The Sketch-Book of Geoffrey Crayon

THE SKETCH BOOK OF GEOFFREY CRAYON, GENT.

By Washington Irving

CONTENTS:

Preface

The Author’s Account of Himself

The Voyage

Roscoe

The Wife

Rip Van Winkle

English Writers on America

Rural Life in England

The Broken Heart

The Art of Book-making

A Royal Poet

The Country Church

The Widow and her Son

A Sunday in London

The Boar’s Head Tavern

The Mutability of Literature

Rural Funerals

The Inn Kitchen

The Spectre Bridegroom

Westminster Abbey

Christmas

The Stage-Coach

Christmas Eve

Christmas Day

The Christmas Dinner

London Antiques

Little Britain

Statford-on-Avon

Traits of Indian Character

Philip of Pokanoket

John Bull

The Pride of the Village

The Angler

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

L’Envoy

THE SKETCH-BOOK OF GEOFFREY CRAYON, GENT.

“I have no wife nor children, good or bad, to provide for. A mere

spectator of other men’s fortunes and adventures, and how they play

their parts; which, methinks, are diversely presented unto me, as from a

common theatre or scene.”--BURTON.

PREFACE TO THE REVISED EDITION.

THE following papers, with two exceptions, were written in England, and

formed but part of an intended series for which I had made notes and

memorandums. Before I could mature a plan, however, circumstances

compelled me to send them piecemeal to the United States, where they

were published from time to time in portions or numbers. It was not my

intention to publish them in England, being conscious that much of their

contents could be interesting only to American readers, and, in truth,

being deterred by the severity with which American productions had been

treated by the British press.

By the time the contents of the first volume had appeared in this

occasional manner, they began to find their way across the Atlantic,

and to be inserted, with many kind encomiums, in the London Literary

Gazette. It was said, also, that a London bookseller intended to publish

them in a collective form. I determined, therefore, to bring them

forward myself, that they might at least have the benefit of my

superintendence and revision. I accordingly took the printed numbers

which I had received from the United States, to Mr. John Murray, the

eminent publisher, from whom I had already received friendly attentions,

and left them with him for examination, informing him that should he be

inclined to bring them before the public, I had materials enough on

hand for a second volume. Several days having elapsed without any

communication from Mr. Murray, I addressed a note to him, in which I

construed his silence into a tacit rejection of my work, and begged that

the numbers I had left with him might be returned to me. The following

was his reply:

MY DEAR SIR: I entreat you to believe that I feel truly obliged by your

kind intentions towards me, and that I entertain the most unfeigned

respect for your most tasteful talents. My house is completely filled

with workpeople at this time, and I have only an office to transact

business in; and yesterday I was wholly occupied, or I should have done

myself the pleasure of seeing you.

If it would not suit me to engage in the publication of your present

work, it is only because I do not see that scope in the nature of it

which would enable me to make those satisfactory accounts between us,

without which I really feel no satisfaction in engaging--but I will

do all I can to promote their circulation, and shall be most ready to

attend to any future plan of yours.

With much regard, I remain, dear sir,

Your faithful servant,

JOHN MURRAY.

This was disheartening, and might have deterred me from any further

prosecution of the matter, had the question of republication in Great

Britain rested entirely with me; but I apprehended the appearance of a

spurious edition. I now thought of Mr. Archibald Constable as publisher,

having been treated by him with much hospitality during a visit to

Edinburgh; but first I determined to submit my work to Sir-Walter (then

Mr.) Scott, being encouraged to do so by the cordial reception I had

experienced from him at Abbotsford a few years previously, and by the

favorable opinion he had expressed to others of my earlier writings. I

accordingly sent him the printed numbers of the Sketch-Book in a parcel

by coach, and at the same time wrote to him, hinting that since I had

had the pleasure of partaking of his hospitality, a reverse had taken

place in my affairs which made the successful exercise of my pen

all-important to me; I begged him, therefore, to look over the literary

articles I had forwarded to him, and, if he thought they would bear

European republication, to ascertain whether Mr. Constable would be

inclined to be the publisher.

The parcel containing my work went by coach to Scott’s address in

Edinburgh; the letter went by mail to his residence in the country. By

the very first post I received a reply, before he had seen my work.

“I was down at Kelso,” said he, “when your letter reached Abbotsford. I

am now on my way to town, and will converse with Constable, and do all

in my power to forward your views--I assure you nothing will give me

more pleasure.”

The hint, however, about a reverse of fortune had struck the quick

apprehension of Scott, and, with that practical and efficient good-will

which belonged to his nature, he had already devised a way of aiding me.

A weekly periodical, he went on to inform me, was about to be set up

in Edinburgh, supported by the most respectable talents, and amply

furnished with all the necessary information. The appointment of the

editor, for which ample funds were provided, would be five hundred

pounds sterling a year, with the reasonable prospect of further

advantages. This situation, being apparently at his disposal, he frankly

offered to me. The work, however, he intimated, was to have somewhat of

a political bearing, and he expressed an apprehension that the tone it

was desired to adopt might not suit me. “Yet I risk the question,” added

he, “because I know no man so well qualified for this important task,

and perhaps because it will necessarily bring you to Edinburgh. If my

proposal does not suit, you need only keep the matter secret and there

is no harm done. ‘And for my love I pray you wrong me not.’ If on the

contrary you think it could be made to suit you, let me know as soon as

possible, addressing Castle Street, Edinburgh.”

In a postscript, written from Edinburgh, he adds, “I am just come here,

and have glanced over the Sketch-Book. It is positively beautiful, and

increases my desire to crimp you, if it be possible. Some difficulties

there always are in managing such a matter, especially at the outset;

but we will obviate them as much as we possibly can.”

The following is from an imperfect draught of my reply, which underwent

some modifications in the copy sent:

“I cannot express how much I am gratified by your letter. I had begun to

feel as if I had taken an unwarrantable liberty; but, somehow or other,

there is a genial sunshine about you that warms every creeping thing

into heart and confidence. Your literary proposal both surprises and

flatters me, as it evinces a much higher opinion of my talents than I

have myself.”

I then went on to explain that I found myself peculiarly unfitted for

the situation offered to me, not merely by my political opinions, but by

the very constitution and habits of my mind. “My whole course of life,”

I observed, “has been desultory, and I am unfitted for any periodically

recurring task, or any stipulated labor of body or mind. I have no

command of my talents, such as they are, and have to watch the varyings

of my mind as I would those of a weathercock. Practice and training

may bring me more into rule; but at present I am as useless for regular

service as one of my own country Indians or a Don Cossack.

“I must, therefore, keep on pretty much as I have begun; writing when I

can, not when I would. I shall occasionally shift my residence and write

whatever is suggested by objects before me, or whatever rises in my

imagination; and hope to write better and more copiously by and by.

“I am playing the egotist, but I know no better way of answering your

proposal than by showing what a very good-for-nothing kind of being I

am. Should Mr. Constable feel inclined to make a bargain for the wares I

have on hand, he will encourage me to further enterprise; and it will be

something like trading with a gypsy for the fruits of his prowlings, who

may at one time have nothing but a wooden bowl to offer, and at another

time a silver tankard.”

In reply, Scott expressed regret, but not surprise, at my declining what

might have proved a troublesome duty. He then recurred to the original

subject of our correspondence; entered into a detail of the various

terms upon which arrangements were made between authors and booksellers,

that I might take my choice; expressing the most encouraging confidence

of the success of my work, and of previous works which I had produced

in America. “I did no more,” added he, “than open the trenches with

Constable; but I am sure if you will take the trouble to write to him,

you will find him disposed to treat your overtures with every degree of

attention. Or, if you think it of consequence in the first place to

see me, I shall be in London in the course of a month, and whatever my

experience can command is most heartily at your command. But I can add

little to what I have said above, except my earnest recommendation to

Constable to enter into the negotiation.” *

* I cannot avoid subjoining in a note a succeeding paragraph

of Scott’s letter, which, though it does not relate to the

main subject of our correspondence, was too characteristic

to be omitted. Some time previously I had sent Miss Sophia

Scott small duodecimo American editions of her father’s

poems published in Edinburgh in quarto volumes; showing the

“nigromancy” of the American press, by which a quart of wine

is conjured into a pint bottle. Scott observes: “In my

hurry, I have not thanked you in Sophia’s name for the kind

attention which furnished her with the American volumes. I

am not quite sure I can add my own, since you have made her

acquainted with much more of papa’s folly than she would

ever otherwise have learned; for I had taken special care

they should never see any of those things during their

earlier years. I think I have told you that Walter is

sweeping the firmament with a feather like a maypole and

indenting the pavement with a sword like a scythe--in other

words, he has become a whiskered hussar in the 18th

Dragoons.”

Before the receipt of this most obliging letter, however, I had

determined to look to no leading bookseller for a launch, but to throw

my work before the public at my own risk, and let it sink or swim

according to its merits. I wrote to that effect to Scott, and soon

received a reply:

“I observe with pleasure that you are going to come forth in Britain. It

is certainly not the very best way to publish on one’s own accompt; for

the booksellers set their face against the circulation of such works as

do not pay an amazing toll to themselves. But they have lost the art of

altogether damming up the road in such cases between the author and the

public, which they were once able to do as effectually as Diabolus in

John Bunyan’s Holy War closed up the windows of my Lord Understanding’s

mansion. I am sure of one thing, that you have only to be known to the

British public to be admired by them, and I would not say so unless I

really was of that opinion.

“If you ever see a witty but rather local publication called Blackwood’s

Edinburgh Magazine, you will find some notice of your works in the last

number: the author is a friend of mine, to whom I have introduced you

in your literary capacity. His name is Lockhart, a young man of very

considerable talent, and who will soon be intimately connected with

my family. My faithful friend Knickerbocker is to be next examined and

illustrated. Constable was extremely willing to enter into consideration

of a treaty for your works, but I foresee will be still more so when

Your name is up, and may go

From Toledo to Madrid.

“----And that will soon be the case. I trust to be in London about the

middle of the month, and promise myself great pleasure in once again

shaking you by the hand.”

The first volume of the Sketch-Book was put to press in London, as I had

resolved, at my own risk, by a bookseller unknown to fame, and without

any of the usual arts by which a work is trumpeted into notice.

Still some attention had been called to it by the extracts which had

previously appeared in the Literary Gazette, and by the kind word

spoken by the editor of that periodical, and it was getting into fair

circulation, when my worthy bookseller failed before the first month was

over, and the sale was interrupted.

At this juncture Scott arrived in London. I called to him for help, as I

was sticking in the mire, and, more propitious than Hercules, he put his

own shoulder to the wheel. Through his favorable representations, Murray

was quickly induced to undertake the future publication of the work

which he had previously declined. A further edition of the first volume

was struck off and the second volume was put to press, and from that

time Murray became my publisher, conducting himself in all his dealings

with that fair, open, and liberal spirit which had obtained for him the

well-merited appellation of the Prince of Booksellers.

Thus, under the kind and cordial auspices of Sir Walter Scott, I began

my literary career in Europe; and I feel that I am but discharging, in

a trifling degree, my debt of gratitude to the memory of that

golden-hearted man in acknowledging my obligations to him. But who of

his literary contemporaries ever applied to him for aid or counsel that

did not experience the most prompt, generous, and effectual assistance?

W. I.

SUNNYSIDE, 1848.

THE SKETCH BOOK.

THE AUTHOR’S ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF

I am of this mind with Homer, that as the snaile that crept out of her

shel was turned eftsoones into a toad, and thereby was forced to make a

stoole to sit on; so the traveller that stragleth from his owne country

is in a short time transformed into so monstrous a shape, that he is

faine to alter his mansion with his manners, and to live where he can,

not where he would.--LYLY’S EUPHUES.

I was always fond of visiting new scenes, and observing strange

characters and manners. Even when a mere child I began my travels, and

made many tours of discovery into foreign parts and unknown regions of

my native city, to the frequent alarm of my parents, and the emolument

of the town crier. As I grew into boyhood, I extended the range of my

observations. My holiday afternoons were spent in rambles about the

surrounding country. I made myself familiar with all its places famous

in history or fable. I knew every spot where a murder or robbery had

been committed, or a ghost seen. I visited the neighboring villages,

and added greatly to my stock of knowledge, by noting their habits and

customs, and conversing with their sages and great men. I even journeyed

one long summer’s day to the summit of the most distant hill, whence I

stretched my eye over many a mile of terra incognita, and was astonished

to find how vast a globe I inhabited.

This rambling propensity strengthened with my years. Books of voyages

and travels became my passion, and in devouring their contents, I

neglected the regular exercises of the school. How wistfully would

I wander about the pier-heads in fine weather, and watch the parting

ships, bound to distant climes; with what longing eyes would I gaze

after their lessening sails, and waft myself in imagination to the ends

of the earth!

Further reading and thinking, though they brought this vague inclination

into more reasonable bounds, only served to make it more decided. I

visited various parts of my own country; and had I been merely a lover

of fine scenery, I should have felt little desire to seek elsewhere

its gratification, for on no country had the charms of nature been more

prodigally lavished. Her mighty lakes, her oceans of liquid silver; her

mountains, with their bright aerial tints; her valleys, teeming with

wild fertility; her tremendous cataracts, thundering in their solitudes;

her boundless plains, waving with spontaneous verdure; her broad, deep

rivers, rolling in solemn silence to the ocean; her trackless forests,

where vegetation puts forth all its magnificence; her skies, kindling

with the magic of summer clouds and glorious sunshine;--no, never need

an American look beyond his own country for the sublime and beautiful of

natural scenery.

But Europe held forth all the charms of storied and poetical

association. There were to be seen the masterpieces of art, the

refinements of highly cultivated society, the quaint peculiarities

of ancient and local custom. My native country was full of youthful

promise; Europe was rich in the accumulated treasures of age. Her very

ruins told the history of the times gone by, and every mouldering

stone was a chronicle. I longed to wander over the scenes of renowned

achievement--to tread, as it were, in the footsteps of antiquity--to

loiter about the ruined castle--to meditate on the falling tower--to

escape, in short, from the commonplace realities of the present, and

lose myself among the shadowy grandeurs of the past.

I had, besides all this, an earnest desire to see the great men of the

earth. We have, it is true, our great men in America: not a city but has

an ample share of them. I have mingled among them in my time, and been

almost withered by the shade into which they cast me; for there

is nothing so baleful to a small man as the shade of a great one,

particularly the great man of a city. But I was anxious to see the great

men of Europe; for I had read in the works of various philosophers, that

all animals degenerated in America, and man among the number. A great

man of Europe, thought I, must therefore be as superior to a great man

of America, as a peak of the Alps to a highland of the Hudson; and in

this idea I was confirmed by observing the comparative importance and

swelling magnitude of many English travellers among us, who, I was

assured, were very little people in their own country. I will visit this

land of wonders, thought I, and see the gigantic race from which I am

degenerated.

It has been either my good or evil lot to have my roving passion

gratified. I have wandered through different countries and witnessed

many of the shifting scenes of life. I cannot say that I have studied

them with the eye of a philosopher, but rather with the sauntering gaze

with which humble lovers of the picturesque stroll from the window

of one print-shop to another; caught sometimes by the delineations of

beauty, sometimes by the distortions of caricature, and sometimes by

the loveliness of landscape. As it is the fashion for modern tourists

to travel pencil in hand, and bring home their portfolios filled with

sketches, I am disposed to get up a few for the entertainment of my

friends. When, however, I look over the hints and memorandums I have

taken down for the purpose, my heart almost fails me, at finding how

my idle humor has led me astray from the great object studied by every

regular traveller who would make a book. I fear I shall give equal

disappointment with an unlucky landscape-painter, who had travelled on

the Continent, but following the bent of his vagrant inclination, had

sketched in nooks, and corners, and by-places. His sketch-book was

accordingly crowded with cottages, and landscapes, and obscure ruins;

but he had neglected to paint St. Peter’s, or the Coliseum, the cascade

of Terni, or the bay of Naples, and had not a single glacier or volcano

in his whole collection.

THE VOYAGE.

Ships, ships, I will descrie you

Amidst the main,

I will come and try you,

What you are protecting,

And projecting,

What’s your end and aim.

One goes abroad for merchandise and trading,

Another stays to keep his country from invading,

A third is coming home with rich and wealthy lading.

Hallo! my fancie, whither wilt thou go?

OLD POEM.

To an American visiting Europe, the long voyage he has to make is an

excellent preparative. The temporary absence of worldly scenes and

employments produces a state of mind peculiarly fitted to receive

new and vivid impressions. The vast space of waters that separate the

hemispheres is like a blank page in existence. There is no gradual

transition by which, as in Europe, the features and population of one

country blend almost imperceptibly with those of another. From the

moment you lose sight of the land you have left, all is vacancy, until

you step on the opposite shore, and are launched at once into the bustle

and novelties of another world.

In travelling by land there is a continuity of scene, and a connected

succession of persons and incidents, that carry on the story of life,

and lessen the effect of absence and separation. We drag, it is true,

“a lengthening chain” at each remove of our pilgrimage; but the chain is

unbroken; we can trace it back link by link; and we feel that the last

still grapples us to home. But a wide sea voyage severs us at once.

It makes us conscious of being cast loose from the secure anchorage of

settled life, and sent adrift upon a doubtful world. It interposes a

gulf, not merely imaginary, but real, between us and our homes--a

gulf, subject to tempest, and fear, and uncertainty, rendering distance

palpable, and return precarious.

Such, at least, was the case with myself. As I saw the last blue lines

of my native land fade away like a cloud in the horizon, it seemed as if

I had closed one volume of the world and its concerns, and had time for

meditation, before I opened another. That land, too, now vanishing from

my view, which contained all most dear to me in life; what vicissitudes

might occur in it--what changes might take place in me, before I should

visit it again! Who can tell, when he sets forth to wander, whither he

may be driven by the uncertain currents of existence; or when he may

return; or whether it may be ever his lot to revisit the scenes of his

childhood?

I said, that at sea all is vacancy; I should correct the impression. To

one given to day-dreaming, and fond of losing himself in reveries, a sea

voyage is full of subjects for meditation; but then they are the wonders

of the deep and of the air, and rather tend to abstract the mind from

worldly themes. I delighted to loll over the quarter-railing or climb to

the main-top, of a calm day, and muse for hours together on the tranquil

bosom of a summer’s sea; to gaze upon the piles of golden clouds just

peering above the horizon, fancy them some fairy realms, and people

them with a creation of my own;--to watch the gently undulating billows

rolling their silver volumes, as if to die away on those happy shores.

There was a delicious sensation of mingled security and awe with which I

looked down, from my giddy height, on the monsters of the deep at their

uncouth gambols: shoals of porpoises tumbling about the bow of the ship;

the grampus, slowly heaving his huge form above the surface; or the

ravenous shark, darting, like a spectre, through the blue waters. My

imagination would conjure up all that I had heard or read of the watery

world beneath me; of the finny herds that roam its fathomless valleys;

of the shapeless monsters that lurk among the very foundations of the

earth; and of those wild phantasms that swell the tales of fishermen and

sailors.

Sometimes a distant sail, gliding along the edge of the ocean, would be

another theme of idle speculation. How interesting this fragment of a

world, hastening to rejoin the great mass of existence! What a glorious

monument of human invention; which has in a manner triumphed over

wind and wave; has brought the ends of the world into communion; has

established an interchange of blessings, pouring into the sterile

regions of the north all the luxuries of the south; has diffused the

light of knowledge, and the charities of cultivated life; and has thus

bound together those scattered portions of the human race, between which

nature seemed to have thrown an insurmountable barrier.

We one day descried some shapeless object drifting at a distance. At

sea, every thing that breaks the monotony of the surrounding expanse

attracts attention. It proved to be the mast of a ship that must have

been completely wrecked; for there were the remains of handkerchiefs, by

which some of the crew had fastened themselves to this spar, to prevent

their being washed off by the waves. There was no trace by which the

name of the ship could be ascertained. The wreck had evidently drifted

about for many months; clusters of shell-fish had fastened about it, and

long sea-weeds flaunted at its sides. But where, thought I, is the crew?

Their struggle has long been over--they have gone down amidst the roar

of the tempest--their bones lie whitening among the caverns of the deep.

Silence, oblivion, like the waves, have closed over them, and no one

can tell the story of their end. What sighs have been wafted after that

ship! what prayers offered up at the deserted fireside of home! How

often has the mistress, the wife, the mother, pored over the daily news,

to catch some casual intelligence of this rover of the deep! How has

expectation darkened into anxiety--anxiety into dread--and dread into

despair! Alas! not one memento may ever return for love to cherish. All

that may ever be known, is that she sailed from her port, “and was never

heard of more!”

The sight of this wreck, as usual, gave rise to many dismal anecdotes.

This was particularly the case in the evening, when the weather, which

had hitherto been fair, began to look wild and threatening, and gave

indications of one of those sudden storms that will sometimes break in

upon the serenity of a summer voyage. As we sat round the dull light of

a lamp, in the cabin, that made the gloom more ghastly, everyone had his

tale of shipwreck and disaster. I was particularly struck with a short

one related by the captain:

“As I was once sailing,” said he, “in a fine, stout ship, across the

banks of Newfoundland, one of those heavy fogs that prevail in those

parts rendered it impossible for us to see far ahead, even in the

daytime; but at night the weather was so thick that we could not

distinguish any object at twice the length of the ship. I kept lights

at the mast-head, and a constant watch forward to look out for fishing

smacks, which are accustomed to lie at anchor on the banks. The wind was

blowing a smacking breeze, and we were going at a great rate through

the water. Suddenly the watch gave the alarm of ‘a sail ahead!’--it was

scarcely uttered before we were upon her. She was a small schooner, at

anchor, with her broadside toward us. The crew were all asleep, and had

neglected to hoist a light. We struck her just amidships. The force, the

size, and weight of our vessel, bore her down below the waves; we passed

over her and were hurried on our course. As the crashing wreck was

sinking beneath us, I had a glimpse of two or three half-naked wretches,

rushing from her cabin; they just started from their beds to be

swallowed shrieking by the waves. I heard their drowning cry mingling

with the wind. The blast that bore it to our ears, swept us out of all

further hearing. I shall never forget that cry! It was some time before

we could put the ship about, she was under such headway. We returned, as

nearly as we could guess, to the place where the smack had anchored. We

cruised about for several hours in the dense fog. We fired signal-guns,

and listened if we might hear the halloo of any survivors: but all was

silent--we never saw or heard any thing of them more.”

I confess these stories, for a time, put an end to all my fine fancies.

