra rising and leaving the room while a tear — yes actually a tear seemed on the point of coursing down those rigid features. '* She's a strange girl that I" said Sacha- rissa. *' Not a particle of feeling ! You see how she dresses ! She's never fit to be seen. We are all ashamed of her — mamma particularly. She's a disgrace to the family. We feel it acutely. You'll scarcely believe me when I give you the reason of her discreditable appearance. She actually keeps the three orphan children of Tim- mins the gunner who was lost in the Alci- biades with my brother, because he was a favourite of Fletcher's, and on this last occasion tried to save his life. But she's a APHRA. 257 strange passionless creature — no poetic fire — no fervour — no furor. Here are the lines I mentioned to you. They are about the best of her performances." TO FLETCHER MASSINGER, LOST IN THE ALCIBIADES, FEBRUARY 2d, 1819, WHEN ALL HANDS PERISHED. In earlier days and happier hours, When fancy wove luxuriant flowers. When thou with pencil, I with pen. The features traced of hill and glen ; Or else outstretched the live long day. At ease among the wild flowers lay ; View'd the lambs bound upon the green, Or listened to the eaglet's scream; — 'Twas then I promised that to thee, Sacred my first attempt should be. Away those winged hours have flown. To join the mass of ages gone. And o'er thee angry billows roll. Lamented brother of my soul ! 258 APHRA. Dear brother ! o'er thy lowly grave. No dirge shall sound, no knell shall ring. But angels bending o'er the grave, Their half heard hallelujahs sing ! No flowers of transient bloom at eve Can maidens o'er thy green grave strew ; Nor sigh, — as the sad spot they leave, '' To worth and youth a long adieu !" O'er her son's corpse no mother grieves, 'Tis tossed together with the wave. Which, sadly tranquil ocean, heaves To wash the shipwrecked sailor's grave. Sweet be thy last long sleep profound. May nought disturb thy shroudless breast. And ocean swell with softer sound ; A requiem to thy place of rest. THE DUKE OF REICHSTADT. '' A Csssar's mansion and an emperoror's son ; The world thy dowry ere thy course began, Thou now art but — the oflsprhig of the man. Yet where's the prince, — who for that simple name Would not exchange his title — sceptre — fame ?" It was evening when, wet and weary, dissatisfied and desolate, we reached Vi- enna. The last ten miles we had traversed in profound silence. We were desperately hungry, and proportionably surly. The route from Presburg to Vienna, a distance of about forty English miles, is intolerably tedious ; and never did I hail with greater 260 DIFFICULTIES. joy the signs and symptoms of a resting place, than the Hghts, on a dreary Novem- ber evening, of the Austrian capital. On the following morning, I knew my companion proposed taking his first mea- sures towards achieving the grand object of his journey — an interview with the Duke of Reichstadt. I know not that I ever sought repose with less enviable feelings than on this sombre evening. Charged as I knew Dr. to be, with messages and missives from more than one member of the ex- imperial family — aware of the vigi- lance w^ith w^hich every movement of the young Napoleon was observed and control- led — sensible of the strict seclusion to which certain parties wish to destine him, and the jealousy with w^hich the slightest inter- course on his part with foreigners is viewed by those about him — and above all, con- vinced by experience of my companion's inexplicable deficiency in tact and temper. THE ROAD TO SCHOENBRUNX. 26 1 I must confess that, bemoaning my want of judgment, and auguring all sorts of calami- ties from our Quixotic enterprize, I threw myself on my pillow, heartily repenting I had ever consented to share the perils of it. Morning came— bright, sunny, cheering morning — and at eight the Doctor roused me by an intimation that breakfast was ready, that horses were ordered, that he was impatient to be off— following up these announcements by that indescribable series of partly audible ejaculations, by which a hasty, impetuous, restless man contrives to let you know he's in a devil of a hurry. At ten w^e were on the road to Schoen- brunn. Gold, that subtle agent that makes even Germans eloquent, and before which even the secrets of princes give way, had procured for us the positive information that the duke was then at Schoenbrunn ; and that if, after reaching the neighbourhood of 262 THE duke's horsemanship. the palace, we proceeded on foot, and took at a certain hour a direction minutely pointed out to us, we were sure of meeting, during his morning's ride, this important scion of the imperial family. We were not disappointed : on a beauti- ful Arabian steed, the gift of his grand- father, attended by his lord chamberlain and aide-de-camp, the youth for whom so many brave hearts in France would struggle even to the death to seat on his father's throne, rode rapidly past us. He rides fast and well. His resemblance to the late emperor is strong, and on horse- back most striking. He inherits, or I am mistaken, the firm and fearless horseman- ship for which Napoleon was so justly celebrated. " To say that he — he is without ambi- tion ! — that he will never come near France — that he will never fight for his father's throne — never build up his father's house — MILITARY AIR, ^(J3 idiots — idiots! Who that has ever seen him