The storm increased with the night. The sea was lashed into tremendous

confusion. There was a fearful, sullen sound of rushing waves and broken

surges. Deep called unto deep. At times the black volume of clouds

overhead seemed rent asunder by flashes of lightning which quivered

along the foaming billows, and made the succeeding darkness doubly

terrible. The thunders bellowed over the wild waste of waters, and were

echoed and prolonged by the mountain waves. As I saw the ship staggering

and plunging among these roaring caverns, it seemed miraculous that she

regained her balance, or preserved her buoyancy. Her yards would dip

into the water; her bow was almost buried beneath the waves. Sometimes

an impending surge appeared ready to overwhelm her, and nothing but a

dexterous movement of the helm preserved her from the shock.

When I retired to my cabin, the awful scene still followed me. The

whistling of the wind through the rigging sounded like funereal

wailings. The creaking of the masts; the straining and groaning of

bulkheads, as the ship labored in the weltering sea, were frightful. As

I heard the waves rushing along the side of the ship, and roaring in my

very ear, it seemed as if Death were raging around this floating prison,

seeking for his prey: the mere starting of a nail, the yawning of a

seam, might give him entrance.

A fine day, however, with a tranquil sea and favoring breeze, soon put

all these dismal reflections to flight. It is impossible to resist the

gladdening influence of fine weather and fair wind at sea. When the ship

is decked out in all her canvas, every sail swelled, and careering gayly

over the curling waves, how lofty, how gallant, she appears--how she

seems to lord it over the deep!

I might fill a volume with the reveries of a sea voyage; for with me it

is almost a continual reverie--but it is time to get to shore.

It was a fine sunny morning when the thrilling cry of “land!” was given

from the mast-head. None but those who have experienced it can form an

idea of the delicious throng of sensations which rush into an American’s

bosom, when he first comes in sight of Europe. There is a volume of

associations with the very name. It is the land of promise, teeming with

everything of which his childhood has heard, or on which his studious

years have pondered.

From that time, until the moment of arrival, it was all feverish

excitement. The ships of war, that prowled like guardian giants along

the coast; the headlands of Ireland, stretching out into the channel;

the Welsh mountains towering into the clouds;--all were objects of

intense interest. As we sailed up the Mersey, I reconnoitred the shores

with a telescope. My eye dwelt with delight on neat cottages, with their

trim shrubberies and green grass-plots. I saw the mouldering ruin of an

abbey overrun with ivy, and the taper spire of a village church rising

from the brow of a neighboring hill;--all were characteristic of

England.

The tide and wind were so favorable, that the ship was enabled to come

at once to her pier. It was thronged with people; some idle lookers-on;

others, eager expectants of friends or relations. I could distinguish

the merchant to whom the ship was consigned. I knew him by his

calculating brow and restless air. His hands were thrust into his

pockets; he was whistling thoughtfully, and walking to and fro, a

small space having been accorded him by the crowd, in deference to his

temporary importance. There were repeated cheerings and salutations

interchanged between the shore and the ship, as friends happened to

recognize each other. I particularly noticed one young woman of humble

dress, but interesting demeanor. She was leaning forward from among the

crowd; her eye hurried over the ship as it neared the shore, to catch

some wished-for countenance. She seemed disappointed and sad; when I

heard a faint voice call her name.--It was from a poor sailor who had

been ill all the voyage, and had excited the sympathy of every one on

board. When the weather was fine, his messmates had spread a mattress

for him on deck in the shade, but of late his illness had so increased

that he had taken to his hammock, and only breathed a wish that he might

see his wife before he died. He had been helped on deck as we came up

the river, and was now leaning against the shrouds, with a countenance

so wasted, so pale, so ghastly, that it was no wonder even the eye of

affection did not recognize him. But at the sound of his voice, her eye

darted on his features: it read, at once, a whole volume of sorrow; she

clasped her hands, uttered a faint shriek, and stood wringing them in

silent agony.

All now was hurry and bustle. The meetings of acquaintances--the

greetings of friends--the consultations of men of business. I alone was

solitary and idle. I had no friend to meet, no cheering to receive. I

stepped upon the land of my forefathers--but felt that I was a stranger

in the land.

ROSCOE.

----In the service of mankind to be

A guardian god below; still to employ

The mind’s brave ardor in heroic aims,

Such as may raise us o’er the grovelling herd,

And make us shine for ever--that is life.

THOMSON.

ONE of the first places to which a stranger is taken in Liverpool is

the Athenaeum. It is established on a liberal and judicious plan; it

contains a good library, and spacious reading-room, and is the great

literary resort of the place. Go there at what hour you may, you are

sure to find it filled with grave-looking personages, deeply absorbed in

the study of newspapers.

As I was once visiting this haunt of the learned, my attention was

attracted to a person just entering the room. He was advanced in life,

tall, and of a form that might once have been commanding, but it was

a little bowed by time--perhaps by care. He had a noble Roman style of

countenance; a a head that would have pleased a painter; and though some

slight furrows on his brow showed that wasting thought had been busy

there, yet his eye beamed with the fire of a poetic soul. There was

something in his whole appearance that indicated a being of a different

order from the bustling race round him.

I inquired his name, and was informed that it was ROSCOE. I drew back

with an involuntary feeling of veneration. This, then, was an author of

celebrity; this was one of those men whose voices have gone forth to

the ends of the earth; with whose minds I have communed even in the

solitudes of America. Accustomed, as we are in our country, to know

European writers only by their works, we cannot conceive of them, as of

other men, engrossed by trivial or sordid pursuits, and jostling with

the crowd of common minds in the dusty paths of life. They pass before

our imaginations like superior beings, radiant with the emanations of

their genius, and surrounded by a halo of literary glory.

To find, therefore, the elegant historian of the Medici mingling among

the busy sons of traffic, at first shocked my poetical ideas; but it is

from the very circumstances and situation in which he has been placed,

that Mr. Roscoe derives his highest claims to admiration. It is

interesting to notice how some minds seem almost to create themselves,

springing up under every disadvantage, and working their solitary but

irresistible way through a thousand obstacles. Nature seems to delight

in disappointing the assiduities of art, with which it would rear

legitimate dulness to maturity; and to glory in the vigor and luxuriance

of her chance productions. She scatters the seeds of genius to the

winds, and though some may perish among the stony places of the world,

and some be choked, by the thorns and brambles of early adversity, yet

others will now and then strike root even in the clefts of the rock,

struggle bravely up into sunshine, and spread over their sterile

birthplace all the beauties of vegetation.

Such has been the case with Mr. Roscoe. Born in a place apparently

ungenial to the growth of literary talent--in the very market-place of

trade; without fortune, family connections, or patronage; self-prompted,

self-sustained, and almost self-taught, he has conquered every obstacle,

achieved his way to eminence, and, having become one of the ornaments of

the nation, has turned the whole force of his talents and influence to

advance and embellish his native town.

Indeed, it is this last trait in his character which has given him the

greatest interest in my eyes, and induced me particularly to point him

out to my countrymen. Eminent as are his literary merits, he is but one

among the many distinguished authors of this intellectual nation.

They, however, in general, live but for their own fame, or their own

pleasures. Their private history presents no lesson to the world, or,

perhaps, a humiliating one of human frailty or inconsistency. At best,

they are prone to steal away from the bustle and commonplace of busy

existence; to indulge in the selfishness of lettered eas; and to revel

in scenes of mental, but exclusive enjoyment.

Mr. Roscoe, on the contrary, has claimed none of the accorded privileges

of talent. He has shut himself up in no garden of thought, nor elysium

of fancy; but has gone forth into the highways and thoroughfares of

life, he has planted bowers by the wayside, for the refreshment of the

pilgrim and the sojourner, and has opened pure fountains, where the

laboring man may turn aside from the dust and heat of the day, and drink

of the living streams of knowledge. There is a “daily beauty in his

life,” on which mankind may meditate, and grow better. It exhibits no

lofty and almost useless, because inimitable, example of excellence; but

presents a picture of active, yet simple and imitable virtues, which are

within every man’s reach, but which, unfortunately, are not exercised by

many, or this world would be a paradise.

But his private life is peculiarly worthy the attention of the citizens

of our young and busy country, where literature and the elegant arts

must grow up side by side with the coarser plants of daily necessity;

and must depend for their culture, not on the exclusive devotion of time

and wealth; nor the quickening rays of titled patronage; but on

hours and seasons snatched from the purest of worldly interests, by

intelligent and public-spirited individuals.

He has shown how much may be done for a place in hours of leisure by

one master-spirit, and how completely it can give its own impress to

surrounding objects. Like his own Lorenzo de’ Medici, on whom he

seems to have fixed his eye, as on a pure model of antiquity, he has

interwoven the history of his life with the history of his native town,

and has made the foundations of his fame the monuments of his virtues.

Wherever you go, in Liverpool, you perceive traces of his footsteps in

all that is elegant and liberal. He found the tide of wealth flowing

merely in the channels of traffic; he has diverted from it invigorating

rills to refresh the garden of literature. By his own example and

constant exertions, he has effected that union of commerce and the

intellectual pursuits, so eloquently recommended in one of his latest

writings;* and has practically proved how beautifully they may be

brought to harmonize, and to benefit each other. The noble institutions

for literary and scientific purposes, which reflect such credit on

Liverpool, and are giving such an impulse to the public mind, have

mostly been originated, and have all been effectively promoted, by

Mr. Roscoe; and when we consider the rapidly increasing opulence and

magnitude of that town, which promises to vie in commercial importance

with the metropolis, it will be perceived that in awakening an ambition

of mental improvement among its inhabitants, he has effected a great

benefit to the cause of British literature.

* Address on the opening of the Liverpool Institution.

In America, we know Mr. Roscoe only as the author; in Liverpool he is

spoken of as the banker; and I was told of his having been unfortunate

in business. I could not pity him, as I heard some rich men do. I

considered him far above the reach of pity. Those who live only for the

world, and in the world, may be cast down by the frowns of adversity;

but a man like Roscoe is not to be overcome by the reverses of fortune.

They do but drive him in upon the resources of his own mind, to the

superior society of his own thoughts; which the best of men are apt

sometimes to neglect, and to roam abroad in search of less worthy

associates. He is independent of the world around him. He lives with

antiquity, and with posterity: with antiquity, in the sweet communion of

studious retirement; and with posterity, in the generous aspirings

after future renown. The solitude of such a mind is its state of highest

enjoyment. It is then visited by those elevated meditations which

are the proper aliment of noble souls, and are, like manna, sent from

heaven, in the wilderness of this world.

While my feelings were yet alive on the subject, it was my fortune

to light on further traces of Mr. Roscoe. I was riding out with a

gentleman, to view the environs of Liverpool, when he turned off,

through a gate, into some ornamented grounds. After riding a short

distance, we came to a spacious mansion of freestone, built in the

Grecian style. It was not in the purest style, yet it had an air of

elegance, and the situation was delightful. A fine lawn sloped away from

it, studded with clumps of trees, so disposed as to break a soft fertile

country into a variety of landscapes. The Mersey was seen winding a

broad quiet sheet of water through an expanse of green meadow land,

while the Welsh mountains, blended with clouds, and melting into

distance, bordered the horizon.

This was Roscoe’s favorite residence during the days of his prosperity.

It had been the seat of elegant hospitality and literary retirement. The

house was now silent and deserted. I saw the windows of the study, which

looked out upon the soft scenery I have mentioned. The windows were

closed--the library was gone. Two or three ill-favored beings were

loitering about the place, whom my fancy pictured into retainers of the

law. It was like visiting some classic fountain, that had once welled

its pure waters in a sacred shade, but finding it dry and dusty, with

the lizard and the toad brooding over the shattered marbles.

I inquired after the fate of Mr. Roscoe’s library, which had consisted

of scarce and foreign books, from many of which he had drawn the

materials for his Italian histories. It had passed under the hammer of

the auctioneer, and was dispersed about the country. The good people

of the vicinity thronged liked wreckers to get some part of the

noble vessel that had been driven on shore. Did such a scene admit of

ludicrous associations, we might imagine something whimsical in this

strange irruption in the regions of learning. Pigmies rummaging the

armory of a giant, and contending for the possession of weapons which

they could not wield. We might picture to ourselves some knot of

speculators, debating with calculating brow over the quaint binding and

illuminated margin of an obsolete author; of the air of intense, but

baffled sagacity, with which some successful purchaser attempted to dive

into the black-letter bargain he had secured.

It is a beautiful incident in the story of Mr. Roscoe’s misfortunes, and

one which cannot fail to interest the studious mind, that the parting

with his books seems to have touched upon his tenderest feelings, and

to have been the only circumstance that could provoke the notice of

his muse. The scholar only knows how dear these silent, yet eloquent,

companions of pure thoughts and innocent hours become in the season of

adversity. When all that is worldly turns to dross around us, these only

retain their steady value. When friends grow cold, and the converse of

intimates languishes into vapid civility and commonplace, these only

continue the unaltered countenance of happier days, and cheer us with

that true friendship which never deceived hope, nor deserted sorrow.

I do not wish to censure; but, surely, if the people of Liverpool had

been properly sensible of what was due to Mr. Roscoe and themselves, his

library would never have been sold. Good worldly reasons may, doubtless,

be given for the circumstance, which it would be difficult to combat

with others that might seem merely fanciful; but it certainly appears

to me such an opportunity as seldom occurs, of cheering a noble mind

struggling under misfortunes by one of the most delicate, but most

expressive tokens of public sympathy. It is difficult, however, to

estimate a man of genius properly who is daily before our eyes. He

becomes mingled and confounded with other men. His great qualities lose

their novelty; we become too familiar with the common materials which

form the basis even of the loftiest character. Some of Mr. Roscoe’s

townsmen may regard him merely as a man of business; others, as

a politician; all find him engaged like themselves in ordinary

occupations, and surpassed, perhaps, by themselves on some points of

worldly wisdom. Even that amiable and unostentatious simplicity of

character, which gives the nameless grace to real excellence, may cause

him to be undervalued by some coarse minds, who do not know that true

worth is always void of glare and pretension. But the man of letters,

who speaks of Liverpool, speaks of it as the residence of Roscoe.--The

intelligent traveller who visits it inquires where Roscoe is to be seen.

He is the literary landmark of the place, indicating its existence to

the distant scholar.--He is like Pompey’s column at Alexandria, towering

alone in classic dignity.

The following sonnet, addressed by Mr. Roscoe to his books, on parting

with them, has already been alluded to. If anything can add effect

to the pure feeling and elevated thought here displayed, it is the

conviction, that the who leis no effusion of fancy, but a faithful

transcript from the writer’s heart.

TO MY BOOKS.

As one who, destined from his friends to part,

Regrets his loss, but hopes again erewhile

To share their converse and enjoy their smile,

And tempers as he may affliction’s dart;

Thus, loved associates, chiefs of elder art,

Teachers of wisdom, who could once beguile

My tedious hours, and lighten every toil,

I now resign you; nor with fainting heart;

For pass a few short years, or days, or hours,

And happier seasons may their dawn unfold,

And all your sacred fellowship restore:

When, freed from earth, unlimited its powers.

Mind shall with mind direct communion hold,

And kindred spirits meet to part no more.

THE WIFE.

The treasures of the deep are not so precious

As are the concealed comforts of a man

Lock’d up in woman’s love. I scent the air

Of blessings, when I came but near the house,

What a delicious breath marriage sends forth--

The violet bed’s no sweeter!

MIDDLETON.

I HAVE often had occasion to remark the fortitude with which women

sustain the most overwhelming reverses of fortune. Those disasters which

break down the spirit of a man, and prostrate him in the dust, seem to

call forth all the energies of the softer sex, and give such intrepidity

and elevation to their character, that at times it approaches to

sublimity. Nothing can be more touching, than to behold a soft and

tender female, who had been all weakness and dependence, and alive to

every trivial roughness, while threading the prosperous paths of life,

suddenly rising in mental force to be the comforter and support of her

husband under misfortune, and abiding with unshrinking firmness the

bitterest blasts of adversity.

As the vine, which has long twined its graceful foliage about the oak,

and been lifted by it into sunshine, will, when the hardy plant is

rifted by the thunderbolt, cling round it with its caressing tendrils,

and bind up its shattered boughs, so is it beautifully ordered by

Providence, that woman, who is the mere dependent and ornament of man

in his happier hours, should be his stay and solace when smitten with

sudden calamity; winding herself into the rugged recesses of his nature,

tenderly supporting the drooping head, and binding up the broken heart.

I was once congratulating a friend, who had around him a blooming

family, knit together in the strongest affection. “I can wish you

no better lot,” said he, with enthusiasm, “than to have a wife

and children. If you are prosperous, there they are to share your

prosperity; if otherwise, there they are to comfort you.” And, indeed, I

have observed that a married man falling into misfortune, is more apt to

retrieve his situation in the world than a single one; partly, because

he is more stimulated to exertion by the necessities of the helpless and

beloved beings who depend upon him for subsistence, but chiefly because

his spirits are soothed and relieved by domestic endearments, and his

self-respect kept alive by finding, that, though all abroad is darkness

and humiliation, yet there is still a little world of love at home, of

which he is the monarch. Whereas, a single man is apt to run to waste

and self-neglect; to fancy himself lonely and abandoned, and his heart

to fall to ruin, like some deserted mansion, for want of an inhabitant.

These observations call to mind a little domestic story, of which I was

once a witness. My intimate friend, Leslie, had married a beautiful and

accomplished girl, who had been brought up in the midst of fashionable

life. She had, it is true, no fortune, but that of my friend was ample;

and he delighted in the anticipation of indulging her in every elegant

pursuit, and administering to those delicate tastes and fancies that

spread a kind of witchery about the sex.--“Her life,” said he, “shall be

like a fairy tale.”

The very difference in their characters produced a harmonious

combination; he was of a romantic, and somewhat serious cast; she was

all life and gladness. I have often noticed the mute rapture with which

he would gaze upon her in company, of which her sprightly powers made

her the delight: and how, in the midst of applause, her eye would still

turn to him, as if there alone she sought favor and acceptance. When

leaning on his arm, her slender form contrasted finely with his tall,

manly person. The fond, confiding air with which she looked up to

him seemed to call forth a flush of triumphant pride and cherishing

tenderness, as if he doated on his lovely burden from its very

helplessness. Never did a couple set forward on the flowery path of

early and well-suited marriage with a fairer prospect of felicity.

It was the misfortune of my friend, however, to have embarked his

property in large speculations; and he had not been married many months,

when, by a succession of sudden disasters, it was swept from him, and he

found himself reduced to almost penury. For a time he kept his situation

to himself, and went about with a haggard countenance, and a breaking

heart. His life was but a protracted agony; and what rendered it more

insupportable was the necessity of keeping up a smile in the presence of

his wife; for he could not bring himself to overwhelm her with the news.

She saw, however, with the quick eyes of affection, that all was not

well with him. She marked his altered looks and stifled sighs, and was

not to be deceived by his sickly and vapid attempts at cheerfulness. She

tasked all her sprightly powers and tender blandishments to win him back

to happiness; but she only drove the arrow deeper into his soul. The

more he saw cause to love her, the more torturing was the thought that

he was soon to make her wretched. A little while, thought he, and the

smile will vanish from that cheek--the song will die away from those

lips--the lustre of those eyes will be quenched with sorrow and the

happy heart which now beats lightly in that bosom, will be weighed down,

like mine, by the cares and miseries of the world.

At length he came to me one day, and related his whole situation in a

tone of the deepest despair. When I had heard him through, I inquired:

“Does your wife know all this?”--At the question he burst into an agony

of tears. “For God’s sake!” cried he, “if you have any pity on me don’t

mention my wife; it is the thought of her that drives me almost to

madness!”

“And why not?” said I. “She must know it sooner or later: you cannot

keep it long from her, and the intelligence may break upon her in a more

startling manner than if imparted by yourself; for the accents of those

we love soften the harshest tidings. Besides, you are depriving

yourself of the comforts of her sympathy; and not merely that, but also

endangering the only bond that can keep hearts together--an unreserved

community of thought and feeling. She will soon perceive that something

is secretly preying upon your mind; and true love will not brook

reserve; it feels undervalued and outraged, when even the sorrows of

those it loves are concealed from it.”

“Oh, but my friend! to think what a blow I am to give to all her future

prospects,--how I am to strike her very soul to the earth, by telling

her that her husband is a beggar! that she is to forego all the

elegancies of life--all the pleasures of society--to shrink with me into

indigence and obscurity! To tell her that I have dragged her down

from the sphere in which she might have continued to move in constant

brightness--the light of every eye--the admiration of every heart!--How

can she bear poverty? She has been brought up in all the refinements of

opulence. How can she bear neglect? She has been the idol of society.

Oh, it will break her heart--it will break her heart!”

I saw his grief was eloquent, and I let it have its flow; for sorrow

relieves itself by words. When his paroxysm had subsided, and he had

relapsed into moody silence, I resumed the subject gently, and urged

him to break his situation at once to his wife. He shook his head

mournfully, but positively.

“But how are you to keep it from her? It is necessary she should

know it, that you may take the steps proper to the alteration of your

circumstances. You must change your style of living--nay,” observing a

pang to pass across his countenance, “don’t let that afflict you. I am

sure you have never placed your happiness in outward show--you have yet

friends, warm friends, who will not think the worse of you for being

less splendidly lodged: and surely it does not require a palace to be

happy with Mary--”

“I could be happy with her,” cried he, convulsively, “in a hovel!--I

could go down with her into poverty and the dust!--I could--I could--God

bless her!--God bless her!” cried he, bursting into a transport of grief

and tenderness.

“And believe me, my friend,” said I, stepping up, and grasping him

warmly by the hand, “believe me, she can be the same with you. Ay, more;

it will be a source of pride and triumph to her--it will call forth all

the latent energies and fervent sympathies of her nature; for she will

rejoice to prove that she loves you for yourself. There is in every true

woman’s heart a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant in the broad

daylight of prosperity; but which kindles up, and beams, and blazes

in the dark hour of adversity. No man knows what the wife of his bosom

is--no man knows what a ministering angel she is--until he has gone with

her through the fiery trials of this world.”

There was something in the earnestness of my manner, and the figurative

style of my language, that caught the excited imagination of Leslie. I

knew the auditor I had to deal with; and following up the impression I

had made, I finished by persuading him to go home and unburden his sad

heart to his wife.

I must confess, notwithstanding all I had said, I felt some little

solicitude for the result. Who can calculate on the fortitude of one

whose life has been a round of pleasures? Her gay spirits might revolt

at the dark, downward path of low humility suddenly pointed out before

her, and might cling to the sunny regions in which they had hitherto

revelled. Besides, ruin in fashionable life is accompanied by so many

galling mortifications, to which, in other ranks, it is a stranger. In

short, I could not meet Leslie, the next morning, without trepidation.

He had made the disclosure.

“And how did she bear it?”

“Like an angel! It seemed rather to be a relief to her mind, for she

threw her arms around my neck, and asked if this was all that had lately

made me unhappy.--But, poor girl,” added he, “she cannot realize the

change we must undergo. She has no idea of poverty but in the abstract;

she has only read of it in poetry, where it is allied to love. She feels

as yet no privation; she suffers no loss of accustomed conveniences nor

elegancies. When we come practically to experience its sordid cares, its

paltry wants, its petty humiliations--then will be the real trial.”

“But,” said I, “now that you have got over the severest task, that of

breaking it to her, the sooner you let the world into the secret the

better. The disclosure may be mortifying; but then it is a single

misery, and soon over: whereas you otherwise suffer it, in anticipation,

every hour in the day. It is not poverty, so much as pretence, that

harasses a ruined man--the struggle between a proud mind and an empty

purse-the keeping up a hollow show that must soon come to an end. Have

the courage to appear poor, and you disarm poverty of its sharpest

sting.” On this point I found Leslie perfectly prepared. He had no false

pride himself, and as to his wife, she was only anxious to conform to

their altered fortunes.

Some days afterwards, he called upon me in the evening. He had disposed

of his dwelling-house, and taken a small cottage in the country, a few

miles from town. He had been busied all day in sending out furniture.

The new establishment required few articles, and those of the simplest

kind. All the splendid furniture of his late residence had been sold,

excepting his wife’s harp. That, he said, was too closely associated

with the idea of herself it belonged to the little story of their loves;

for some of the sweetest moments of their courtship were those when he

had leaned over that instrument, and listened to the melting tones of

her voice.--I could not but smile at this instance of romantic gallantry

in a doating husband.

He was now going out to the cottage, where his wife had been all

day superintending its arrangement. My feelings had become strongly

interested in the progress of his family story, and, as it was a fine

evening, I offered to accompany him.

He was wearied with the fatigues of the day, and, as we walked out, fell

into a fit of gloomy musing.

“Poor Mary!” at length broke, with a heavy sigh, from his lips.

“And what of her,” asked I, “has anything happened to her?”

“What,” said he, darting an impatient glance, “is it nothing to be

reduced to this paltry situation--to be caged in a miserable cottage--to

be obliged to toil almost in the menial concerns of her wretched

habitation?”

Has she then repined at the change?

“Repined! she has been nothing but sweetness and good-humor. Indeed, she

seems in better spirits than I have ever known her; she has been to me

all love, and tenderness, and comfort!”

“Admirable girl!” exclaimed I. “You call yourself poor, my friend;

you never were so rich,--you never knew the boundless treasures of

excellence you possessed in that woman.”

“Oh! but, my friend, if this first meeting at the cottage were over,

I think I could then be comfortable. But this is her first day of real

experience; she has been introduced into a humble dwelling,--she has

been employed all day in arranging its miserable equipments,--she has,

for the first time, known the fatigues of domestic employment,--she has,

for the first time, looked around her on a home destitute of every thing

elegant--almost of every thing convenient; and may now be sitting down,

exhausted and spiritless, brooding over a prospect of future poverty.”

There was a degree of probability in this picture that I could not

gainsay, so we walked on in silence.

After turning from the main road up a narrow lane, so thickly shaded

with forest-trees as to give it a complete air of seclusion, we came

in sight of the cottage. It was humble enough in its appearance for the

most pastoral poet; and yet it had a pleasing rural look. A wild vine

had overrun one end with a profusion of foliage; a few trees threw their

branches gracefully over it; and I observed several pots of flowers

tastefully disposed about the door, and on the grass-plot in front.

A small wicket-gate opened upon a footpath that wound through some

shrubbery to the door. Just as we approached, we heard the sound of

music--Leslie grasped my arm; we paused and listened. It was Mary’s

voice singing, in a style of the most touching simplicity, a little air

of which her husband was peculiarly fond.

I felt Leslie’s hand tremble on my arm. He stepped forward, to hear more

distinctly. His step made a noise on the gravel-walk. A bright beautiful

face glanced out at the window, and vanished--a light footstep-was

heard--and Mary came tripping forth to meet us. She was in a pretty

rural dress of white; a few wild flowers were twisted in her fine

hair; a fresh bloom was on her cheek; her whole countenance beamed with

smiles--I had never seen her look so lovely.

“My dear George,” cried she, “I am so glad you are come; I have been

watching and watching for you; and running down the lane, and looking

out for you. I’ve set out a table under a beautiful tree behind

the cottage; and I’ve been gathering some of the most delicious

strawberries, for I know you are fond of them--and we have such

excellent cream--and everything is so sweet and still here-Oh!”--said

she, putting her arm within his, and looking up brightly in his face,

“Oh, we shall be so happy!”

Poor Leslie was overcome.--He caught her to his bosom--he folded his

arms round her--he kissed her again and again--he could not speak, but

the tears gushed into his eyes; and he has often assured me, that

though the world has since gone prosperously with him, and his life has,

indeed, been a happy one, yet never has he experienced a moment of more

exquisite felicity.

RIP VAN WINKLE.

A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.

By Woden, God of Saxons,

From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday,

Truth is a thing that ever I will keep

Unto thylke day in which I creep into

My sepulchre--

CARTWRIGHT.

[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich

Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the

Dutch History of the province and the manners of the descendants from

its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie

so much among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty

on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still

more, their wives, rich in that legendary lore, so invaluable to true

history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,

snugly shut up in its low-roofed farm-house, under a spreading sycamore,

he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and

studied it with the zeal of a bookworm.

The result of all these researches was a history of the province, during

the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.

There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his

work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.

Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little

questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely

established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections, as

a book of unquestionable authority.

The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and

now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to

say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier

labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though

it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his

neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt

the truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies

are remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be

suspected, that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his

memory may be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear among many

folks, whose good opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain

biscuit-bakers, who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their

new-year cakes, and have thus given him a chance for immortality,

almost equal to the being stamped on a Waterloo medal, or a Queen Anne’s

farthing.]

WHOEVER has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill

mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian

family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a

noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change

of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day

produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains;

and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect

barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in

blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;

but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will

gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last

rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.

At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the

light smoke curling up from a Village, whose shingle roofs gleam among

the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the

fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great

antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists, in the

early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government

of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!), and there were

some of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,

built of small yellow bricks, brought from Holland, having latticed

windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.

In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell

the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived,

many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,

a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a

descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous

days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort

Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial character of

his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple, good-natured man;

he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient henpecked husband.

Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing that meekness of

spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for those men are apt

to be obsequious and conciliating abroad, who are under the discipline

of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered pliant

and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation, and a

curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the

virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant wife may, therefore,

in some respects, be considered a tolerable blessing, and if so, Rip Van

Winkle was thrice blessed.

Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of

the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all

family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters

over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van

Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever

he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,

taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told them long stories

of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the

village, he was surrounded by a troop of them hanging on his skirts,

clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with

impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.

The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to

all kinds of profitable labor. It could not be for want of assiduity

or perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as long

and heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur, even

though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would carry

a fowling-piece on his shoulder, for hours together, trudging through

woods and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few squirrels

or wild pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even in the

roughest toil, and was a foremost man in all country frolics for husking

Indian corn, or building stone fences; the women of the village, too,

used to employ him to run their errands, and to do such little odd jobs

as their less obliging husbands would not do for them. In a word, Rip

was ready to attend to anybody’s business but his own; but as to doing

family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it impossible.

In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the

most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything

about it went wrong, in spite of him. His fences were continually

falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get among the

cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than anywhere

else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had some

out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had dwindled

away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little more

left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the

worst-conditioned farm in the neighborhood.

His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to

nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised

to inherit the habits, with the old clothes, of his father. He was

generally seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in

a pair of his father’s cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to

hold up with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.

Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,

well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or

brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would

rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he

would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept

continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,

and the ruin he was bringing on his family. Morning, noon, and night,

her tongue was incessantly going, and every thing he said or did was

sure to produce a torrent of household eloquence. Rip had but one way

of replying to all lectures of the kind, and that, by frequent use, had

grown into a habit. He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, cast

up his eyes, but said nothing. This, however, always provoked a fresh

volley from his wife, so that he was fain to draw off his forces, and

take to the outside of the house--the only side which, in truth, belongs

to a henpecked husband.

Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked

as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in

idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of

his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit

befitting in honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever

scoured the woods--but what courage can withstand the evil-doing and

all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the

house his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground or curled between

his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong

glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or

ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.

Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony

rolled on; a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue

is the only edged tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long

while he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting

a kind of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle

personages of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a

small inn, designated by a rubicund portrait of his Majesty George the

Third. Here they used to sit in the shade through a long, lazy summer’s

day, talking listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless, sleepy

stories about nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s

money to have heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place,

when by chance an old newspaper fell into their hands from some passing

traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled

out by Derrick Van Bummel, the school-master, a dapper learned little

man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the

dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some

months after they had taken place.

The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas

Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the

door of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving

sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so

that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements as accurately as

by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked his

pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has

his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his

opinions. When any thing that was read or related displeased him, he was

observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to send forth frequent, and

angry puffs; but when pleased, he would inhale the smoke slowly and

tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid clouds, and sometimes,

taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the fragrant vapor curl

about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token of perfect

approbation.

From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his

termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of

the assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august

personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of

this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her

husband in habits of idleness.

Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair; and his only

alternative, to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his

wife, was to take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here

he would sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share

the contents of his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a

fellow-sufferer in persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress

leads thee a dog’s life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live

thou shalt never want a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would wag his

tail, look wistfully in his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I

verily believe he reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.

In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had

unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill

mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the

still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.

Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a

green knoll, covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a

precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the

lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance

the lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic

course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging

bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom and at last losing

itself in the blue highlands.

On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,

lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending

cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting

sun. For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually

advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over

the valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the

village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the

terrors of Dame Van Winkle.

As he was about to descend, he heard a voice from a distance hallooing:

“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could see

nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain. He

thought his fancy must have deceived him, and turned again to descend,

when he heard the same cry ring through the still evening air, “Rip Van

Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”--at the same time Wolf bristled up his back,

and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s side, looking fearfully

down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague apprehension stealing over

him; he looked anxiously in the same direction, and perceived a strange

figure slowly toiling up the rocks, and bending under the weight of

something he carried on his back. He was surprised to see any human

being in this lonely and unfrequented place, but supposing it to be some

one of the neighborhood in need of his assistance, he hastened down to

yield it.

On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of

the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with

thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique

Dutch fashion--a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist--several pairs of

breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons

down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders

a stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to

approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful

of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity; and

mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,

apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip

every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that

seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty

rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an

instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient

thunder-showers which often take place in the mountain heights, he

proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a

small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the

brinks of which impending trees shot their branches, so that you only

caught glimpses of the azure sky, and the bright evening cloud. During

the whole time Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for

though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying

a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange

and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked

familiarity.

On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented

themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking

personages playing at ninepins. They were dressed in quaint outlandish

fashion; some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long knives in

their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of similar style

with that of the guide’s. Their visages, too, were peculiar; one had

a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the face of another

seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted by a white

sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They all had

beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who seemed to be

the commander. He was a stout old gentleman, with a weather-beaten

countenance; he wore a laced doublet, broad belt and hanger,

high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and high-heeled shoes, with

roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of the figures in an old

Flemish painting, in the parlor of Dominie Van Schaick, the village

parson, and which had been brought over from Holland at the time of the

settlement.

What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were

evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the

most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of

pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of

the scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,

echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.

As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from

their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and

such strange uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned

within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the

contents of the keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait

upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the

liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.

By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when

no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage which he found had much

of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty soul,

and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked another;

and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at length his

senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head gradually

declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.

On waking, he found himself on the green knoll whence he had first

seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed his eyes--it was a bright sunny

morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes, and

the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure mountain breeze.

“Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all night.” He recalled

the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange man with the keg

of liquor--the mountain ravine--the wild retreat among the rocks--the

woe-begone party at ninepins--the flagon--“Oh! that flagon! that wicked

flagon!” thought Rip--“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van Winkle?”

He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled

fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel

encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He

now suspected that the grave roysterers of the mountains had put a trick

upon him, and, having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his

gun. Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a

squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but

all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was

to be seen.

He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if

he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to

walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual

activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and

if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall

have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got

down into the glen: he found the gully up which he and his companion

had ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain

stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling

the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble

up its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,

sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by

the wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to

tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.

At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the cliffs

to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The rocks

presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came tumbling

in a sheet of feathery foam, and fell into a broad deep basin, black

from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then, poor Rip was

brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his dog; he was

only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows, sporting high

in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny precipice; and who,

secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and scoff at the poor

man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning was passing away,

and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He grieved to give up

his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it would not do to

starve among the mountains. He shook his head, shouldered the rusty

firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and anxiety, turned his

steps homeward.

As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none

whom he new, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself

acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was

of a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all

stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes

upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence of

this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his

astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!

He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange

children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his

gray beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old

acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:

it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he

had never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had

disappeared. Strange names were over the doors--strange faces at the

windows--everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began

to doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.

Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.

There stood the Kaatskill mountains--there ran the silver Hudson at

a distance--there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always

been--Rip was sorely perplexed--“That flagon last night,” thought he,

“has addled my poor head sadly!”

It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,

which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the

shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay--the

roof had fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges.

A half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip

called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed

on. This was an unkind cut indeed--“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has

forgotten me!”

He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had

always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and apparently

abandoned. This desolateness overcame all his connubial fears--he called

loudly for his wife and children--the lonely chambers rang for a moment

with his voice, and then all again was silence.

He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village

inn--but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its

place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with

old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union

Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to

shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall

naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red nightcap,

and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage

of stars and stripes--all this was strange and incomprehensible. He

recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George,

under which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was

singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and

buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head

was decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large

characters, “GENERAL WASHINGTON.”

There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip

recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was

a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed

phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the sage Nicholas

Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long pipe, uttering

clouds of tobacco-smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van Bummel, the

schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient newspaper. In

place of these, a lean, bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets full

of handbills, was haranguing, vehemently about rights of

citizens-elections--members of Congress--liberty--Bunker’s hill--heroes

of seventy-six-and other words, which were a perfect Babylonish jargon

to the bewildered Van Winkle.

The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty

fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children at

his heels, soon attracted the attention of the tavern politicians. They

crowded round him, eying him from head to foot, with great curiosity.

The orator bustled up to him, and, drawing him partly aside, inquired,

“on which side he voted?” Rip stared in vacant stupidity. Another short

but busy little fellow pulled him by the arm, and rising on tiptoe,

inquired in his ear, “whether he was Federal or Democrat.” Rip

was equally at a loss to comprehend the question; when a knowing,

self-important old gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his way

through the crowd, putting them to the right and left with his elbows as

he passed, and planting himself before Van Winkle, with one arm akimbo,

the other resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat penetrating,

as it were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere tone, “What

brought him to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and a mob at his

heels; and whether he meant to breed a riot in the village?”

“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet

man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless

him!”

Here a general shout burst from the bystanders-“a tory! a tory! a spy!

a refugee! hustle him! away with him!” It was with great difficulty

that the self-important man in the cocked hat restored order; and having

assumed a tenfold austerity of brow, demanded again of the unknown

culprit, what he came there for, and whom he was seeking. The poor

man humbly assured him that he meant no harm, but merely came there in

search of some of his neighbors, who used to keep about the tavern.

“Well--who are they?--name them.”

Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, Where’s Nicholas Vedder?

There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a

thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these

eighteen years! There was a wooden tombstone in the churchyard that used

to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”

“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”

“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he

was killed at the storming of Stony-Point--others say he was drowned in

a squall at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know--he never came back

again.”

“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”

“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now

in Congress.”

Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home

and friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer

puzzled him too, by treating of such enormous lapses of time, and of

matters which he could not understand: war--Congress-Stony-Point;--he

had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,

“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”

“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s

Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”

Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up

the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor

fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and

whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,

the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?

“God knows!” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself--I’m

somebody else--that’s me yonder-no--that’s somebody else, got into my

shoes--I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and

they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I

can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”

The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink

significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads. There was

a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from

doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man

with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical

moment a fresh, comely woman pressed through the throng to get a peep

at the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,

frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,

you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child,

the air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of

recollections in his mind.

“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.

“Judith Cardenier.”

“And your father’s name?”

“Ah, poor man, Rip Van Winkle was his name, but it’s twenty years

since he went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of

since,--his dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself,

or was carried away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a

little girl.”

Rip had but one more question to ask; but he put it with a faltering

voice:

“Where’s your mother?”

Oh, she too had died but a short time since; she broke a blood-vessel in

a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.

There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest

man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her

child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he-“Young Rip Van Winkle

once-old Rip Van Winkle now--Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”

All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the

crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for

a moment exclaimed, “sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle--it is himself.

Welcome home again, old neighbor. Why, where have you been these twenty

long years?”

Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him

but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were

seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and

the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,

had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and

shook his head--upon which there was a general shaking of the head

throughout the assemblage.

It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter Vanderdonk,

who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a descendant of the

historian of that name, who wrote one of the earliest accounts of the

province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the village, and well

versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of the neighborhood.

He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story in the most

satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a fact, handed

down from his ancestor, the historian, that the Kaatskill mountains had

always been haunted by strange beings. That it was affirmed that the

great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the river and country,

kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with his crew of the

Half-moon; being permitted in this way to revisit the scenes of his

enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the great city

called by his name. That his father had once seen them in their old

Dutch dresses playing at ninepins in the hollow of the mountain; and

that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound of their

balls, like distant peals of thunder.

To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the

more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to

live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery

farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that

used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto

of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on

the farm; but evinced an hereditary disposition to attend to any thing

else but his business.

Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his

former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of

time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with

whom he soon grew into great favor.

Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when a

man can be idle with impunity, he took his place once more on the bench,

at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of the

village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was some

time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could be

made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his

torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war--that the country

had thrown off the yoke of old England--and that, instead of being a

subject to his Majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen

of the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of

states and empires made but little impression on him; but there was

one species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that

was--petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his

neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he

pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her

name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,

and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of

resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.

He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.

Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points

every time he told it, which was, doubtless, owing to his having so

recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have

related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it

by heart. Some always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted

that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point on which

he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, almost

universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never hear a

thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they say

Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of ninepins; and it is

a common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when life

hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught out

of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.

NOTE.

The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested to Mr.

Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the Emperor

Frederick der Rothbart and the Kypphauser mountain; the subjoined note,

however, which had appended to the tale, shows that it is an absolute

fact, narrated with his usual fidelity.

“The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but

nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity of our

old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to marvellous events and

appearances. Indeed, I have heard many stranger stories than this, in

the villages along the Hudson; all of which were too well authenticated

to admit of a doubt. I have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself,

who, when last I saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so

perfectly rational and consistent on every other point, that I think no

conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain; nay, I

have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a country justice,

and signed with cross, in the justice’s own handwriting. The story,

therefore, is beyond the possibility of doubt.

“D. K.”

POSTSCRIPT.

The following are travelling notes from a memorandum-book of Mr.

Knickerbocker:

The Kaatsberg or Catskill mountains have always been a region full of

fable. The Indians considered them the abode of spirits, who influenced

the weather, spreading sunshine or clouds over the landscape, and

sending good or bad hunting seasons. They were ruled by an old squaw

spirit, said to be their mother. She dwelt on the highest peak of the

Catskills, and had charge of the doors of day and night to open and shut

them at the proper hour. She hung up the new moons in the skies, and

cut up the old ones into stars. In times of drought, if properly

propitiated, she would spin light summer clouds out of cobwebs and

morning dew, and send them off from the crest of the mountain, flake

after flake, like flakes of carded cotton, to float in the air; until,

dissolved by the heat of the sun, they would fall in gentle showers,

causing the grass to spring, the fruits to ripen, and the corn to grow

an inch an hour. If displeased, however, she would brew up clouds black

as ink, sitting in the midst of them like a bottle-bellied spider in the

midst of its web; and when these clouds broke, woe betide the valleys!

In old times, say the Indian traditions, there was a kind of Manitou or

Spirit, who kept about the wildest recesses of the Catskill mountains,

and took a mischievous pleasure in wreaking all kind of evils and

vexations upon the red men. Sometimes he would assume the form of a

bear, a panther, or a deer, lead the bewildered hunter a weary chase

through tangled forests and among ragged rocks, and then spring off with

a loud ho! ho! leaving him aghast on the brink of a beetling precipice

or raging torrent.

The favorite abode of this Manitou is still shown. It is a rock or cliff

on the loneliest port of the mountains, and, from the flowering vines

which clamber about it, and the wild flowers which abound in its

neighborhood, is known by the name of the Garden Rock. Near the foot of

it is a small lake, the haunt of the solitary bittern, with water-snakes

basking in the sun on the leaves of the pond-lilies which lie on the

surface. This place was held in great awe by the Indians, insomuch that

the boldest hunter would not pursue his game within its precincts. Once

upon a time, however, a hunter who had lost his way penetrated to the

Garden Rock, where he beheld a number of gourds placed in the crotches

of trees. One of these he seized and made off with it, but in the hurry

of his retreat he let it fall among the rocks, when a great stream

gushed forth, which washed him away and swept him down precipices, where

he was dished to pieces, and the stream made its way to the Hudson, and

continues to flow to the present day, being the identical stream known

by the name of the Kaaterskill.

ENGLISH WRITERS ON AMERICA.

Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation, rousting herself

like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks;

methinks I see her as an eagle, mewing her mighty youth, and kindling

her endazzled eyes at the full mid-day beam.--MILTON ON THE LIBERTY OF

THE PRESS.

IT is with feelings of deep regret that I observe the literary animosity

daily growing up between England and America. Great curiosity has been

awakened of late with respect to the United States, and the London press

has teemed with volumes of travels through the Republic; but they seem

intended to diffuse error rather than knowledge; and so successful have

they been, that, notwithstanding the constant intercourse between

the nations, there is no people concerning whom the great mass of the

British public have less pure information, or entertain more numerous

prejudices.

English travellers are the best and the worst in the world. Where no

motives of pride or interest intervene, none can equal them for

profound and philosophical views of society, or faithful and graphical

description of external objects; but when either the interest or

reputation of their own country comes in collision with that of another,

they go to the opposite extreme, and forget their usual probity and

candor, in the indulgence of splenetic remark, and an illiberal spirit

of ridicule.