can credit such a fable ?" And exulting in the success of the first wish of his heart, the Doctor strode joy- ously away. Several succeeding days were spent — and spent most vainly, but expensimly^ in at- tempts to procure a private interview. We were told it was utterly impossible — imprac- ticable—that the sooner we abandoned all idea of it the better for our personal secu- rity — that the duke was a kind of state prisoner, and that private access to him was out of the question. In the meantime there was a review ; and we had an opportunity of seeing him manoeuvre his troop, and hearing him give the word of command. It was a spectacle full of interest. The presence of the young duke, riding at the head of his esca- fbwi, and evidently taking the most vivid interest in all its movements — of him who ♦264 THE EMPEROR OF AUSTRIA. must be by descent every inch a soldier — whose heart must leap at the note of the shrill clarion and the roll of the distant drum —him, whose young blood must stir witliin him at the plumed troop, ghttering gaily in the sunbeam, and the colours waving brightly in the breeze —recalled involuntarily the conquests and career of HIM who now sleeps beside the willow at St. Helena. His grandfather is deeply attached to him ; and his troop look up to him with the most enthusiastic devotion. Could it be otherwise? Independent of the military associations connected with his name, there is a smartness, a precision, an eagle glance, a military air, and manly courage about him, which to the experienced veteran are unfailing omens of the future general. On our return to our hotel, we were greeted with the very agreeable informa- tion, that in our absence the police had AUSTRIAN POLICE. 265 done us the favour of inspecting our effects. Their politeness was quite embarrassing. Their inquiries had been most particular, and their search unquestionably most mi- nute. No part of our property seemed to have escaped their observation. They had not contented themselves with opening and overhauling our trunks, but had sprung the lock of my letter-case, rifled the Doc- tor's writing-desk, and scattered the papers belonging to both in endless confusion about the floor of our sitting room. Fortunately — it was more than I expect- ed — the Doctor had had the precaution to secrete all the documents he was charged with about his own person ; and as to myself, their royal master and their inqui- sitive selves were heartily welcome to any information my papers could supply. They consisted of my aunt's letters, and mainly ran to this effect : VOL. I. N 266 AN aunt's letter. " Be sure you wear flannel next your skin. Don't carry too much money about you to public places. Did you see the Rev. Mr. Wix at Paris ? I charged him to give you some seasonable exhortations. Your old flirt Fanny Fane is dead ; she was a very wild girl, and died of a brain fever. Never eat rice when you're warm. Above all, avoid Frescati's and the Palais Royale. I hope you keep an accurate account of your expences ; your last bills were tre- mendous. I trust I need not warn you against the society of women of light character. Your sister was confined of twins last week. You don't mention your shagreen case; I hope it has not been in- jured. I put into it, with my own hands. Judge Bayley's Prayer Book and Dr. Kitchiner's *' Peptic Precepts." Study the latter ; and neglect what you may, Aylmer, be sure to attend to your digestion. Think of your dear gi'andfather, who died, at DOMICILIARY VISITS. 267 sixty-seven, a martyr to a morbid appe- tite !" Whether the emperor and his minions profited by my dignified aunt's injunctions, I had no means of ascertaining. The lat- ter must have been struck with their con- tents, for some were actually purloined. Little did the sagacious writer imagine the fate — I will not say honour— that awaited her effusions ! But to return. — The visit, we were told, would be repeated on the following day, when my companion and myself were to be personally interrogated. I never felt so sensible of the security, freedom, and beauty of the English constitution, as when, hav- ing arranged my luckless letters, I sat down to muse upon the probable consequences of these domiciliary visits. In Austria, every third man you meet is a spy : sold body and soul to the purposes N 2 268 AUSTRIAN ESPIONAGE. of government. Espionage is the business of an Austrian's life ; it feeds, clothes, and shelters him. The very people in whose house we were staying were, beyond doubt, the salaried spies of the police, and the prompt reporters of our proceedings. While we were canvassing our prospects, and cursing the suspicion of an Austrian government, our ally at Shoenbrunn for- warded to us information that there was on that very evening a ball in honour of one of the imperial birthdays, and that an opportunity would be afforded us of seeing his Highness alone. Time, place, and signal were agreed on. At ten, we were again under the walls of Shoenbrunn. After a long and most pain- ful interval, our guide came up, hurried us through some damp, dreary, dirty, ill- lighted passages, and finally ushered us into a lofty, but ill-proportioned and miserably YOUNG NAPOLEON. 