Hence, their travels are more honest and accurate, the more remote the

country described. I would place implicit confidence in an Englishman’s

description of the regions beyond the cataracts of the Nile; of unknown

islands in the Yellow Sea; of the interior of India; or of any other

tract which other travellers might be apt to picture out with the

illusions of their fancies. But I would cautiously receive his account

of his immediate neighbors, and of those nations with which he is in

habits of most frequent intercourse. However I might be disposed to

trust his probity, I dare not trust his prejudices.

It has also been the peculiar lot of our country to be visited by the

worst kind of English travellers. While men of philosophical spirit and

cultivated minds have been sent from England to ransack the poles, to

penetrate the deserts, and to study the manners and customs of barbarous

nations, with which she can have no permanent intercourse of profit or

pleasure; it has been left to the broken-down tradesman, the scheming

adventurer, the wandering mechanic, the Manchester and Birmingham agent,

to be her oracles respecting America. From such sources she is content

to receive her information respecting a country in a singular state of

moral and physical development; a country in which one of the greatest

political experiments in the history of the world is now performing; and

which presents the most profound and momentous studies to the statesman

and the philosopher.

That such men should give prejudicial accounts of America, is not a

matter of surprise. The themes it offers for contemplation, are too vast

and elevated for their capacities. The national character is yet in a

state of fermentation: it may have its frothiness and sediment, but

its ingredients are sound and wholesome; it has already given proofs of

powerful and generous qualities; and the whole promises to settle

down into something substantially excellent. But the causes which are

operating to strengthen and ennoble it, and its daily indications of

admirable properties, are all lost upon these purblind observers; who

are only affected by the little asperities incident to its present

situation. They are capable of judging only of the surface of things;

of those matters which come in contact with their private interests and

personal gratifications. They miss some of the snug conveniences

and petty comforts which belong to an old, highly-finished, and

over-populous state of society; where the ranks of useful labor are

crowded, and many earn a painful and servile subsistence, by studying

the very caprices of appetite and self-indulgence. These minor comforts,

however, are all-important in the estimation of narrow minds; which

either do not perceive, or will not acknowledge, that they are more than

counterbalanced among us, by great and generally diffused blessings.

They may, perhaps, have been disappointed in some unreasonable

expectation of sudden gain. They may have pictured America to themselves

an El Dorado, where gold and silver abounded, and the natives were

lacking in sagacity, and where they were to become strangely and

suddenly rich, in some unforeseen but easy manner. The same weakness

of mind that indulges absurd expectations, produces petulance in

disappointment. Such persons become embittered against the country on

finding that there, as everywhere else, a man must sow before he can

reap; must win wealth by industry and talent; and must contend with the

common difficulties of nature, and the shrewdness of an intelligent and

enterprising people.

Perhaps, through mistaken or ill-directed hospitality, or from the

prompt disposition to cheer and countenance the stranger, prevalent

among my countrymen, they may have been treated with unwonted respect

in America; and, having been accustomed all their lives to consider

themselves below the surface of good society, and brought up in a

servile feeling of inferiority, they become arrogant, on the common

boon of civility; they attribute to the lowliness of others their

own elevation; and underrate a society where there are no artificial

distinctions, and where, by any chance, such individuals as themselves

can rise to consequence.

One would suppose, however, that information coming from such sources,

on a subject where the truth is so desirable, would be received with

caution by the censors of the press; that the motives of these men,

their veracity, their opportunities of inquiry and observation, and

their capacities for judging correctly, would be rigorously scrutinized,

before their evidence was admitted, in such sweeping extent, against a

kindred nation. The very reverse, however, is the case, and it furnishes

a striking instance of human inconsistency. Nothing can surpass the

vigilance with which English critics will examine the credibility of

the traveller who publishes an account of some distant and comparatively

unimportant country. How warily will they compare the measurements of a

pyramid, or the description of a ruin; and how sternly will they censure

any inaccuracy in these contributions of merely curious knowledge, while

they will receive, with eagerness and unhesitating faith, the gross

misrepresentations of coarse and obscure writers, concerning a country

with which their own is placed in the most important and delicate

relations. Nay, they will even make these apocryphal volumes text-books,

on which to enlarge, with a zeal and an ability worthy of a more

generous cause.

I shall not, however, dwell on this irksome and hackneyed topic; nor

should I have adverted to it, but for the undue interest apparently

taken in it by my countrymen, and certain injurious effects which I

apprehend it might produce upon the national feeling. We attach too much

consequence to these attacks. They cannot do us any essential injury.

The tissue of misrepresentations attempted to be woven round us, are

like cobwebs woven round the limbs of an infant giant. Our country

continually outgrows them. One falsehood after another falls off of

itself. We have but to live on, and every day we live a whole volume of

refutation.

All the writers of England united, if we could for a moment suppose

their great minds stooping to so unworthy a combination, could not

conceal our rapidly growing importance and matchless prosperity. They

could not conceal that these are owing, not merely to physical and

local, but also to moral causes--to the political liberty, the general

diffusion of knowledge, the prevalence of sound, moral, and religious

principles, which give force and sustained energy to the character of

a people, and which in fact, have been the acknowledged and wonderful

supporters of their own national power and glory.

But why are we so exquisitely alive to the aspersions of England? Why

do we suffer ourselves to be so affected by the contumely she has

endeavored to cast upon us? It is not in the opinion of England alone

that honor lives, and reputation has its being. The world at large is

the arbiter of a nation’s fame: with its thousand eyes it witnesses a

nation’s deeds, and from their collective testimony is national glory or

national disgrace established.

For ourselves, therefore, it is comparatively of but little importance

whether England does us justice or not; it is, perhaps, of far more

importance to herself. She is instilling anger and resentment into the

bosom of a youthful nation, to grow with its growth, and strengthen

with its strength. If in America, as some of her writers are laboring

to convince her, she is hereafter to find an invidious rival, and a

gigantic foe, she may thank those very writers for having provoked

rivalship, and irritated hostility. Every one knows the all-pervading

influence of literature at the present day, and how much the opinions

and passions of mankind are under its control. The mere contests of the

sword are temporary; their wounds are but in the flesh, and it is the

pride of the generous to forgive and forget them; but the slanders of

the pen pierce to the heart; they rankle longest in the noblest spirits;

they dwell ever present in the mind, and render it morbidly sensitive

to the most trifling collision. It is but seldom that any one overt act

produces hostilities between two nations; there exists, most commonly, a

previous jealousy and ill-will, a predisposition to take offence. Trace

these to their cause, and how often will they be found to originate in

the mischievous effusions of mercenary writers, who, secure in their

closets, and for ignominious bread, concoct and circulate the venom that

is to inflame the generous and the brave.

I am not laying too much stress upon this point; for it applies most

emphatically to our particular case. Over no nation does the press

hold a more absolute control than over the people of America; for the

universal education of the poorest classes makes every individual a

reader. There is nothing published in England on the subject of our

country, that does not circulate through every part of it. There is not

a calumny dropt from an English pen, nor an unworthy sarcasm uttered by

an English statesman, that does not go to blight good-will, and add to

the mass of latent resentment. Possessing, then, as England does,

the fountain-head whence the literature of the language flows, how

completely is it in her power, and how truly is it her duty, to make it

the medium of amiable and magnanimous feeling--a stream where the two

nations might meet together and drink in peace and kindness. Should she,

however, persist in turning it to waters of bitterness, the time may

come when she may repent her folly. The present friendship of America

may be of but little moment to her; but the future destinies of that

country do not admit of a doubt; over those of England, there lower

some shadows of uncertainty. Should, then, a day of gloom arrive--should

those reverses overtake her, from which the proudest empires have

not been exempt--she may look back with regret at her infatuation, in

repulsing from her side a nation she might have grappled to her bosom,

and thus destroying her only chance for real friendship beyond the

boundaries of her own dominions.

There is a general impression in England, that the people of the United

States are inimical to the parent country. It is one of the errors

which have been diligently propagated by designing writers. There is,

doubtless, considerable political hostility, and a general soreness at

the illiberality of the English press; but, collectively speaking, the

prepossessions of the people are strongly in favor of England. Indeed,

at one time they amounted, in many parts of the Union, to an absurd

degree of bigotry. The bare name of Englishman was a passport to

the confidence and hospitality of every family, and too often gave a

transient currency to the worthless and the ungrateful. Throughout the

country, there was something of enthusiasm connected with the idea

of England. We looked to it with a hallowed feeling of tenderness and

veneration, as the land of our forefathers--the august repository of the

monuments and antiquities of our race--the birthplace and mausoleum of

the sages and heroes of our paternal history. After our own country,

there was none in whose glory we more delighted--none whose good opinion

we were more anxious to possess--none toward which our hearts yearned

with such throbbings of warm consanguinity. Even during the late war,

whenever there was the least opportunity for kind feelings to spring

forth, it was the delight of the generous spirits of our country to show

that, in the midst of hostilities, they still kept alive the sparks of

future friendship.

Is all this to be at an end? Is this golden band of kindred sympathies,

so rare between nations, to be broken forever?--Perhaps it is for the

best--it may dispel an allusion which might have kept us in mental

vassalage; which might have interfered occasionally with our true

interests, and prevented the growth of proper national pride. But it

is hard to give up the kindred tie! and there are feelings dearer than

interest--closer to the heart than pride--that will still make us cast

back a look of regret as we wander farther and farther from the paternal

roof, and lament the waywardness of the parent that would repel the

affections of the child.

Short-sighted and injudicious, however, as the conduct or England may be

in this system of aspersion, recrimination on our part would be equally

ill-judged. I speak not of a prompt and spirited vindication of our

country, or the keenest castigation of her slanderers--but I allude to

a disposition to retaliate in kind, to retort sarcasm and inspire

prejudice, which seems to be spreading widely among our writers. Let us

guard particularly against such a temper; for it would double the evil,

instead of redressing the wrong. Nothing is so easy and inviting as

the retort of abuse and sarcasm; but it is a paltry and an unprofitable

contest. It is the alternative of a morbid mind, fretted into petulance,

rather than warmed into indignation. If England is willing to permit the

mean jealousies of trade, or the rancorous animosities of politics, to

deprave the integrity of her press, and poison the fountain of public

opinion, let us beware of her example. She may deem it her interest

to diffuse error, and engender antipathy, for the purpose of checking

emigration: we have no purpose of the kind to serve. Neither have we

any spirit of national jealousy to gratify; for as yet, in all our

rivalships with England, we are the rising and the gaining party.

There can be no end to answer, therefore, but the gratification of

resentment--a mere spirit of retaliation--and even that is impotent. Our

retorts are never republished in England; they fall short, therefore,

of their aim; but they foster a querulous and peevish temper among

our writers; they sour the sweet flow of our early literature, and

sow thorns and brambles among its blossoms. What is still worse, they

circulate through our own country, and, as far as they have effect,

excite virulent national prejudices. This last is the evil most

especially to be deprecated. Governed, as we are, entirely by public

opinion, the utmost care should be taken to preserve the purity of

the public mind. Knowledge is power, and truth is knowledge; whoever,

therefore, knowingly propagates a prejudice, wilfully saps the

foundation of his country’s strength.

The members of a republic, above all other men, should be candid and

dispassionate. They are, individually, portions of the sovereign mind

and sovereign will, and should be enabled to come to all questions of

national concern with calm and unbiassed judgments. From the peculiar

nature of our relations with England, we must have more frequent

questions of a difficult and delicate character with her, than with

any other nation,--questions that affect the most acute and excitable

feelings: and as, in the adjustment of these, our national measures

must ultimately be determined by popular sentiment, we cannot be

too anxiously attentive to purify it from all latent passion or

prepossession.

Opening, too, as we do, an asylum for strangers every portion of the

earth, we should receive all with impartiality. It should be our pride

to exhibit an example of one nation, at least, destitute of national

antipathies, and exercising, not merely the overt acts of hospitality,

but those more rare and noble courtesies which spring from liberality of

opinion.

What have we to do with national prejudices? They are the inveterate

diseases of old countries, contracted in rude and ignorant ages, when

nations knew but little of each other, and looked beyond their own

boundaries with distrust and hostility. We, on the contrary, have sprung

into national existence in an enlightened and philosophic age, when the

different parts of the habitable world, and the various branches of the

human family, have been indefatigably studied and made known to each

other; and we forego the advantages of our birth, if we do not shake off

the national prejudices, as we would the local superstitions, of the old

world.

But above all let us not be influenced by any angry feelings, so far

as to shut our eyes to the perception of what is really excellent and

amiable in the English character. We are a young people, necessarily an

imitative one, and must take our examples and models, in a great degree,

from the existing nations of Europe. There is no country more worthy of

our study than England. The spirit of her constitution is most analogous

to ours. The manners of her people--their intellectual activity--their

freedom of opinion--their habits of thinking on those subjects which

concern the dearest interests and most sacred charities of private

life, are all congenial to the American character; and, in fact, are all

intrinsically excellent: for it is in the moral feeling of the people

that the deep foundations of British prosperity are laid; and however

the superstructure may be timeworn, or overrun by abuses, there must be

something solid in the basis, admirable in the materials, and stable in

the structure of an edifice that so long has towered unshaken amidst the

tempests of the world.

Let it be the pride of our writers, therefore, discarding all feelings

of irritation, and disdaining to retaliate the illiberality of British

authors, to speak of the English nation without prejudice, and with

determined candor. While they rebuke the indiscriminating bigotry with

which some of our countrymen admire and imitate every thing English,

merely because it is English, let them frankly point out what is

really worthy of approbation. We may thus place England before us as

a perpetual volume of reference, wherein are recorded sound deductions

from ages of experience; and while we avoid the errors and absurdities

which may have crept into the page, we may draw thence golden maxims of

practical wisdom, wherewith to strengthen and to embellish our national

character.

RURAL LIFE IN ENGLAND.

Oh! friendly to the best pursuits of man,

Friendly to thought, to virtue and to peace,

Domestic life in rural pleasures past!

COWPER.

THE stranger who would form a correct opinion of the English character,

must not confine his observations to the metropolis. He must go forth

into the country; he must sojourn in villages and hamlets; he must visit

castles, villas, farm-houses, cottages; he must wander through parks

and gardens; along hedges and green lanes; he must loiter about country

churches; attend wakes and fairs, and other rural festivals; and cope

with the people in all their conditions, and all their habits and

humors.

In some countries, the large cities absorb the wealth and fashion of

the nation; they are the only fixed abodes of elegant and intelligent

society, and the country is inhabited almost entirely by boorish

peasantry. In England, on the contrary, the metropolis is a mere

gathering-place, or general rendezvous, of the polite classes, where

they devote a small portion of the year to a hurry of gayety and

dissipation, and, having indulged this kind of carnival, return again to

the apparently more congenial habits of rural life. The various orders

of society are therefore diffused over the whole surface of the kingdom,

and the more retired neighborhoods afford specimens of the different

ranks.

The English, in fact, are strongly gifted with the rural feeling. They

possess a quick sensibility to the beauties of nature, and a keen relish

for the pleasures and employments of the country. This passion seems

inherent in them. Even the inhabitants of cities, born and brought up

among brick walls and bustling streets, enter with facility into rural

habits, and evince a tact for rural occupation. The merchant has his

snug retreat in the vicinity of the metropolis, where he often displays

as much pride and zeal in the cultivation of his flower-garden, and the

maturing of his fruits, as he does in the conduct of his business,

and the success of a commercial enterprise. Even those less fortunate

individuals, who are doomed to pass their lives in the midst of din and

traffic, contrive to have something that shall remind them of the green

aspect of nature. In the most dark and dingy quarters of the city, the

drawing-room window resembles frequently a bank of flowers; every spot

capable of vegetation has its grass-plot and flower-bed; and every

square its mimic park, laid out with picturesque taste, and gleaming

with refreshing verdure.

Those who see the Englishman only in town, are apt to form an

unfavorable opinion of his social character. He is either absorbed in

business, or distracted by the thousand engagements that dissipate time,

thought, and feeling, in this huge metropolis. He has, therefore, too

commonly, a look of hurry and abstraction. Wherever he happens to be, he

is on the point of going somewhere else; at the moment he is talking

on one subject, his mind is wandering to another; and while paying a

friendly visit, he is calculating how he shall economize time so as to

pay the other visits allotted to the morning. An immense metropolis,

like London, is calculated to make men selfish and uninteresting.

In their casual and transient meetings, they can but deal briefly in

commonplaces. They present but the cold superfices of character--its

rich and genial qualities have no time to be warmed into a flow.

It is in the country that the Englishman gives scope to his natural

feelings. He breaks loose gladly from the cold formalities and negative

civilities of town; throws off his habits of shy reserve, and becomes

joyous and free-hearted. He manages to collect round him all the

conveniences and elegancies of polite life, and to banish its

restraints. His country-seat abounds with every requisite, either for

studious retirement, tasteful gratification, or rural exercise. Books,

paintings, music, horses, dogs, and sporting implements of all kinds,

are at hand. He puts no constraint, either upon his guests or himself,

but, in the true spirit of hospitality, provides the means of enjoyment,

and leaves every one to partake according to his inclination.

The taste of the English in the cultivation of land, and in what is

called landscape gardening, is unrivalled. They have studied Nature

intently, and discovered an exquisite sense of her beautiful forms and

harmonious combinations. Those charms which, in other countries, she

lavishes in wild solitudes, are here assembled round the haunts of

domestic life. They seem to have caught her coy and furtive graces, and

spread them, like witchery, about their rural abodes.

Nothing can be more imposing than the magnificence of English park

scenery. Vast lawns that extend like sheets of vivid green, with here

and there clumps of gigantic trees, heaping up rich piles of foliage.

The solemn pomp of groves and woodland glades, with the deer trooping in

silent herds across them; the hare, bounding away to the covert; or the

pheasant, suddenly bursting upon the wing. The brook, taught to wind in

natural meanderings, or expand into a glassy lake--the sequestered pool,

reflecting the quivering trees, with the yellow leaf sleeping on its

bosom, and the trout roaming fearlessly about its limpid waters; while

some rustic temple, or sylvan statue, grown green and dank with age,

gives an air of classic sanctity to the seclusion.

These are but a few of the features of park scenery; but what most

delights me, is the creative talent with which the English decorate the

unostentatious abodes of middle life. The rudest habitation, the most

unpromising and scanty portion of land, in the hands of an Englishman of

taste, becomes a little paradise. With a nicely discriminating eye,

he seizes at once upon its capabilities, and pictures in his mind the

future landscape. The sterile spot grows into loveliness under his hand;

and yet the operations of art which produce the effect are scarcely to

be perceived. The cherishing and training of some trees; the cautious

pruning of others; the nice distribution of flowers and plants of tender

and graceful foliage; the introduction of a green slope of velvet turf;

the partial opening to a peep of blue distance, or silver gleam of

water;-all these are managed with a delicate tact, a pervading yet quiet

assiduity, like the magic touchings with which a painter finishes up a

favorite picture.

The residence of people of fortune and refinement in the country, has

diffused a degree of taste and elegance in rural economy that descends

to the lowest class. The very laborer, with his thatched cottage and

narrow slip of ground, attends to their embellishment. The trim hedge,

the grass-plot before the door, the little flower-bed bordered with snug

box, the woodbine trained up against the wall, and hanging its blossoms

about the lattice; the pot of flowers in the window; the holly,

providently planted about the house, to cheat winter of its dreariness,

and to throw in a semblance of green summer to cheer the fireside; all

these bespeak the influence of taste, flowing down from high sources,

and pervading the lowest levels of the public mind. If ever Love, as

poets sing, delights to visit a cottage, it must be the cottage of an

English peasant.

The fondness for rural life among the higher classes of the English has

had a great and salutary effect upon the national character. I do not

know a finer race of men than the English gentlemen. Instead of the

softness and effeminacy which characterize the men of rank in most

countries, they exhibit a union of elegance and strength, a robustness

of frame and freshness of complexion, which I am inclined to attribute

to their living so much in the open air, and pursuing so eagerly the

invigorating recreations of the country. The hardy exercises produce

also a healthful tone of mind and spirits, and a manliness and

simplicity of manners, which even the follies and dissipations of the

town cannot easily pervert, and can never entirely destroy. In the

country, too, the different orders of society seem to approach more

freely, to be more disposed to blend and operate favorably upon each

other. The distinctions between them do not appear to be so marked

and impassable as in the cities. The manner in which property has been

distributed into small estates and farms has established a regular

gradation from the noblemen, through the classes of gentry, small landed

proprietors, and substantial farmers, down to the laboring peasantry;

and while it has thus banded the extremes of society together, has

infused into each intermediate rank a spirit of independence. This, it

must be confessed, is not so universally the case at present as it was

formerly; the larger estates having, in late years of distress, absorbed

the smaller, and, in some parts of the country, almost annihilated the

sturdy race of small farmers. These, however, I believe, are but casual

breaks in the general system I have mentioned.

In rural occupation, there is nothing mean and debasing. It leads a man

forth among scenes of natural grandeur and beauty; it leaves him to the

workings of his own mind, operated upon by the purest and most elevating

of external influences. Such a man may be simple and rough, but he

cannot be vulgar. The man of refinement, therefore, finds nothing

revolting in an intercourse with the lower orders in rural life, as he

does when he casually mingles with the lower orders of cities. He lays

aside his distance and reserve, and is glad to waive the distinctions of

rank, and to enter into the honest, heartfelt enjoyments of common life.

Indeed, the very amusements of the country bring, men more and more

together; and the sound hound and horn blend all feelings into harmony.

I believe this is one great reason why the nobility and gentry are more

popular among the inferior orders in England than they are in any other

country; and why the latter have endured so many excessive pressures and

extremities, without repining more generally at the unequal distribution

of fortune and privilege.

To this mingling of cultivated and rustic society may also be attributed

the rural feeling that runs through British literature; the frequent

use of illustrations from rural life; those incomparable descriptions of

Nature, that abound in the British poets--that have continued down from

“The Flower and the Leaf,” of Chaucer, and have brought into our closets

all the freshness and fragrance of the dewy landscape. The pastoral

writers of other countries appear as if they had paid Nature an

occasional visit, and become acquainted with her general charms; but the

British poets have lived and revelled with her--they have wooed her in

her most secret haunts--they have watched her minutest caprices. A

spray could not tremble in the breeze--a leaf could not rustle to the

ground--a diamond drop could not patter in the stream--a fragrance could

not exhale from the humble violet, nor a daisy unfold its crimson

tints to the morning, but it has been noticed by these impassioned and

delicate observers, and wrought up into some beautiful morality.

The effect of this devotion of elegant minds to rural occupations has

been wonderful on the face of the country. A great part of the island

is rather level, and would be monotonous, were it not for the charms

of culture; but it is studded and gemmed, as it were, with castles and

palaces, and embroidered with parks and gardens. It does not abound in

grand and sublime prospects, but rather in little home scenes of rural

repose and sheltered quiet. Every antique farm-house and moss-grown

cottage is a picture; and as the roads are continually winding, and

the view is shut in by groves and hedges, the eye is delighted by a

continual succession of small landscapes of captivating loveliness.

The great charm, however, of English scenery, is the moral feeling that

seems to pervade it. It is associated in the mind with ideas of order,

of quiet, of sober well-established principles, of hoary usage and

reverend custom. Every thing seems to be the growth of ages of regular

and peaceful existence. The old church of remote architecture, with its

low, massive portal; its Gothic tower; its windows rich with tracery

and painted glass, in scrupulous preservation; its stately monuments of

warriors and worthies of the olden time, ancestors of the present lords

of the soil; its tombstones, recording successive generations of sturdy

yeomanry, whose progeny still plough the same fields, and kneel at the

same altar;--the parsonage, a quaint irregular pile, partly

antiquated, but repaired and altered in the tastes of various ages and

occupants;--the stile and foot-path leading from the churchyard, across

pleasant fields, and along shady hedgerows, according to an immemorial

right of way;--the neighboring village, with its venerable cottages,

its public green sheltered by trees, under which the forefathers of the

present race have sported;--the antique family mansion, standing apart

in some little rural domain, but looking down with a protecting air on

the surrounding scene; all these common features of English landscape

evince a calm and settled security, a hereditary transmission of

homebred virtues and local attachments, that speak deeply and touchingly

for the moral character of the nation.

It is a pleasing sight, of a Sunday morning, when the bell is sending

its sober melody across the quiet fields, to behold the peasantry in

their best finery, with ruddy faces, and modest cheerfulness, thronging

tranquilly along the green lanes to church; but it is still more

pleasing to see them in the evenings, gathering about their cottage

doors, and appearing to exult in the humble comforts and embellishments

which their own hands have spread around them.

It is this sweet home-feeling, this settled repose of affection in the

domestic scene, that is, after all, the parent of the steadiest virtues

and purest enjoyments; and I cannot close these desultory remarks

better, than by quoting the words of a modern English poet, who has

depicted it with remarkable felicity:

Through each gradation, from the castled hall,

The city dome, the villa crowned with shade,

But chief from modest mansions numberless,

In town or hamlet, shelt’ring middle life,

Down to the cottaged vale, and straw-roof’d shed;

This western isle has long been famed for scenes

Where bliss domestic finds a dwelling-place;

Domestic bliss, that, like a harmless dove,

(Honor and sweet endearment keeping guard,)

Can centre in a little quiet nest

All that desire would fly for through the earth;

That can, the world eluding, be itself

A world enjoyed; that wants no witnesses

But its own sharers, and approving Heaven;

That, like a flower deep hid in rock cleft,

Smiles, though ‘t is looking only at the sky.*

* From a poem on the death of the Princess Charlotte, by the

Reverend Rann Kennedy, A.M.

THE BROKEN HEART.

I never heard

Of any true affection, but ‘t was nipt

With care, that, like the caterpillar, eats

The leaves of the spring’s sweetest book, the rose.

MIDDLETON.

IT is a common practice with those who have outlived the susceptibility

of early feeling, or have been brought up in the gay heartlessness of

dissipated life, to laugh at all love stories, and to treat the tales

of romantic passion as mere fictions of novelists and poets. My

observations on human nature have induced me to think otherwise. They

have convinced me that, however the surface of the character may be

chilled and frozen by the cares of the world, or cultivated into mere

smiles by the arts of society, still there are dormant fires lurking

in the depths of the coldest bosom, which, when once enkindled, become

impetuous, and are sometimes desolating in their effects. Indeed, I am

a true believer in the blind deity, and go to the full extent of his

doctrines. Shall I confess it?--I believe in broken hearts, and the

possibility of dying of disappointed love! I do not, however, consider

it a malady often fatal to my own sex; but I firmly believe that it

withers down many a lovely woman into an early grave.

Man is the creature of interest and ambition. His nature leads him forth

into the struggle and bustle of the world. Love is but the embellishment

of his early life, or a song piped in the intervals of the acts. He

seeks for fame, for fortune for space in the world’s thought, and

dominion over his fellow-men. But a woman’s whole life is a history of

the affections. The heart is her world; it is there her ambition strives

for empire--it is there her avarice seeks for hidden treasures. She

sends forth her sympathies on adventure; she embarks her whole soul in

the traffic of affection; and if shipwrecked, her case is hopeless--for

it is a bankruptcy of the heart.

To a man, the disappointment of love may occasion some bitter pangs;

it wounds some feelings of tenderness--it blasts some prospects of

felicity; but he is an active being--he may dissipate his thoughts in

the whirl of varied occupation, or may plunge into the tide of pleasure;

or, if the scene of disappointment be too full of painful associations,

he can shift his abode at will, and taking, as it were, the wings of the

morning, can “fly to the uttermost parts of the earth, and be at rest.”

But woman’s is comparatively a fixed, a secluded, and meditative life.

She is more the companion of her own thoughts and feelings; and if they

are turned to ministers of sorrow, where shall she look for consolation?

Her lot is to be wooed and won; and if unhappy in her love, her heart

is like some fortress that has been captured, and sacked, and abandoned,

and left desolate.

How many bright eyes grow dim--how many soft cheeks grow pale--how many

lovely forms fade away into the tomb, and none can tell the cause that

blighted their loveliness! As the dove will clasp its wings to its side,

and cover and conceal the arrow that is preying on its vitals--so is

it the nature of woman, to hide from the world the pangs of wounded

affection. The love of a delicate female is always shy and silent. Even

when fortunate, she scarcely breathes it to herself; but when otherwise,

she buries it in the recesses of her bosom, and there lets it cower and

brood among the ruins of her peace. With her, the desire of her heart

has failed--the great charm of existence is at an end. She neglects all

the cheerful exercises which gladden the spirits, quicken the pulses,

and send the tide of life in healthful currents through the veins. Her

rest is broken--the sweet refreshment of sleep is poisoned by melancholy

dreams--“dry sorrow drinks her blood,” until her enfeebled frame sinks

under the slightest external injury. Look for her, after a little while,

and you find friendship weeping over her untimely grave, and wondering

that one, who but lately glowed with all the radiance of health and

beauty, should so speedily be brought down to “darkness and the worm.”

You will be told of some wintry chill, some casual indisposition, that

laid her low;--but no one knows of the mental malady which previously

sapped her strength, and made her so easy a prey to the spoiler.

She is like some tender tree, the pride and beauty of the grove;

graceful in its form, bright in its foliage, but with the worm preying

at its heart. We find it suddenly withering, when it should be most

fresh and luxuriant. We see it drooping its branches to the earth, and

shedding leaf by leaf, until, wasted and perished away, it falls even in

the stillness of the forest; and as we muse over the beautiful ruin,

we strive in vain to recollect the blast or thunderbolt that could have

smitten it with decay.

I have seen many instances of women running to waste and self-neglect,

and disappearing gradually from the earth, almost as if they had been

exhaled to heaven; and have repeatedly fancied that I could trace their

deaths through the various declensions of consumption, cold, debility,

languor, melancholy, until I reached the first symptom of disappointed

love. But an instance of the kind was lately told to me; the

circumstances are well known in the country where they happened, and I

shall but give them in the manner in which they were related.

Every one must recollect the tragical story of young E----, the Irish

patriot; it was too touching to be soon forgotten. During the troubles

in Ireland, he was tried, condemned, and executed, on a charge of

treason. His fate made a deep impression on public sympathy. He was so

young--so intelligent--so generous--so brave--so every thing that we are

apt to like in a young man. His conduct under trial, too, was so lofty

and intrepid. The noble indignation with which he repelled the charge of

treason against his country--the eloquent vindication of his

name--and his pathetic appeal to posterity, in the hopeless hour of

condemnation,--all these entered deeply into every generous bosom, and

even his enemies lamented the stern policy that dictated his execution.

But there was one heart whose anguish it would be impossible to

describe. In happier days and fairer fortunes, he had won the affections

of a beautiful and interesting girl, the daughter of a late celebrated

Irish barrister. She loved him with the disinterested fervor of a

woman’s first and early love. When every worldly maxim arrayed itself

against him; when blasted in fortune, and disgrace and danger

darkened around his name, she loved him the more ardently for his very

sufferings. If, then, his fate could awaken the sympathy even of

his foes, what must have been the agony of her, whose whole soul was

occupied by his image? Let those tell who have had the portals of the

tomb suddenly closed between them and the being they most loved on

earth--who have sat at its threshold, as one shut out in a cold and

lonely world, whence all that was most lovely and loving had departed.

But then the horrors of such a grave!--so frightful, so dishonored!

There was nothing for memory to dwell on that could soothe the pang of

separation--none of those tender, though melancholy circumstances which

endear the parting scene--nothing to melt sorrow into those blessed

tears, sent like the dews of heaven, to revive the heart in the parting

hour of anguish.

To render her widowed situation more desolate, she had incurred her

father’s displeasure by her unfortunate attachment, and was an exile

from the parental roof. But could the sympathy and kind offices of

friends have reached a spirit so shocked and driven in by horror, she

would have experienced no want of consolation, for the Irish are a

people of quick and generous sensibilities. The most delicate

and cherishing attentions were paid her by families of wealth and

distinction. She was led into society, and they tried by all kinds of

occupation and amusement to dissipate her grief, and wean her from the

tragical story of her loves. But it was all in vain. There are some

strokes of calamity that scathe and scorch the soul--which penetrate to

the vital seat of happiness--and blast it, never again to put forth bud

or blossom. She never objected to frequent the haunts of pleasure, but

was as much alone there as in the depths of solitude; walking about in a

sad revery, apparently unconscious of the world around her. She

carried with her an inward woe that mocked at all the blandishments of

friendship, and “heeded not the song of the charmer, charm he never so

wisely.”

The person who told me her story had seen her at a masquerade. There can

be no exhibition of far-gone wretchedness more striking and painful than

to meet it in such a scene. To find it wandering like a spectre, lonely

and joyless, where all around is gay--to see it dressed out in the

trappings of mirth, and looking so wan and woe-begone, as if it had

tried in vain to cheat the poor heart into momentary forgetfulness of

sorrow. After strolling through the splendid rooms and giddy crowd with

an air of utter abstraction, she sat herself down on the steps of an

orchestra, and, looking about for some time with a vacant air, that

showed her insensibility to the garish scene, she began, with the

capriciousness of a sickly heart, to warble a little plaintive air.

She had an exquisite, voice; but on this occasion it was so simple, so

touching, it breathed forth such a soul of wretchedness--that she drew a

crowd, mute and silent, around her and melted every one into tears.

The story of one so true and tender could not but excite great interest

in a country remarkable for enthusiasm. It completely won the heart of

a brave officer, who paid his addresses to her, and thought that one so

true to the dead, could not but prove affectionate to the living. She

declined his attentions, for her thoughts were irrevocably engrossed by

the memory of her former lover. He, however, persisted in his suit. He

solicited not her tenderness, but her esteem. He was assisted by

her conviction of his worth, and her sense of her own destitute and

dependent situation, for she was existing on the kindness of friends.

In a word, he at length succeeded in gaining her hand, though with the

solemn assurance, that her heart was unalterably another’s.

He took her with him to Sicily, hoping that a change of scene might

wear out the remembrance of early woes. She was an amiable and exemplary

wife, and made an effort to be a happy one; but nothing could cure the

silent and devouring melancholy that had entered into her very soul. She

wasted away in a slow, but hopeless decline, and at length sunk into the

grave, the victim of a broken heart.

It was on her that Moore, the distinguished Irish poet, composed the

following lines:

She is far from the land where her young hero sleeps,

And lovers around her are sighing:

But coldly she turns from their gaze, and weeps,

For her heart in his grave is lying.

She sings the wild song of her dear native plains,

Every note which he loved awaking--

Ah! little they think, who delight in her strains,

How the heart of the minstrel is breaking!

He had lived for his love--for his country he died,

They were all that to life had entwined him--

Nor soon shall the tears of his country be dried,

Nor long will his love stay behind him!

Oh! make her a grave where the sunbeams rest,

When they promise a glorious morrow;

They’ll shine o’er her sleep, like a smile from the west,

From her own loved island of sorrow!

THE ART OF BOOK-MAKING.

If that severe doom of Synesius be true,--“It is a greater offence to

steal dead men’s labor, than their clothes,”--what shall become of most

writers? BURTON’S ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY.

I HAVE often wondered at the extreme fecundity of the press, and how

it comes to pass that so many heads, on which Nature seems to have

inflicted the curse of barrenness, should teem with voluminous

productions. As a man travels on, however, in the journey of life, his

objects of wonder daily diminish, and he is continually finding out some

very simple cause for some great matter of marvel. Thus have I chanced,

in my peregrinations about this great metropolis, to blunder upon a

scene which unfolded to me some of the mysteries of the book-making

craft, and at once put an end to my astonishment.

I was one summer’s day loitering through the great saloons of the

British Museum, with that listlessness with which one is apt to saunter

about a museum in warm weather; sometimes lolling over the glass cases

of minerals, sometimes studying the hieroglyphics on an Egyptian mummy,

and some times trying, with nearly equal success, to comprehend the

allegorical paintings on the lofty ceilings. Whilst I was gazing about

in this idle way, my attention was attracted to a distant door, at the

end of a suite of apartments. It was closed, but every now and then it

would open, and some strange-favored being, generally clothed in black,

would steal forth, and glide through the rooms, without noticing any

of the surrounding objects. There was an air of mystery about this that

piqued my languid curiosity, and I determined to attempt the passage of

that strait, and to explore the unknown regions beyond. The door yielded

to my hand, with all that facility with which the portals of enchanted

castles yield to the adventurous knight-errant. I found myself in a

spacious chamber, surrounded with great cases of venerable books. Above

the cases, and just under the cornice, were arranged a great number of

black-looking portraits of ancient authors. About the room were placed

long tables, with stands for reading and writing, at which sat many

pale, studious personages, poring intently over dusty volumes, rummaging

among mouldy manuscripts, and taking copious notes of their contents.

A hushed stillness reigned through this mysterious apartment, excepting

that you might hear the racing of pens over sheets of paper, and

occasionally the deep sigh of one of these sages, as he shifted his

position to turn over the page of an old folio; doubtless arising from

that hollowness and flatulency incident to learned research.

Now and then one of these personages would write something on a small

slip of paper, and ring a bell, whereupon a familiar would appear, take

the paper in profound silence, glide out of the room, and return shortly

loaded with ponderous tomes, upon which the other would fall, tooth

and nail, with famished voracity. I had no longer a doubt that I had

happened upon a body of magi, deeply engaged in the study of occult

sciences. The scene reminded me of an old Arabian tale, of a philosopher

shut up in an enchanted library, in the bosom of a mountain, which

opened only once a year; where he made the spirits of the place bring

him books of all kinds of dark knowledge, so that at the end of the

year, when the magic portal once more swung open on its hinges, he

issued forth so versed in forbidden lore, as to be able to soar above

the heads of the multitude, and to control the powers of Nature.

My curiosity being now fully aroused, I whispered to one of

the familiars, as he was about to leave the room, and begged an

interpretation of the strange scene before me. A few words were

sufficient for the purpose. I found that these mysterious personages,

whom I had mistaken for magi, were principally authors, and were in the

very act of manufacturing books. I was, in fact, in the reading-room of

the great British Library, an immense collection of volumes of all ages

and languages, many of which are now forgotten, and most of which are

seldom read: one of these sequestered pools of obsolete literature to

which modern authors repair, and draw buckets full of classic lore, or

“pure English, undefiled,” wherewith to swell their own scanty rills of

thought.

Being now in possession of the secret, I sat down in a corner, and

watched the process of this book manufactory. I noticed one lean,

bilious-looking wight, who sought none but the most worm-eaten volumes,

printed in black letter. He was evidently constructing some work of

profound erudition, that would be purchased by every man who wished to

be thought learned, placed upon a conspicuous shelf of his library, or

laid open upon his table--but never read. I observed him, now and then,

draw a large fragment of biscuit out of his pocket, and gnaw; whether

it was his dinner, or whether he was endeavoring to keep off that

exhaustion of the stomach, produced by much pondering over dry works, I

leave to harder students than myself to determine.

There was one dapper little gentleman in bright-colored clothes, with a

chirping gossiping expression of countenance, who had all the appearance

of an author on good terms with his bookseller. After considering him

attentively, I recognized in him a diligent getter-up of miscellaneous

works, which bustled off well with the trade. I was curious to see how

he manufactured his wares. He made more stir and show of business than

any of the others; dipping into various books, fluttering over the

leaves of manuscripts, taking a morsel out of one, a morsel out of

another, “line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there

a little.” The contents of his book seemed to be as heterogeneous as

those of the witches’ cauldron in Macbeth. It was here a finger and

there a thumb, toe of frog and blind worm’s sting, with his own gossip

poured in like “baboon’s blood,” to make the medley “slab and good.”

After all, thought I, may not this pilfering disposition be implanted in

authors for wise purposes? may it not be the way in which Providence

has taken care that the seeds of knowledge and wisdom shall be preserved

from age to age, in spite of the inevitable decay of the works in

which they were first produced? We see that Nature has wisely, though

whimsically provided for the conveyance of seeds from clime to clime,

in the maws of certain birds; so that animals, which, in themselves, are

little better than carrion, and apparently the lawless plunderers of the

orchard and the corn-field, are, in fact, Nature’s carriers to disperse

and perpetuate her blessings. In like manner, the beauties and fine

thoughts of ancient and obsolete authors are caught up by these flights

of predatory writers, and cast forth, again to flourish and bear fruit

in a remote and distant tract of time. Many of their works, also,

undergo a kind of metempsychosis, and spring up under new forms. What

was formerly a ponderous history, revives in the shape of a romance--an

old legend changes into a modern play--and a sober philosophical

treatise furnishes the body for a whole series of bouncing and sparkling

essays. Thus it is in the clearing of our American woodlands; where we

burn down a forest of stately pines, a progeny of dwarf oaks start up in

their place; and we never see the prostrate trunk of a tree mouldering

into soil, but it gives birth to a whole tribe of fungi.

Let us not then, lament over the decay and oblivion into which ancient

writers descend; they do but submit to the great law of Nature, which

declares that all sublunary shapes of matter shall be limited in their

duration, but which decrees, also, that their element shall never

perish. Generation after generation, both in animal and vegetable life,

passes away, but the vital principle is transmitted to posterity, and

the species continue to flourish. Thus, also, do authors beget authors,

and having produced a numerous progeny, in a good old age they sleep

with their fathers, that is to say, with the authors who preceded

them--and from whom they had stolen.

Whilst I was indulging in these rambling fancies I had leaned my head

against a pile of reverend folios. Whether it was owing to the soporific

emanations for these works; or to the profound quiet of the room; or

to the lassitude arising from much wandering; or to an unlucky habit

of napping at improper times and places, with which I am grievously

afflicted, so it was, that I fell into a doze. Still, however, my

imagination continued busy, and indeed the same scene continued before

my mind’s eye, only a little changed in some of the details. I dreamt

that the chamber was still decorated with the portraits of ancient

authors, but that the number was increased. The long tables had

disappeared, and, in place of the sage magi, I beheld a ragged,

threadbare throng, such as may be seen plying about the great repository

of cast-off clothes, Monmouth Street. Whenever they seized upon a book,

by one of those incongruities common to dreams, methought it turned into

a garment of foreign or antique fashion, with which they proceeded to

equip themselves. I noticed, however, that no one pretended to clothe

himself from any particular suit, but took a sleeve from one, a cape

from another, a skirt from a third, thus decking himself out piecemeal,

while some of his original rags would peep out from among his borrowed

finery.

There was a portly, rosy, well-fed parson, whom I observed ogling

several mouldy polemical writers through an eyeglass. He soon contrived

to slip on the voluminous mantle of one of the old fathers, and having

purloined the gray beard of another, endeavored to look exceedingly

wise; but the smirking commonplace of his countenance set at naught

all the trappings of wisdom. One sickly-looking gentleman was busied

embroidering a very flimsy garment with gold thread drawn out of several

old court-dresses of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Another had trimmed

himself magnificently from an illuminated manuscript, had stuck a

nosegay in his bosom, culled from “The Paradise of Dainty Devices,” and

having put Sir Philip Sidney’s hat on one side of his head, strutted off

with an exquisite air of vulgar elegance. A third, who was but of puny

dimensions, had bolstered himself out bravely with the spoils from

several obscure tracts of philosophy, so that he had a very imposing

front, but he was lamentably tattered in rear, and I perceived that

he had patched his small-clothes with scraps of parchment from a Latin

author.

There were some well-dressed gentlemen, it is true, who only helped

themselves to a gem or so, which sparkled among their own ornaments,

without eclipsing them. Some, too, seemed to contemplate the costumes

of the old writers, merely to imbibe their principles of taste, and to

catch their air and spirit; but I grieve to say, that too many were apt

to array themselves, from top to toe, in the patchwork manner I have

mentioned. I shall not omit to speak of one genius, in drab breeches

and gaiters, and an Arcadian hat, who had a violent propensity to the

pastoral, but whose rural wanderings had been confined to the classic

haunts of Primrose Hill, and the solitudes of the Regent’s Park. He had

decked himself in wreaths and ribbons from all the old pastoral poets,

and, hanging his head on one side, went about with a fantastical,

lackadaisical air, “babbling about green field.” But the personage that

most struck my attention was a pragmatical old gentleman in clerical

robes, with a remarkably large and square but bald head. He entered the

room wheezing and puffing, elbowed his way through the throng with a

look of sturdy self-confidence, and, having laid hands upon a thick

Greek quarto, clapped it upon his head, and swept majestically away in a

formidable frizzled wig.

In the height of this literary masquerade, a cry suddenly resounded from

every side, of “Thieves! thieves!” I looked, and lo! the portraits about

the walls became animated! The old authors thrust out, first a head,

then a shoulder, from the canvas, looked down curiously for an instant

upon the motley throng, and then descended, with fury in their eyes,

to claim their rifled property. The scene of scampering and hubbub that

ensued baffles all description. The unhappy culprits endeavored in vain

to escape with their plunder. On one side might be seen half a dozen

old monks, stripping a modern professor; on another, there was sad

devastation carried into the ranks of modern dramatic writers. Beaumont

and Fletcher, side by side, raged round the field like Castor and

Pollux, and sturdy Ben Jonson enacted more wonders than when a volunteer

with the army in Flanders. As to the dapper little compiler of farragos

mentioned some time since, he had arrayed himself in as many patches and

colors as harlequin, and there was as fierce a contention of claimants

about him, as about the dead body of Patroclus. I was grieved to

see many men, to whom I had been accustomed to look up with awe and

reverence, fain to steal off with scarce a rag to cover their nakedness.