269 furnished apartment, where he left us, with an assurance that there the duke w^ould give us audience. After a few minutes the door of a little cabinet at the higher end of the room was slowly unclosed; a youthful figure glided through the opening, and we stood in the presence of the young Napoleon. His appearance is peculiarly prepossess- ing. The delicate and chiselled beauty of his features— then' air of mournful intelli- gence and serene command — the deep, sad, settled composure of his eye — the thought- ful paleness of his cheek — and the lofty, noble, but intense abstraction which cha- racterized all his movements — form too remarkable a portrait to be speedily forgot- ten. It is difficult to describe a countenance so peculiar in its expression ; so deeply sad when in repose, so captivating when ani- mated by the exertion of speaking. Some- 270 THE INTERVIEW. thing, however, must be attempted. He inherits the fair complexion and light hair of his mother ; his eyes are blue, deep, sad, and thoughtful. To him have descended the finely formed lips of his father, and the small, beautiful hand ; and he boasts the same soft, winning, attractive smile. There is something of the Austrian in his fore- head : it is high, but narrow, and not finely developed : all else is noble and command- ing. But the unwonted paleness of his features, the settled though tfuln ess of his brow, the look of deep, and habitual, and unutterable sadness, betoken one w^ho has brooded over the secrets of his own heart, and found them unmingled bitterness. He advanced quickly down the room towards the doctor, and then gave a rapid glance of inquiry at his companion. It was understood and answered. ** An inti- mate and most particular friend." *' Your name is ?" THE INTERVIEW. '271 <*It is/' " And the papers you are in possession of, and have with such difficulty pre- served — " " Are with me." During these short and rapid interroga- tories, the duke had so adroitly shifted his position, as to throw the light full upon my companion's countenance, which he scanned with the most searching observa- tion : then, as if he were satisfied with the result, he said, with a faint smile, " I am ready, sir, to receive the documents." " The papers I am charged with," the doctor began, with an air of considerable importance — " They will speak for themselves," said the prince calmly. '' The few moments I can spare to you are sensibly diminishing : excuse me" — and he extended his hand. He opened the pacquet — examined its contents eagerly and minutely, and, as he ^72 THE INTERVIEW, closed his inspection, uttered in a tone of deep feeling — " These are valuable : the Emperor's family will not forget the obliga- tion of receiving them, or the hazard of the attempt to place them where they wdll be most precious." At this moment the man of medicine made some observation — I scarcely heard it, so intently was my attention riveted on the princely prisoner — to the effect that he was pained or surprized — I forget which — at observing no vestige, no relic of the late ruler of France in the apartment of his son, to prove that he was not forgotten. *' Forgotten ! Behold the cabinet where the Emperor, when at Shoenbrunn, was wont to read and write for hours alone, and where he first saw my mother's portrait." << Forgotten !" and he touched the spring of a small inlaid writing- stand, and there ap- peared a beautifully finished miniature on enamel, of Napoleon on the heights of THE INTERVIEW. 'rZjS Areola. « Forgotten !" and he turned a full- length engraving of his grandfather Fran- cis, which hung near him. Its reverse exhibited a proof impression of the splen- did print of Bonaparte in his coronation robes. " No" — said the prince, as he ear- nestly, yet sadly gazed upon it — **he is never" (he spoke in French, with the deep- est emotion,) '* no, he is never — never for one instant— forgotten !" He paused for an instant, recovered his composure, and pro- ceeded in calmer tones. " Farewell, sir. You will hear from me : from others. Form no opinion on the state mockery with which you see me sur- rounded, or the indifference with which I endure it. At present I bow to circum- stances — their creature, not their victim. Death must shortly produce great changes. I am aware I have friends— many, lirm, devoted— mv father's!" — his voice trem- "274 A WARNING. - bled— "let them be assured I live but to avenge his memory and — his murder !" He bowed, as a sign the interview v/as ended, and quitted by the same door as he had entered the apartment. Our guide re-appeared, and we hastily retraced our steps. But before we had cleared the precincts of the palace, a voice whispered in my ear, as we hurried through the dark, dismal passage already noticed^ '* Quit Vienna without delay : your pro- ceedings are watched, and your design detected." This intimation did not cheer our spirits, which were again damped by the intelli- gence, on arriving at the inn, that the police had paid us a second visit ; had waited for us till twelve ; when deeming it unlikely we should return at all that night, they had taken their reluctant departure. *' They will pay their respects to you in ESCAPE. S75 the morning," was the closing intimation of our informant. We deemed this ceremony unnecessary, and determined we would not trouble them to pay so needless a compli- ment. The object for which we came to Vienna was attained : day -break saw us at some distance from her walls, and the night- fall of the following day but one, beyond the Austrian frontier. END OF VOL. I. 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