Just then my eye was caught by the pragmatical old gentleman in the

Greek grizzled wig, who was scrambling away in sore affright with half

a score of authors in full cry after him. They were close upon his

haunches; in a twinkling off went his wig; at every turn some strip of

raiment was peeled away, until in a few moments, from his domineering

pomp, he shrunk into a little, pursy, “chopp’d bald shot,” and made his

exit with only a few tags and rags fluttering at his back.

There was something so ludicrous in the catastrophe of this learned

Theban that I burst into an immoderate fit of laughter, which broke the

whole illusion. The tumult and the scuffle were at an end. The chamber

resumed its usual appearance. The old authors shrunk back into their

picture-frames, and hung in shadowy solemnity along the walls. In short,

I found myself wide awake in my corner, with the whole assemblage of

hookworms gazing at me with astonishment. Nothing of the dream had been

real but my burst of laughter, a sound never before heard in that grave

sanctuary, and so abhorrent to the ears of wisdom, as to electrify the

fraternity.

The librarian now stepped up to me, and demanded whether I had a card of

admission. At first I did not comprehend him, but I soon found that the

library was a kind of literary “preserve,” subject to game-laws, and

that no one must presume to hunt there without special license and

permission. In a word, I stood convicted of being an arrant poacher, and

was glad to make a precipitate retreat, lest I should have a whole pack

of authors let loose upon me.

A ROYAL POET.

Though your body be confined

And soft love a prisoner bound,

Yet the beauty of your mind

Neither check nor chain hath found.

Look out nobly, then, and dare

Even the fetters that you wear.

FLETCHER.

ON a soft sunny morning in the genial month of May I made an excursion

to Windsor Castle. It is a place full of storied and poetical

associations. The very external aspect of the proud old pile is enough

to inspire high thought. It rears its irregular walls and massive

towers, like a mural crown around the brow of a lofty ridge, waves its

royal banner in the clouds, and looks down with a lordly air upon the

surrounding world.

On this morning, the weather was of that voluptuous vernal kind which

calls forth all the latent romance of a man’s temperament, filling his

mind with music, and disposing him to quote poetry and dream of beauty.

In wandering through the magnificent saloons and long echoing galleries

of the castle I passed with indifference by whole rows of portraits

of warriors and statesmen, but lingered in the chamber where hang the

likenesses of the beauties which graced the gay court of Charles

the Second; and as I gazed upon them, depicted with amorous,

half-dishevelled tresses, and the sleepy eye of love, I blessed the

pencil of Sir Peter Lely, which had thus enabled me to bask in the

reflected rays of beauty. In traversing also the “large green courts,”

with sunshine beaming on the gray walls and glancing along the velvet

turf, my mind was engrossed with the image of the tender, the gallant,

but hapless Surrey, and his account of his loiterings about them in his

stripling days, when enamoured of the Lady Geraldine--

“With eyes cast up unto the maiden’s tower,

With easie sighs, such as men draw in love.”

In this mood of mere poetical susceptibility, I visited the ancient keep

of the castle, where James the First of Scotland, the pride and theme of

Scottish poets and historians, was for many years of his youth detained

a prisoner of state. It is a large gray tower, that has stood the brunt

of ages, and is still in good preservation. It stands on a mound which

elevates it above the other parts of the castle, and a great flight of

steps leads to the interior. In the armory, a Gothic hall furnished with

weapons of various kinds and ages, I was shown a coat of armor hanging

against the wall, which had once belonged to James. Hence I

was conducted up a staircase to a suite of apartments, of faded

magnificence, hung with storied tapestry, which formed his prison, and

the scene of that passionate and fanciful amour, which has woven into

the web of his story the magical hues of poetry and fiction.

The whole history of this amiable but unfortunate prince is highly

romantic. At the tender age of eleven, he was sent from home by his

father, Robert III., and destined for the French court, to be reared

under the eye of the French monarch, secure from the treachery and

danger that surrounded the royal house of Scotland. It was his mishap,

in the course of his voyage, to fall into the hands of the English,

and he was detained prisoner by Henry IV., notwithstanding that a truce

existed between the two countries.

The intelligence of his capture, coming in the train of many sorrows and

disasters, proved fatal to his unhappy father. “The news,” we are told,

“was brought to him while at supper, and did so overwhelm him with grief

that he was almost ready to give up the ghost into the hands of the

servants that attended him. But being carried to his bedchamber, he

abstained from all food, and in three days died of hunger and grief at

Rothesay.” *

* Buchanan.

James was detained in captivity above eighteen years; but, though

deprived of personal liberty, he was treated with the respect due to

his rank. Care was taken to instruct him in all the branches of useful

knowledge cultivated at that period, and to give him those mental and

personal accomplishments deemed proper for a prince. Perhaps in this

respect his imprisonment was an advantage, as it enabled him to apply

himself the more exclusively to his improvement, and quietly to imbibe

that rich fund of knowledge and to cherish those elegant tastes which

have given such a lustre to his memory. The picture drawn of him in

early life by the Scottish historians is highly captivating, and seems

rather the description of a hero of romance than of a character in real

history. He was well learnt, we are told, “to fight with the sword,

to joust, to tourney, to wrestle, to sing and dance; he was an expert

mediciner, right crafty in playing both of lute and harp, and sundry

other instruments of music, and was expert in grammar, oratory, and

poetry.” *

* Ballenden’s translation of Hector Boyce.

With this combination of manly and delicate accomplishments, fitting him

to shine both in active and elegant life, and calculated to give him an

intense relish for joyous existence, it must have been a severe trial,

in an age of bustle and chivalry, to pass the spring-time of his years

in monotonous captivity. It was the good fortune of James, however, to

be gifted with a powerful poetic fancy, and to be visited in his prison

by the choicest inspirations of the muse. Some minds corrode, and grow

inactive, under the loss of personal liberty; others grow morbid

and irritable; but it is the nature of the poet to become tender and

imaginative in the loneliness of confinement. He banquets upon the honey

of his own thoughts, and, like the captive bird, pours forth his soul in

melody.

Have you not seen the nightingale,

A pilgrim coop’d into a cage,

How doth she chant her wonted tale,

In that her lonely hermitage!

Even there her charming melody doth prove

That all her boughs are trees, her cage a grove.+

+ Roger L’Estrange.

Indeed, it is the divine attribute of the imagination, that it is

irrepressible, unconfinable--that when the real world is shut out,

it can create a world for itself, and, with a necromantic power, can

conjure up glorious shapes and forms and brilliant visions, to make

solitude populous, and irradiate the gloom of the dungeon. Such was the

world of pomp and pageant that lived round Tasso in his dismal cell at

Ferrara, when he conceived the splendid scenes of his Jerusalem; and we

may consider The King’s Quair,* composed by James during his captivity

at Windsor, as another of those beautiful breakings forth of the soul

from the restraint and gloom of the prison-house.

The subject of the poem is his love for the lady Jane Beaufort, daughter

of the Earl of Somerset, and a princess of the blood-royal of England,

of whom he became enamoured in the course of his captivity. What gives

it a peculiar value, is, that it may be considered a transcript of

the royal bard’s true feelings, and the story of his real loves and

fortunes. It is not often that sovereigns write poetry or that poets

deal in fact. It is gratifying to the pride of a common man, to find

a monarch thus suing, as it were, for admission into his closet, and

seeking to win his favor by administering to his pleasures. It is a

proof of the honest equality of intellectual competition, which strips

off all the trappings of factitious dignity, brings the candidate down

to a level with his fellow-men, and obliges him to depend on his own

native powers for distinction. It is curious, too, to get at the history

of a monarch’s heart, and to find the simple affections of human nature

throbbing under the ermine. But James had learnt to be a poet before he

was a king; he was schooled in adversity, and reared in the company of

his own thoughts. Monarchs have seldom time to parley with their hearts

or to meditate their minds into poetry; and had James been brought up

amidst the adulation and gayety of a court, we should never, in all

probability, have had such a poem as the Quair.

* Quair, an old term for book.

I have been particularly interested by those parts of the poem which

breathe his immediate thoughts concerning his situation, or which are

connected with the apartment in the Tower. They have thus a personal and

local charm, and are given with such circumstantial truth as to make the

reader present with the captive in his prison and the companion of his

meditations.

Such is the account which he gives of his weariness of spirit, and of

the incident which first suggested the idea of writing the poem. It was

the still mid-watch of a clear moonlight night; the stars, he says, were

twinkling as fire in the high vault of heaven, and “Cynthia rinsing her

golden locks in Aquarius.” He lay in bed wakeful and restless, and took

a book to beguile the tedious hours. The book he chose was Boetius’

Consolations of Philosophy, a work popular among the writers of that

day, and which had been translated by his great prototype, Chaucer. From

the high eulogium in which he indulges, it is evident this was one of

his favorite volumes while in prison; and indeed it is an admirable

text-book for meditation under adversity. It is the legacy of a noble

and enduring spirit, purified by sorrow and suffering, bequeathing to

its successors in calamity the maxims of sweet morality, and the trains

of eloquent but simple reasoning, by which it was enabled to bear

up against the various ills of life. It is a talisman, which the

unfortunate may treasure up in his bosom, or, like the good King James,

lay upon his nightly pillow.

After closing the volume he turns its contents over in his mind, and

gradually falls into a fit of musing on the fickleness of fortune, the

vicissitudes of his own life, and the evils that had overtaken him even

in his tender youth. Suddenly he hears the bell ringing to matins, but

its sound, chiming in with his melancholy fancies, seems to him like a

voice exhorting him to write his story. In the spirit of poetic errantry

he determines to comply with this intimation; he therefore takes pen in

hand, makes with it a sign of the cross to implore a benediction,

and sallies forth into the fairy-land of poetry. There is something

extremely fanciful in all this, and it is interesting as furnishing

a striking and beautiful instance of the simple manner in which

whole trains of poetical thought are sometimes awakened and literary

enterprises suggested to the mind.

In the course of his poem, he more than once bewails the peculiar

hardness of his fate, thus doomed to lonely and inactive life, and

shut up from the freedom and pleasure of the world in which the meanest

animal indulges unrestrained. There is a sweetness, however, in his very

complaints; they are the lamentations of an amiable and social spirit at

being denied the indulgence of its kind and generous propensities; there

is nothing in them harsh nor exaggerated; they flow with a natural and

touching pathos, and are perhaps rendered more touching by their

simple brevity. They contrast finely with those elaborate and iterated

repinings which we sometimes meet with in poetry, the effusions of

morbid minds sickening under miseries of their own creating, and

venting their bitterness upon an unoffending world. James speaks of his

privations with acute sensibility, but having mentioned them passes on,

as if his manly mind disdained to brood over unavoidable calamities.

When such a spirit breaks forth into complaint, however brief, we

are aware how great must be the suffering that extorts the murmur. We

sympathize with James, a romantic, active, and accomplished prince, cut

off in the lustihood of youth from all the enterprise, the noble uses,

and vigorous delights of life, as we do with Milton, alive to all the

beauties of nature and glories of art, when he breathes forth brief but

deep-toned lamentations over his perpetual blindness.

Had not James evinced a deficiency of poetic artifice, we might almost

have suspected that these lowerings of gloomy reflection were meant as

preparative to the brightest scene of his story, and to contrast with

that refulgence of light and loveliness, that exhilarating accompaniment

of bird and song, and foliage and flower, and all the revel of, the

year, with which he ushers in the lady of his heart. It is this scene,

in particular, which throws all the magic of romance about the old

castle keep. He had risen, he says, at daybreak, according to custom, to

escape from the dreary meditations of a sleepless pillow. “Bewailing in

his chamber thus alone,” despairing of all joy and remedy, “for, tired

of thought, and woe-begone,” he had wandered to the window to indulge

the captive’s miserable solace, of gazing wistfully upon the world from

which he is excluded. The window looked forth upon a small garden which

lay at the foot of the tower. It was a quiet, sheltered spot, adorned

with arbors and green alleys, and protected from the passing gaze by

trees and hawthorn hedges.

Now was there made fast by the tower’s wall,

A garden faire, and in the corners set

An arbour green with wandis long and small

Railed about, and so with leaves beset

Was all the place and hawthorn hedges knet,

That lyf* was none, walkyng there forbye,

That might within scarce any wight espye.

So thick the branches and the leves grene,

Beshaded all the alleys that there were,

And midst of every arbour might be seen,

The sharpe, grene, swete juniper,

Growing so fair with branches here and there,

That as it seemed to a lyf without,

The boughs did spread the arbour all about.

And on the small grene twistis+ set

The lytel swete nightingales, and sung

So loud and clear, the hymnis consecrate

Of lovis use, now soft, now loud among,

That all the garden and the wallis rung

Right of their song----

* Lyf, Person.

+ Twistis, small boughs or twigs. NOTE--The language of the

quotations is generally modernized.

It was the month of May, when every thing was in bloom, and he

interprets the song of the nightingale into the language of his

enamoured feeling:

Worship, all ye that lovers be, this May;

For of your bliss the kalends are begun,

And sing with us, Away, winter, away.

Come, summer, come, the sweet season and sun.

As he gazes on the scene, and listens to the notes of the birds, he

gradually relapses into one of those tender and undefinable reveries,

which fill the youthful bosom in this delicious season. He wonders what

this love may be of which he has so often read, and which thus seems

breathed forth in the quickening breath of May, and melting all nature

into ecstasy and song. If it really be so great a felicity, and if it be

a boon thus generally dispensed to the most insignificant beings, why is

he alone cut off from its enjoyments?

Oft would I think, O Lord, what may this be,

That love is of such noble myght and kynde?

Loving his folke, and such prosperitee,

Is it of him, as we in books do find;

May he oure hertes setten* and unbynd:

Hath he upon oure hertes such maistrye?

Or is all this but feynit fantasye?

For giff he be of so grete excellence

That he of every wight hath care and charge,

What have I gilt+ to him, or done offense,

That I am thral’d, and birdis go at large?

* Setten, incline.

+ Gilt, what injury have I done, etc.

In the midst of his musing, as he casts his eye downward, he beholds

“the fairest and the freshest young floure” that ever he had seen. It is

the lovely Lady Jane, walking in the garden to enjoy the beauty of that

“fresh May morrowe.” Breaking thus suddenly upon his sight in a moment

of loneliness and excited susceptibility, she at once captivates the

fancy of the romantic prince, and becomes the object of his wandering

wishes, the sovereign of his ideal world.

There is, in this charming scene, an evident resemblance to the early

part of Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale, where Palamon and Arcite fall in

love with Emilia, whom they see walking in the garden of their prison.

Perhaps the similarity of the actual fact to the incident which he had

read in Chaucer may have induced James to dwell on it in his poem. His

description of the Lady Jane is given in the picturesque and minute

manner of his master, and, being doubtless taken from the life, is a

perfect portrait of a beauty of that day. He dwells with the fondness

of a lover on every article of her apparel, from the net of pearl,

splendent with emeralds and sapphires, that confined her golden hair,

even to the “goodly chaine of small orfeverye” * about her neck, whereby

there hung a ruby in shape of a heart, that seemed, he says, like a

spark of fire burning upon her white bosom. Her dress of white

tissue was looped up to enable her to walk with more freedom. She was

accompanied by two female attendants, and about her sported a little

hound decorated with bells, probably the small Italian hound of

exquisite symmetry which was a parlor favorite and pet among the

fashionable dames of ancient times. James closes his description by a

burst of general eulogium:

In her was youth, beauty, with humble port,

Bounty, richesse, and womanly feature:

God better knows than my pen can report,

Wisdom, largesse,+ estate,++ and cunning& sure.

In every point so guided her measure,

In word, in deed, in shape, in countenance,

That nature might no more her child advance.

* Wrought gold.

+ Largesse, bounty.

++ Estate, dignity.

& Cunning, discretion.

The departure of the Lady Jane from the garden puts an end to this

transient riot of the heart. With her departs the amorous illusion

that had shed a temporary charm over the scene of his captivity, and he

relapses into loneliness, now rendered tenfold more intolerable by this

passing beam of unattainable beauty. Through the long and weary day he

repines at his unhappy lot, and when evening approaches, and Phoebus,

as he beautifully expresses it, had “bade farewell to every leaf and

flower,” he still lingers at the window, and, laying his head upon the

cold stone, gives vent to a mingled flow of love and sorrow, until,

gradually lulled by the mute melancholy of the twilight hour, he lapses,

“half-sleeping, half swoon,” into a vision, which occupies the remainder

of the poem, and in which is allegorically shadowed out the history of

his passion.

When he wakes from his trance, he rises from his stony pillow, and,

pacing his apartment, full of dreary reflections, questions his spirit,

whither it has been wandering; whether, indeed, all that has

passed before his dreaming fancy has been conjured up by preceding

circumstances, or whether it is a vision intended to comfort and assure

him in his despondency. If the latter, he prays that some token may be

sent to confirm the promise of happier days, given him in his slumbers.

Suddenly, a turtledove of the purest whiteness comes flying in at the

window, and alights upon his hand, bearing in her bill a branch of red

gilliflower, on the leaves of which is written, in letters of gold, the

following sentence:

Awake! Awake! I bring, lover, I bring

The newis glad, that blissful is and sure

Of thy comfort; now laugh, and play, and sing,

For in the heaven decretit is thy cure.

He receives the branch with mingled hope and dread; reads it with

rapture; and this he says was the first token of his succeeding

happiness. Whether this is a mere poetic fiction, or whether the Lady

Jane did actually send him a token of her favor in this romantic way,

remains to be determined according to the fate or fancy of the reader.

He concludes his poem by intimating that the promise conveyed in the

vision and by the flower, is fulfilled by his being restored to liberty,

and made happy in the possession of the sovereign of his heart.

Such is the poetical account given by James of his love adventures

in Windsor Castle. How much of it is absolute fact, and how much the

embellishment of fancy, it is fruitless to conjecture; let us not,

however, reject every romantic incident as incompatible with real life,

but let us sometimes take a poet at his word. I have noticed merely

those parts of the poem immediately connected with the tower, and have

passed over a large part which was in the allegorical vein, so

much cultivated at that day. The language, of course, is quaint and

antiquated, so that the beauty of many of its golden phrases will

scarcely be perceived at the present day, but it is impossible not to

be charmed with the genuine sentiment, the delightful artlessness and

urbanity, which prevail throughout it. The descriptions of Nature too,

with which it is embellished, are given with a truth, a discrimination,

and a freshness, worthy of the most cultivated periods of the art.

As an amatory poem, it is edifying, in these days of coarser thinking,

to notice the nature, refinement, and exquisite delicacy which

pervade it; banishing every gross thought, or immodest expression, and

presenting female loveliness, clothed in all its chivalrous attributes

of almost supernatural purity and grace.

James flourished nearly about the time of Chaucer and Gower, and was

evidently an admirer and studier of their writings. Indeed, in one of

his stanzas he acknowledges them as his masters; and in some parts

of his poem we find traces of similarity to their productions, more

especially to those of Chaucer. There are always, however, general

features of resemblance in the works of contemporary authors, which are

not so much borrowed from each other as from the times. Writers, like

bees, toll their sweets in the wide world; they incorporate with their

own conceptions, the anecdotes and thoughts current in society; and thus

each generation has some features in common, characteristic of the age

in which it lives.

James belongs to one of the most brilliant eras of our literary history,

and establishes the claims of his country to a participation in

its primitive honors. Whilst a small cluster of English writers are

constantly cited as the fathers of our verse, the name of their

great Scottish compeer is apt to be passed over in silence; but he

is evidently worthy of being enrolled in that little constellation of

remote but never-failing luminaries who shine in the highest firmament

of literature, and who, like morning stars, sang together at the bright

dawning of British poesy.

Such of my readers as may not be familiar with Scottish history (though

the manner in which it has of late been woven with captivating fiction

has made it a universal study) may be curious to learn something of the

subsequent history of James and the fortunes of his love. His passion

for the Lady Jane, as it was the solace of his captivity, so it

facilitated his release, it being imagined by the Court that a

connection with the blood-royal of England would attach him to its own

interests. He was ultimately restored to his liberty and crown, having

previously espoused the Lady Jane, who accompanied him to Scotland, and

made him a most tender and devoted wife.

He found his kingdom in great confusion, the feudal chieftains

having taken advantage of the troubles and irregularities of a long

interregnum, to strengthen themselves in their possessions, and place

themselves above the power of the laws. James sought to found the basis

of his power in the affections of his people. He attached the lower

orders to him by the reformation of abuses, the temperate and equable

administration of justice, the encouragement of the arts of peace, and

the promotion of every thing that could diffuse comfort, competency,

and innocent enjoyment through the humblest ranks of society. He

mingled occasionally among the common people in disguise; visited

their firesides; entered into their cares, their pursuits, and their

amusements; informed himself of the mechanical arts, and how they could

best be patronized and improved; and was thus an all-pervading spirit,

watching with a benevolent eye over the meanest of his subjects. Having

in this generous manner made himself strong in the hearts of the common

people, he turned himself to curb the power of the factious nobility;

to strip them of those dangerous immunities which they had usurped; to

punish such as had been guilty of flagrant offences; and to bring the

whole into proper obedience to the Crown. For some time they bore

this with outward submission, but with secret impatience and brooding

resentment. A conspiracy was at length formed against his life, at the

head of which was his own uncle, Robert Stewart, Earl of Athol, who,

being too old himself for the perpetration of the deed of blood,

instigated his grandson, Sir Robert Stewart, together with Sir Robert

Graham, and others of less note, to commit the deed. They broke into his

bedchamber at the Dominican convent near Perth, where he was residing,

and barbarously murdered him by oft-repeated wounds. His faithful queen,

rushing to throw her tender body between him and the sword, was twice

wounded in the ineffectual attempt to shield him from the assassin; and

it was not until she had been forcibly torn from his person, that the

murder was accomplished.

It was the recollection of this romantic tale of former times, and of

the golden little poem, which had its birthplace in this tower, that

made me visit the old pile with more than common interest. The suit

of armor hanging up in the hall, richly gilt and embellished, as if to

figure in the tourney, brought the image of the gallant and romantic

prince vividly before my imagination. I paced the deserted chambers

where he had composed his poem; I leaned upon the window, and endeavored

to persuade myself it was the very one where he had been visited by

his vision; I looked out upon the spot where he had first seen the Lady

Jane. It was the same genial and joyous month; the birds were again

vying with each other in strains of liquid melody; every thing was

bursting into vegetation, and budding forth the tender promise of the

year. Time, which delights to obliterate the sterner memorials of human

pride, seems to have passed lightly over this little scene of poetry and

love, and to have withheld his desolating hand. Several centuries have

gone by, yet the garden still flourishes at the foot of the tower. It

occupies what was once the moat of the keep; and, though some parts have

been separated by dividing walls, yet others have still their arbors

and shaded walks, as in the days of James, and the whole is sheltered,

blooming, and retired. There is a charm about the spot that has been

printed by the footsteps of departed beauty, and consecrated by the

inspirations of the poet, which is heightened, rather than impaired, by

the lapse of ages. It is, indeed, the gift of poetry, to hallow every

place in which it moves; to breathe around nature an odor more exquisite

than the perfume of the rose, and to shed over it a tint more magical

than the blush of morning.

Others may dwell on the illustrious deeds of James as a warrior and a

legislator; but I have delighted to view him merely as the companion

of his fellow-men, the benefactor of the human heart, stooping from his

high estate to sow the sweet flowers of poetry and song in the paths of

common life. He was the first to cultivate the vigorous and hardy plant

of Scottish genius, which has since become so prolific of the most

wholesome and highly flavored fruit. He carried with him into the

sterner regions of the north, all the fertilizing arts of southern

refinement. He did every thing in his power to win his countrymen to the

gay, the elegant, and gentle arts, which soften and refine the character

of a people, and wreathe a grace round the loftiness of a proud and

warlike spirit. He wrote many poems, which, unfortunately for the

fulness of his fame, are now lost to the world; one, which is still

preserved, called “Christ’s Kirk of the Green,” shows how diligently he

had made himself acquainted with the rustic sports and pastimes, which

constitute such a source of kind and social feeling among the Scottish

peasantry; and with what simple and happy humor he could enter into

their enjoyments. He contributed greatly to improve the national music;

and traces of his tender sentiment and elegant taste are said to exist

in those witching airs, still piped among the wild mountains and lonely

glens of Scotland. He has thus connected his image with whatever is most

gracious and endearing in the national character; he has embalmed his

memory in song, and floated his name to after-ages in the rich streams

of Scottish melody. The recollection of these things was kindling at my

heart, as I paced the silent scene of his imprisonment. I have visited

Vaucluse with as much enthusiasm as a pilgrim would visit the shrine

at Loretto; but I have never felt more poetical devotion than when

contemplating the old tower and the little garden at Windsor, and

musing over the romantic loves of the Lady Jane, and the Royal Poet of

Scotland.

THE COUNTRY CHURCH.

A gentleman!

What o’ the woolpack? or the sugar-chest?

Or lists of velvet? which is ‘t, pound, or yard,

You vend your gentry by?

BEGGAR’S BUSH.

THERE are few places more favorable to the study of character than an

English country church. I was once passing a few weeks at the seat of

a friend who resided in, the vicinity of one the appearance of which

particularly struck my fancy. It was one of those rich morsels of quaint

antiquity, which gives such a peculiar charm to English landscape.

It stood in the midst of a country filled with ancient families, and

contained within its cold and silent aisles the congregated dust of many

noble generations. The interior walls were encrusted with monuments

of every age and style. The light streamed through windows dimmed with

armorial bearings, richly emblazoned in stained glass. In various parts

of the church were tombs of knights, and highborn dames, of gorgeous

workmanship, with their effigies in colored marble. On every side, the

eye was struck with some instance of aspiring mortality, some haughty

memorial which human pride had erected over its kindred dust in this

temple of the most humble of all religions.

The congregation was composed of the neighboring people of rank, who sat

in pews sumptuously lined and cushioned, furnished with richly-gilded

prayer-books, and decorated with their arms upon the pew doors; of the

villagers and peasantry, who filled the back seats and a small gallery

beside the organ; and of the poor of the parish, who were ranged on

benches in the aisles.

The service was performed by a snuffling, well-fed vicar, who had a snug

dwelling near the church. He was a privileged guest at all the tables

of the neighborhood, and had been the keenest fox-hunter in the country,

until age and good living had disabled him from doing anything more than

ride to see the hounds throw off, and make one at the hunting dinner.

Under the ministry of such a pastor, I found it impossible to get into

the train of thought suitable to the time and place; so, having, like

many other feeble Christians, compromised with my conscience, by laying

the sin of my own delinquency at another person’s threshold, I occupied

myself by making observations on my neighbors.

I was as yet a stranger in England, and curious to notice the manners

of its fashionable classes. I found, as usual, that there was the least

pretension where there was the most acknowledged title to respect. I was

particularly struck, for instance, with the family of a nobleman of high

rank, consisting of several sons and daughters. Nothing could be more

simple and unassuming than their appearance. They generally came to

church in the plainest equipage, and often on foot. The young ladies

would stop and converse in the kindest manner with the peasantry, caress

the children, and listen to the stories of the humble cottagers. Their

countenances were open and beautifully fair, with an expression of

high refinement, but at the same time a frank cheerfulness and engaging

affability. Their brothers were tall, and elegantly formed. They were

dressed fashionably, but simply--with strict neatness and propriety, but

without any mannerism or foppishness. Their whole demeanor was easy

and natural, with that lofty grace and noble frankness which bespeak

free-born souls that have never been checked in their growth by feelings

of inferiority. There is a healthful hardiness about real dignity, that

never dreads contact and communion with others, however humble. It is

only spurious pride that is morbid and sensitive, and shrinks from every

touch. I was pleased to see the manner in which they would converse with

the peasantry about those rural concerns and field-sports in which the

gentlemen of the country so much delight. In these conversations there

was neither haughtiness on the one part, nor servility on the other, and

you were only reminded of the difference of rank by the habitual respect

of the peasant.

In contrast to these was the family of a wealthy citizen, who had

amassed a vast fortune, and, having purchased the estate and mansion of

a ruined nobleman in the neighborhood, was endeavoring to assume all the

style and dignity of an hereditary lord of the soil. The family always

came to church en prince. They were rolled majestically along in a

carriage emblazoned with arms. The crest glittered in silver radiance

from every part of the harness where a crest could possibly be placed.

A fat coachman, in a three-cornered hat richly laced and a flaxen wig,

curling close round his rosy face, was seated on the box, with a sleek

Danish dog beside him. Two footmen in gorgeous liveries, with huge

bouquets, and gold-headed canes, lolled behind. The carriage rose and

sunk on its long springs with a peculiar stateliness of motion. The very

horses champed their bits, arched their necks, and glanced their eyes

more proudly than common horses; either because they had caught a little

of the family feeling, or were reined up more tightly than ordinary.

I could not but admire the style with which this splendid pageant

was brought up to the gate of the churchyard. There was a vast effect

produced at the turning of an angle of the wall--a great smacking of the

whip, straining and scrambling of the horses, glistening of harness, and

flashing of wheels through gravel. This was the moment of triumph and

vainglory to the coachman. The horses were urged and checked, until they

were fretted into a foam. They threw out their feet in a prancing trot,

dashing about pebbles at every step. The crowd of villagers sauntering

quietly to church opened precipitately to the right and left, gaping in

vacant admiration. On reaching the gate, the horses were pulled up with

a suddenness that produced an immediate stop, and almost threw them on

their haunches.

There was an extraordinary hurry of the footmen to alight, pull down the

steps, and prepare everything for the descent on earth of this august

family. The old citizen first emerged his round red face from out the

door, looking about him with the pompous air of a man accustomed to rule

on ‘Change, and shake the Stock Market with a nod. His consort, a fine,

fleshy, comfortable dame, followed him. There seemed, I must confess,

but little pride in her composition. She was the picture of broad,

honest, vulgar enjoyment. The world went well with her; and she liked

the world. She had fine clothes, a fine house, a fine carriage, fine

children--everything was fine about her: it was nothing but driving

about and visiting and feasting. Life was to her a perpetual revel; it

was one long Lord Mayor’s Day.

Two daughters succeeded to this goodly couple. They certainly were

handsome, but had a supercilious air that chilled admiration and

disposed the spectator to be critical. They were ultrafashionable in

dress, and, though no one could deny the richness of their decorations,

yet their appropriateness might be questioned amidst the simplicity of

a country church. They descended loftily from the carriage, and moved up

the line of peasantry with a step that seemed dainty of the soil it trod

on. They cast an excursive glance around, that passed coldly over the

burly faces of the peasantry, until they met the eyes of the nobleman’s

family, when their countenances immediately brightened into smiles, and

they made the most profound and elegant courtesies, which were returned

in a manner that showed they were but slight acquaintances.

I must not forget the two sons of this inspiring citizen, who came to

church in a dashing curricle with outriders. They were arrayed in the

extremity of the mode, with all that pedantry of dress which marks

the man of questionable pretensions to style. They kept entirely by

themselves, eying every one askance that came near them, as if measuring

his claims to respectability; yet they were without conversation, except

the exchange of an occasional cant phrase. They even moved artificially,

for their bodies, in compliance with the caprice of the day, had been

disciplined into the absence of all ease and freedom. Art had done

everything to accomplish them as men of fashion, but Nature had denied

them the nameless grace. They were vulgarly shaped, like men formed for

the common purposes of life, and had that air of supercilious assumption

which is never seen in the true gentleman.

I have been rather minute in drawing the pictures of these two families,

because I considered them specimens of what is often to be met with in

this country--the unpretending great, and the arrogant little. I have no

respect for titled rank, unless it be accompanied with true nobility

of soul; but I have remarked, in all countries where artificial

distinctions exist, that the very highest classes are always the most

courteous and unassuming. Those who are well assured of their own

standing are least apt to trespass on that of others; whereas, nothing

is so offensive as the aspirings of vulgarity, which thinks to elevate

itself by humiliating its neighbor.

As I have brought these families into contrast, I must notice their

behavior in church. That of the nobleman’s family was quiet, serious,

and attentive. Not that they appeared to have any fervor of devotion,

but rather a respect for sacred things, and sacred places, inseparable

from good-breeding. The others, on the contrary, were in a perpetual

flutter and whisper; they betrayed a continual consciousness of finery,

and the sorry ambition of being the wonders of a rural congregation.

The old gentleman was the only one really attentive to the service. He

took the whole burden of family devotion upon himself; standing bolt

upright, and uttering the responses with a loud voice that might be

heard all over the church. It was evident that he was one of these

thorough Church-and-king men, who connect the idea of devotion and

loyalty; who consider the Deity, somehow or other, of the government

party, and religion “a very excellent sort of thing, that ought to be

countenanced and kept up.”

When he joined so loudly in the service, it seemed more by way of

example to the lower orders, to show them that, though so great and

wealthy, he was not above being religious; as I have seen a turtle-fed

alderman swallow publicly a basin of charity soup, smacking his lips at

every mouthful and pronouncing it “excellent food for the poor.”

When the service was at an end, I was curious to witness the several

exits of my groups. The young noblemen and their sisters, as the day

was fine, preferred strolling home across the fields, chatting with the

country people as they went. The others departed as they came, in grand

parade. Again were the equipages wheeled up to the gate. There was again

the smacking of whips, the clattering of hoofs, and the glittering of

harness. The horses started off almost at a bound; the villagers again

hurried to right and left; the wheels threw up a cloud of dust, and the

aspirin family was rapt out of sight in a whirlwind.

THE WIDOW AND HER SON.

Pittie olde age, within whose silver haires

Honour and reverence evermore have rain’d.

MARLOWE’S TAMBURLAINE.

THOSE who are in the habit of remarking such matters must have noticed

the passive quiet of an English landscape on Sunday. The clacking of

the mill, the regularly recurring stroke of the flail, the din of the

blacksmith’s hammer, the whistling of the ploughman, the rattling of

the cart, and all other sounds of rural labor are suspended. The

very farm-dogs bark less frequently, being less disturbed by passing

travellers. At such times I have almost fancied the wind sunk into

quiet, and that the sunny landscape, with its fresh green tints melting

into blue haze, enjoyed the hallowed calm.

Sweet day, so pure, so calm, so brigh’

The bridal of the earth and sky.

Well was it ordained that the day of devotion should be a day of rest.

The holy repose which reigns over the face of nature has its moral

influence; every restless passion is charmed down, and we feel the

natural religion of the soul gently springing up within us. For my

part, there are feelings that visit me, in a country church, amid the

beautiful serenity of nature, which I experience nowhere else; and if

not a more religious, I think I am a better man on Sunday than on any

other day of the seven.

During my recent residence in the country, I used frequently to attend

at the old village church. Its shadowy aisles, its mouldering monuments,

its dark oaken panelling, all reverend with the gloom of departed years,

seemed to fit it for the haunt of solemn meditation; but, being in a

wealthy, aristocratic neighborhood, the glitter of fashion penetrated

even into the sanctuary; and I felt myself continually thrown back upon

the world, by the frigidity and pomp of the poor worms around me. The

only being in the whole congregation who appeared thoroughly to feel the

humble and prostrate piety of a true Christian was a poor decrepit old

woman, bending under the weight of years and infirmities. She bore the

traces of something better than abject poverty. The lingerings of decent

pride were visible in her appearance. Her dress, though humble in the

extreme, was scrupulously clean. Some trivial respect, too, had been

awarded her, for she did not take her seat among the village poor, but

sat alone on the steps of the altar. She seemed to have survived all

love, all friendship, all society, and to have nothing left her but the

hopes of heaven. When I saw her feebly rising and bending her aged form

in prayer; habitually conning her prayer-book, which her palsied hand

and failing eyes could not permit her to read, but which she evidently

knew by heart, I felt persuaded that the faltering voice of that poor

woman arose to heaven far before the responses of the clerk, the swell

of the organ, or the chanting of the choir.

I am fond of loitering about country churches, and this was so

delightfully situated, that it frequently attracted me. It stood on a

knoll, round which a small stream made a beautiful bend and then wound

its way through a long reach of soft meadow scenery. The church was

surrounded by yew trees, which seemed almost coeval with itself. Its

tall Gothic spire shot up lightly from among them, with rooks and crows

generally wheeling about it. I was seated there one still sunny morning

watching two laborers who were digging a grave. They had chosen one of

the most remote and neglected corners of the churchyard, where, from the

number of nameless graves around, it would appear that the indigent and

friendless were huddled into the earth. I was told that the new-made

grave was for the only son of a poor widow. While I was meditating on

the distinctions of worldly rank, which extend thus down into the very

dust, the toll of the bell announced the approach of the funeral. They

were the obsequies of poverty, with which pride had nothing to do. A

coffin of the plainest materials, without pall or other covering, was

borne by some of the villagers. The sexton walked before with an air

of cold indifference. There were no mock mourners in the trappings of

affected woe, but there was one real mourner who feebly tottered after

the corpse. It was the aged mother of the deceased, the poor old woman

whom I had seen seated on the steps of the altar. She was supported by

a humble friend, who was endeavoring to comfort her. A few of the

neighboring poor had joined the train, and some children of the village

were running hand in hand, now shouting with unthinking mirth, and now

pausing to gaze, with childish curiosity on the grief of the mourner.

As the funeral train approached the grave, the parson issued from the

church-porch, arrayed in the surplice, with prayer-book in hand, and

attended by the clerk. The service, however, was a mere act of charity.

The deceased had been destitute, and the survivor was penniless. It

was shuffled through, therefore, in form, but coldly and unfeeling. The

well-fed priest moved but a few steps from the church door; his voice

could scarcely be heard at the grave; and never did I hear the funeral

service, that sublime and touching ceremony, turned into such a frigid

mummery of words.

I approached the grave. The coffin was placed on the ground. On it were

inscribed the name and age of the deceased--“George Somers, aged 26

years.” The poor mother had been assisted to kneel down at the head

of it. Her withered hands were clasped, as if in prayer; but I could

perceive, by a feeble rocking of the body, and a convulsive motion of

the lips, that she was gazing on the last relics of her son with the

yearnings of a mother’s heart.

Preparations were made to deposit the coffin in the earth. There was

that bustling stir, which breaks so harshly on the feelings of grief and

affection; directions given in the cold tones of business; the striking

of spades into sand and gravel; which, at the grave of those we love,

is, of all sounds, the most withering. The bustle around seemed to

waken the mother from a wretched revery. She raised her glazed eyes, and

looked about with a faint wildness. As the men approached with cords to

lower the coffin into the grave, she wrung her hands, and broke into

an agony of grief. The poor woman who attended her took her by the arm

endeavoring to raise her from the earth, and to whisper something like

consolation: “Nay, now--nay, now--don’t take it so sorely to heart.”

She could only shake her head, and wring her hands, as one not to be

comforted.

As they lowered the body into the earth, the creaking of the cords

seemed to agonize her; but when, on some accidental obstruction, there

was a jostling of the coffin, all the tenderness of the mother burst

forth, as if any harm could come to him who was far beyond the reach of

worldly suffering.

I could see no more--my heart swelled into my throat--my eyes filled

with tears; I felt as if I were acting a barbarous part in standing by

and gazing idly on this scene of maternal anguish. I wandered to another

part of the churchyard, where I remained until the funeral train had

dispersed.

When I saw the mother slowly and painfully quitting the grave, leaving

behind her the remains of all that was dear to her on earth, and

returning to silence and destitution, my heart ached for her. What,

thought I, are the distresses of the rich? They have friends to

soothe--pleasures to beguile--a world to divert and dissipate their

griefs. What are the sorrows of the young? Their growing minds soon

close above the wound--their elastic spirits soon rise beneath the

pressure--their green and ductile affections soon twine round new

objects. But the sorrows of the poor, who have no outward appliances to

soothe--the sorrows of the aged, with whom life at best is but a wintry

day, and who can look for no after-growth of joy--the sorrows of a

widow, aged, solitary, destitute, mourning over an only son, the last

solace of her years,--these are indeed sorrows which make us feel the

impotency of consolation.

It was some time before I left the churchyard. On my way homeward, I met

with the woman who had acted as comforter: she was just returning from

accompanying the mother to her lonely habitation, and I drew from her

some particulars connected with the affecting scene I had witnessed.

The parents of the deceased had resided in the village from childhood.

They had inhabited one of the neatest cottages, and by various rural

occupations, and the assistance of a small garden, had supported

themselves creditably and comfortably, and led a happy and a blameless

life. They had one son, who had grown up to be the staff and pride of

their age. “Oh, sir!” said the good woman, “he was such a comely lad,

so sweet-tempered, so kind to every one around him, so dutiful to his

parents! It did one’s heart good to see him of a Sunday, drest out in

his best, so tall, so straight, so cheery, supporting his old mother to

church; for she was always fonder of leaning on George’s arm than on her

good man’s; and, poor soul, she might well be proud of him, for a finer

lad there was not in the country round.”

Unfortunately, the son was tempted, during a year of scarcity and

agricultural hardship, to enter into the service of one of the small

craft that plied on a neighboring river. He had not been long in this

employ, when he was entrapped by a press-gang, and carried off to sea.

His parents received tidings of his seizure, but beyond that they could

learn nothing. It was the loss of their main prop. The father, who was

already infirm, grew heartless and melancholy and sunk into his grave.

The widow, left lonely in her age and feebleness, could no longer

support herself, and came upon the parish. Still there was a kind

feeling towards her throughout the village, and a certain respect as

being one of the oldest inhabitants. As no one applied for the cottage

in which she had passed so many happy days, she was permitted to remain

in it, where she lived solitary and almost helpless. The few wants of

nature were chiefly supplied from the scanty productions of her little

garden, which the neighbors would now and then cultivate for her. It was

but a few days before the time at which these circumstances were told

me, that she was gathering some vegetables for her repast, when she

heard the cottage-door which faced the garden, suddenly opened. A

stranger came out, and seemed to be looking eagerly and wildly around.

He was dressed in seamen’s clothes, was emaciated and ghastly pale, and

bore the air of one broken by sickness and hardships. He saw her and

hastened towards her, but his steps were faint and faltering; he sank on

his knees before her and sobbed like a child. The poor woman gazed upon

him with a vacant and wandering eye. “Oh, my dear, dear mother! don’t

you know your son? your poor boy, George?” It was, indeed, the wreck

of her once noble lad; who shattered by wounds, by sickness and foreign

imprisonment, had, at length, dragged his wasted limbs homeward, to

repose among the scenes of his childhood.

I will not attempt to detail the particulars of such a meeting, where

sorrow and joy were so completely blended: still, he was alive! he was

come home! he might yet live to comfort and cherish her old age! Nature,

however, was exhausted in him; and if any thing had been wanting to

finish the work of fate, the desolation of his native cottage would have

been sufficient. He stretched himself on the pallet on which his widowed

mother had passed many a sleepless night, and he never rose from it

again.

The villagers, when they heard that George Somers had returned, crowded

to see him, offering every comfort and assistance that their humble

means afforded. He was too weak, however, to talk--he could only

look his thanks. His mother was his constant attendant; and he seemed

unwilling to be helped by any other hand.

There is something in sickness that breaks down the pride of manhood,

that softens the heart, and brings it back to the feelings of infancy.

Who that has languished, even in advanced life, in sickness and

despondency, who that has pined on a weary bed in the neglect and

loneliness of a foreign land, but has thought on the mother “that looked

on his childhood,” that smoothed his pillow, and administered to his

helplessness? Oh, there is an enduring tenderness in the love of a

mother to a son, that transcends all other affections of the heart.

It is neither to be chilled by selfishness, nor daunted by danger,

nor weakened by worthlessness, nor stifled by ingratitude. She will

sacrifice every comfort to his convenience; she will surrender every

pleasure to his enjoyment; she will glory in his fame and exult in his

prosperity; and, if misfortune overtake him, he will be the dearer to

her from misfortune; and if disgrace settle upon his name, she will

still love and cherish him in spite of his disgrace; and if all the

world beside cast him off, she will be all the world to him.

Poor George Somers had known what it was to be in sickness, and none to

soothe--lonely and in prison, and none to visit him. He could not endure

his mother from his sight; if she moved away, his eye would follow her.

She would sit for hours by his bed watching him as he slept. Sometimes

he would start from a feverish dream, and look anxiously up until he saw

her bending over him; when he would take her hand, lay it on his bosom,

and fall asleep with the tranquillity of a child. In this way he died.

My first impulse on hearing this humble tale of affliction was to visit

the cottage of the mourner, and administer pecuniary assistance, and, if

possible, comfort. I found, however, on inquiry, that the good feelings

of the villagers had prompted them to do everything that the case

admitted; and as the poor know best how to console each other’s sorrows,

I did not venture to intrude.

The next Sunday I was at the village church, when, to my surprise, I saw

the poor old woman tottering down the aisle to her accustomed seat on

the steps of the altar.

She had made an effort to put on something like mourning for her son;

and nothing could be more touching than this struggle between pious

affection and utter poverty--a black ribbon or so, a faded black

handkerchief, and one or two more such humble attempts to express by

outward signs that grief which passes show. When I looked round upon

the storied monuments, the stately hatchments, the cold marble pomp with

which grandeur mourned magnificently over departed pride, and turned to

this poor widow, bowed down by age and sorrow at the altar of her God,

and offering up the prayers and praises of a pious though a broken

heart, I felt that this living monument of real grief was worth them

all.

I related her story to some of the wealthy members of the congregation,

and they were moved by it. They exerted themselves to render her

situation more comfortable, and to lighten her afflictions. It was,

however, but smoothing a few steps to the grave. In the course of a

Sunday or two after, she was missed from her usual seat at church, and

before I left the neighborhood I heard, with a feeling of satisfaction,

that she had quietly breathed her last, and had gone to rejoin those she

loved, in that world where sorrow is never known and friends are never

parted.

A SUNDAY IN LONDON.*

* Part of a sketch omitted in the preceding editions.

IN a preceding paper I have spoken of an English Sunday in the country

and its tranquillizing effect upon the landscape; but where is its

sacred influence more strikingly apparent than in the very heart of that

great Babel, London? On this sacred day the gigantic monster is charmed

into repose. The intolerable din and struggle of the week are at an

end. The shops are shut. The fires of forges and manufactories are

extinguished, and the sun, no longer obscured by murky clouds of smoke,

pours down a sober yellow radiance into the quiet streets. The

few pedestrians we meet, instead of hurrying forward with anxious

countenances, move leisurely along; their brows are smoothed from the

wrinkles of business and care; they have put on their Sunday looks and

Sunday manners with their Sunday clothes, and are cleansed in mind as

well as in person.

And now the melodious clangor of bells from church towers summons their

several flocks to the fold. Forth issues from his mansion the family

of the decent tradesman, the small children in the advance; then the

citizen and his comely spouse, followed by the grown-up daughters,

with small morocco-bound prayer-books laid in the folds of their

pocket-handkerchiefs. The housemaid looks after them from the window,

admiring the finery of the family, and receiving, perhaps, a nod and

smile from her young mistresses, at whose toilet she has assisted.

Now rumbles along the carriage of some magnate of the city, peradventure

an alderman or a sheriff, and now the patter of many feet announces it

procession of charity scholars in uniforms of antique cut, and each with

a prayer-book under his arm.

The ringing of bells is at an end; the rumbling of the carriage has

ceased; the pattering of feet is heard no more; the flocks are folded

in ancient churches, cramped up in by-lanes and corners of the crowded

city, where the vigilant beadle keeps watch, like the shepherd’s dog,

round the threshold of the sanctuary. For a time everything is hushed,

but soon is heard the deep, pervading sound of the organ, rolling and

vibrating through the empty lanes and courts, and the sweet chanting of

the choir making them resound with melody and praise. Never have I been

more sensible of the sanctifying effect of church music than when I

have heard it thus poured forth, like a river of joy, through the inmost

recesses of this great metropolis, elevating it, as it were, from all

the sordid pollutions of the week, and bearing the poor world-worn soul

on a tide of triumphant harmony to heaven.

The morning service is at an end. The streets are again alive with the

congregations returning to their homes, but soon again relapse into

silence. Now comes on the Sunday dinner, which, to the city tradesman,

is a meal of some importance. There is more leisure for social enjoyment

at the board. Members of the family can now gather together, who are

separated by the laborious occupations of the week. A school-boy may be

permitted on that day to come to the paternal home; an old friend of

the family takes his accustomed Sunday seat at the board, tells over

his well-known stories, and rejoices young and old with his well-known

jokes.

On Sunday afternoon the city pours forth its lesions to breathe the

fresh air and enjoy the sunshine of the parks and rural environs.

Satirists may say what they please about the rural enjoyments of a

London citizen on Sunday, but to me there is something delightful in

beholding the poor prisoner of the crowded and dusty city enabled thus

to come forth once a week and throw himself upon the green bosom of

nature. He is like a child restored to the mother’s breast; and they

who first spread out these noble parks and magnificent pleasure-grounds

which surround this huge metropolis have done at least as much for

its health and morality as if they had expended the amount of cost in

hospitals, prisons, and penitentiaries.

THE BOAR’S HEAD TAVERN, EASTCHEAP.

A SHAKESPEARIAN RESEARCH.

“A tavern is the rendezvous, the exchange, the staple of good fellows.

I have heard my great-grandfather tell, how his great-great-grandfather

should say, that it was an old proverb when his great-grandfather was a

child, that ‘it was a good wind that blew a man to the wine.’”

MOTHER BOMBIE.

IT is a pious custom in some Catholic countries to honor the memory of

saints by votive lights burnt before their pictures. The popularity of

a saint, therefore, may be known by the number of these offerings.

One, perhaps, is left to moulder in the darkness of his little chapel;

another may have a solitary lamp to throw its blinking rays athwart his

effigy; while the whole blaze of adoration is lavished at the shrine

of some beatified father of renown. The wealthy devotee brings his huge

luminary of wax, the eager zealot, his seven-branched candlestick; and

even the mendicant pilgrim is by no means satisfied that sufficient

light is thrown upon the deceased unless he hangs up his little lamp

of smoking oil. The consequence is, that in the eagerness to enlighten,

they are often apt to obscure; and I have occasionally seen an unlucky

saint almost smoked out of countenance by the officiousness of his

followers.

In like manner has it fared with the immortal Shakespeare. Every writer

considers it his bounden duty to light up some portion of his character

or works, and to rescue some merit from oblivion. The commentator,

opulent in words, produces vast tomes of dissertations; the common herd

of editors send up mists of obscurity from their notes at the bottom of

each page; and every casual scribbler brings his farthing rushlight of

eulogy or research to swell the cloud of incense and of smoke.

As I honor all established usages of my brethren of the quill, I thought

it but proper to contribute my mite of homage to the memory of the

illustrious bard. I was for some time, however, sorely puzzled in what

way I should discharge this duty. I found myself anticipated in every

attempt at a new reading; every doubtful line had been explained a dozen

different ways, and perplexed beyond the reach of elucidation; and as

to fine passages, they had all been amply praised by previous admirers;

nay, so completely had the bard, of late, been overlarded with panegyric

by a great German critic that it was difficult now to find even a fault

that had not been argued into a beauty.

In this perplexity I was one morning turning over his pages when I

casually opened upon the comic scenes of Henry IV., and was, in a

moment, completely lost in the madcap revelry of the Boar’s Head Tavern.

So vividly and naturally are these scenes of humor depicted, and with

such force and consistency are the characters sustained, that they

become mingled up in the mind with the facts and personages of real

life. To few readers does it occur that these are all ideal creations

of a poet’s brain, and that, in sober truth, no such knot of merry

roisterers ever enlivened the dull neighborhood of Eastcheap.

For my part, I love to give myself up to the illusions of poetry. A hero

of fiction that never existed is just as valuable to me as a hero of

history that existed a thousand years since and, if I may be excused

such an insensibility to the common ties of human nature, I would not

give up fat Jack for half the great men of ancient chronicle. What

have the heroes of yore done for me or men like me? They have conquered

countries of which I do not enjoy an acre, or they have gained laurels

of which I do not inherit a leaf, or they have furnished examples of

hair-brained prowess, which I have neither the opportunity nor the

inclination to follow. But, old Jack Falstaff! kind Jack Falstaff! sweet

Jack Falstaff! has enlarged the boundaries of human enjoyment; he has

added vast regions of wit and good-humor, in which the poorest man may

revel, and has bequeathed a never-failing inheritance of jolly laughter,

to make mankind merrier and better to the latest posterity.

A thought suddenly struck me. “I will make a pilgrimage to Eastcheap,”

said I, closing the book, “and see if the old Boar’s Head Tavern still

exists. Who knows but I may light upon some legendary traces of Dame

Quickly and her guests? At any rate, there will be a kindred pleasure in

treading the halls once vocal with their mirth to that the toper enjoys

in smelling to the empty cask, once filled with generous wine.”

The resolution was no sooner formed than put in execution. I forbear to

treat of the various adventures and wonders I encountered in my travels;

of the haunted regions of Cock Lane; of the faded glories of Little

Britain and the parts adjacent; what perils I ran in Cateaton Street

and Old Jewry; of the renowned Guildhall and its two stunted giants, the

pride and wonder of the city and the terror of all unlucky urchins; and

how I visited London Stone, and struck my staff upon it in imitation of

that arch-rebel Jack Cade.

Let it suffice to say, that I at length arrived in merry Eastcheap, that

ancient region of wit and wassail, where the very names of the streets

relished of good cheer, as Pudding Lane bears testimony even at the

present day. For Eastcheap, says old Stow, “was always famous for its

convivial doings. The cookes cried hot ribbes of beef roasted, pies well

baked, and other victuals: there was clattering of pewter pots, harpe,

pipe, and sawtrie.” Alas! how sadly is the scene changed since the

roaring days of Falstaff and old Stow! The madcap roisterer has given

place to the plodding tradesman; the clattering of pots and the sound of

“harpe and sawtrie,” to the din of carts and the accurst dinging of the

dustman’s bell; and no song is heard, save, haply, the strain of some

syren from Billingsgate, chanting the eulogy of deceased mackerel.

I sought, in vain, for the ancient abode of Dame Quickly. The only

relict of it is a boar’s head, carved in relief in stone, which formerly

served as the sign, but at present is built into the parting line of two

houses which stand on the site of the renowned old tavern.

For the history of this little abode of good fellowship I was referred

to a tallow-chandler’s widow opposite, who had been born and brought up

on the spot, and was looked up to as the indisputable chronicler of the

neighborhood. I found her seated in a little back parlor, the window

of which looked out upon a yard about eight feet square laid out as a

flower-garden, while a glass door opposite afforded a distant view of

the street, through a vista of soap and tallow candles--the two views,

which comprised, in all probability, her prospects in life and the

little world in which she had lived and moved and had her being for the

better part of a century.

To be versed in the history of Eastcheap, great and little, from London

Stone even unto the Monument, was doubtless, in her opinion, to be

acquainted with the history of the universe. Yet, with all this, she

possessed the simplicity of true wisdom, and that liberal communicative

disposition which I have generally remarked in intelligent old ladies

knowing in the concerns of their neighborhood.

Her information, however, did not extend far back into antiquity. She

could throw no light upon the history of the Boar’s Head from the time

that Dame Quickly espoused the valiant Pistol until the great fire of

London when it was unfortunately burnt down. It was soon rebuilt,

and continued to flourish under the old name and sign, until a dying

landlord, struck with remorse for double scores, bad measures, and

other iniquities which are incident to the sinful race of publicans,

endeavored to make his peace with Heaven by bequeathing the tavern to

St. Michael’s Church, Crooked Lane, toward the supporting of a chaplain.

For some time the vestry meetings were regularly held there, but it

was observed that the old Boar never held up his head under church

government. He gradually declined, and finally gave his last gasp about

thirty years since. The tavern was then turned into shops; but she

informed me that a picture of it was still preserved in St. Michael’s

Church, which stood just in the rear. To get a sight of this picture

was now my determination; so, having informed myself of the abode of

the sexton, I took my leave of the venerable chronicler of Eastcheap, my

visit having doubtless raised greatly her opinion of her legendary lore

and furnished an important incident in the history of her life.

It cost me some difficulty and much curious inquiry to ferret out the

humble hanger-on to the church. I had to explore Crooked Lane and divers

little alleys and elbows and dark passages with which this old city is

perforated like an ancient cheese, or a worm-eaten chest of drawers.

At length I traced him to a corner of a small court surrounded by lofty

houses, where the inhabitants enjoy about as much of the face of heaven

as a community of frogs at the bottom of a well.

The sexton was a meek, acquiescing little man, of a bowing, lowly habit,

yet he had a pleasant twinkling in his eye, and if encouraged, would

now and then hazard a small pleasantry, such as a man of his low estate

might venture to make in the company of high churchwardens and other

mighty men of the earth. I found him in company with the deputy

organist, seated apart, like Milton’s angels, discoursing, no doubt,

on high doctrinal points, and settling the affairs of the church over a

friendly pot of ale; for the lower classes of English seldom deliberate

on any weighty matter without the assistance of a cool tankard to clear

their understandings. I arrived at the moment when they had finished

their ale and their argument, and were about to repair to the church

to put it in order; so, having made known my wishes, I received their

gracious permission to accompany them.

The church of St. Michael’s, Crooked Lane, standing a short distance

from Billingsgate, is enriched with the tombs of many fishmongers

of renown; and as every profession has its galaxy of glory and

its constellation of great men, I presume the monument of a mighty

fishmonger of the olden time is regarded with as much reverence by

succeeding generations of the craft, as poets feel on contemplating the

tomb of Virgil or soldiers the monument of a Marlborough or Turenne.

I cannot but turn aside, while thus speaking of illustrious men, to

observe that St. Michael’s, Crooked Lane, contains also the ashes of

that doughty champion, William Walworth, Knight, who so manfully clove

down the sturdy wight, Wat Tyler, in Smithfield--a hero worthy of

honorable blazon, as almost the only Lord Mayor on record famous for

deeds of arms, the sovereigns of Cockney being generally renowned as the

most pacific of all potentates.*

* The following was the ancient inscription on the monument

of this worthy, which, unhappily, was destroyed in the great

conflagration.

Hereunder lyth a man of Fame,

William Walworth callyd by name:

Fishmonger he was in lyfftime here,

And twise Lord Maior, as in books appere;

Who, with courage stout and manly myght,

Slew Jack Straw in Kyng Richard’s sight.

For which act done, and trew entent,

The Kyng made him knyght incontinent

And gave him armes, as here you see,

To declare his fact and chivaldrie.

He left this lyff the yere of our God

Thirteen hundred fourscore and three odd.

An error in the foregoing inscription has been corrected by the

venerable Stow. “Whereas,” saith he, “it hath been far spread abroad by

vulgar opinion, that the rebel smitten down so manfully by Sir William

Walworth, the then worthy Lord Maior, was named Jack Straw, and not Wat

Tyler, I thought good to reconcile this rash-conceived doubt by such

testimony as I find in ancient and good records. The principal leaders,

or captains, of the commons, were Wat Tyler, as the first man; the

second was John, or Jack, Straw, etc., etc.”--STOW’S London.

Adjoining the church, in a small cemetery, immediately under the back

window of what was once the Boar’s Head, stands the tombstone of Robert

Preston, whilom drawer at the tavern. It is now nearly a century since

this trusty drawer of good liquor closed his bustling career and was

thus quietly deposited within call of his customers. As I was clearing

away the weeds from his epitaph the little sexton drew me on one side

with a mysterious air, and informed me in a low voice that once upon

a time, on a dark wintry night, when the wind was unruly, howling, and

whistling, banging about doors and windows, and twirling weathercocks,

so that the living were frightened out of their beds, and even the dead

could not sleep quietly in their graves, the ghost of honest Preston,

which happened to be airing itself in the churchyard, was attracted

by the well-known call of “Waiter!” from the Boar’s Head, and made its

sudden appearance in the midst of a roaring club, just as the parish

clerk was singing a stave from the “mirre garland of Captain Death;” to

the discomfiture of sundry train-band captains and the conversion of an

infidel attorney, who became a zealous Christian on the spot, and

was never known to twist the truth afterwards, except in the way of

business.

I beg it may be remembered, that I do not pledge myself for the

authenticity of this anecdote, though it is well known that the

churchyards and by-corners of this old metropolis are very much infested

with perturbed spirits; and every one must have heard of the Cock Lane

ghost, and the apparition that guards the regalia in the Tower which has

frightened so many bold sentinels almost out of their wits.

Be all this as it may, this Robert Preston seems to have been a worthy

successor to the nimbletongued Francis, who attended upon the revels of

Prince Hal; to have been equally prompt with his “Anon, anon, sir;”

and to have transcended his predecessor in honesty; for Falstaff, the

veracity of whose taste no man will venture to impeach, flatly accuses

Francis of putting lime in his sack, whereas honest Preston’s epitaph

lands him for the sobriety of his conduct, the soundness of his wine,

and the fairness of his measure.* The worthy dignitaries of the church,

however, did not appear much captivated by the sober virtues of the

tapster; the deputy organist, who had a moist look out of the eye, made

some shrewd remark on the abstemiousness of a man brought up among

full hogsheads, and the little sexton corroborated his opinion by a

significant wink and a dubious shake of the head.

* As this inscription is rife with excellent morality, I

transcribe it for the admonition of delinquent tapsters. It

is no doubt, the production of some choice spirit who once

frequented the Boar’s Head.

Bacchus, to give the toping world surprise,

Produced one sober son, and here he lies.

Though rear’d among full hogsheads, he defy’d

The charms of wine, and every one beside.

O reader, if to justice thou ‘rt inclined,

Keep honest Preston daily in thy mind.

He drew good wine, took care to fill his pots,

Had sundry virtues that excused his faults.

You that on Bacchus have the like dependence,

Pray copy Bob in measure and attendance.

Thus far my researches, though they threw much light on the history of

tapsters, fishmongers, and Lord Mayors, yet disappointed me in the

great object of my quest, the picture of the Boar’s Head Tavern. No

such painting was to be found in the church of St. Michael’s. “Marry and

amen,” said I, “here endeth my research!” So I was giving the matter

up, with the air of a baffled antiquary, when my friend the sexton,

perceiving me to be curious in everything relative to the old tavern,

offered to show me the choice vessels of the vestry, which had been

handed down from remote times when the parish meetings were held at the

Boar’s Head. These were deposited in the parish club-room, which had

been transferred, on the decline of the ancient establishment, to a

tavern in the neighborhood.

A few steps brought us to the house, which stands No. 12 Miles Lane,

bearing the title of The Mason’s Arms, and is kept by Master Edward

Honeyball, the “bully-rock” of the establishment. It is one of those

little taverns which abound in the heart of the city and form the centre

of gossip and intelligence of the neighborhood. We entered the barroom,

which was narrow and darkling, for in these close lanes but few rays of

reflected light are enabled to struggle down to the inhabitants, whose

broad day is at best but a tolerable twilight. The room was partitioned

into boxes, each containing a table spread with a clean white cloth,

ready for dinner. This showed that the guests were of the good old

stamp, and divided their day equally, for it was but just one o’clock.

At the lower end of the room was a clear coal fire, before which a

breast of lamb was roasting. A row of bright brass candlesticks and

pewter mugs glistened along the mantelpiece, and an old fashioned clock

ticked in one corner. There was something primitive in this medley of

kitchen, parlor, and hall that carried me back to earlier times, and

pleased me. The place, indeed, was humble, but everything had that look

of order and neatness which bespeaks the superintendence of a notable

English housewife. A group of amphibious-looking beings, who might be

either fishermen or sailors, were regaling themselves in one of the

boxes. As I was a visitor of rather higher pretensions, I was ushered

into a little misshapen back room, having at least nine corners. It was

lighted by a sky-light, furnished with antiquated leathern chairs, and

ornamented with the portrait of a fat pig. It was evidently appropriated

to particular customers, and I found a shabby gentleman in a red nose

and oil-cloth hat seated in one corner meditating on a half empty pot of

porter.

The old sexton had taken the landlady aside, and with an air of profound

importance imparted to her my errand. Dame Honeyball was a likely,

plump, bustling little woman, and no bad substitute for that paragon

of hostesses, Dame Quickly. She seemed delighted with an opportunity to

oblige, and, hurrying upstairs to the archives of her house, where

the precious vessels of the parish club were deposited, she returned,

smiling and courtesying, with them in her hands.

The first she presented me was a japanned iron tobacco-box of gigantic

size, out of which, I was told, the vestry had smoked at their stated

meetings since time immemorial, and which was never suffered to be

profaned by vulgar hands, or used on common occasions, I received it

with becoming reverence, but what was my delight at beholding on

its cover the identical painting of which I was in quest! There was

displayed the outside of the Boar’s Head Tavern, and before the door was

to be seen the whole convivial group at table, in full revel, pictured

with that wonderful fidelity and force with which the portraits of

renowned generals and commodores are illustrated on tobacco-boxes, for

the benefit of posterity. Lest, however, there should be any mistake,

the cunning limner had warily inscribed the names of Prince Hal and

Falstaff on the bottoms of their chairs.

On the inside of the cover was an inscription, nearly obliterated,

recording that this box was the gift of Sir Richard Gore, for the use of

the vestry meetings at the Boar’s Head Tavern, and that it was “repaired

and beautified by his successor, Mr. John Packard, 1767.” Such is a

faithful description of this august and venerable relic, and I question

whether the learned Scriblerius contemplated his Roman shield, or

the Knights of the Round Table the long-sought San-greal, with more

exultation.

While I was meditating on it with enraptured gaze, Dame Honeyball,

who was highly gratified by the interest it excited, put in my hands

a drinking-cup or goblet which also belonged to the vestry, and was

descended from the old Boar’s Head. It bore the inscription of having

been the gift of Francis Wythers, Knight, and was held, she told me, in

exceeding great value, being considered very “antyke.” This last opinion

was strengthened by the shabby gentleman with the red nose and oilcloth

hat, and whom I strongly suspected of being a lineal descendant from the

variant Bardolph. He suddenly aroused from his meditation on the pot of

porter, and casting a knowing look at the goblet, exclaimed, “Ay, ay!

the head don’t ache now that made that there article.”

The great importance attached to this memento of ancient revelry by

modern churchwardens, at first puzzled me; but there is nothing sharpens

the apprehension so much as antiquarian research; for I immediately

perceived that this could be no other than the identical “parcel-gilt

goblet,” on which Falstaff made his loving but faithless vow to Dame

Quickly, and which would, of course, be treasured up with care among the

regalia of her domains, as a testimony of that solemn contract.*

* “Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt goblet, sitting

in my Dolphin chamber, at the round table, by a sea-coal

fire, on Wednesday, in Whitsun-week, when the prince broke

thy head for likening his father to a singing man at

Windsor; thou didst swear to me then, as I was washing thy

wound, to marry me, and make me my lady, thy wife. Canst

thou deny it?”--Henry IV., Part 2.

Mine hostess, indeed, gave me a long history how the goblet had been

handed down from generation to generation. She also entertained me

with many particulars concerning the worthy vestrymen who have seated

themselves thus quietly on the stools of the ancient roisterers of

Eastcheap, and, like so many commentators, utter clouds of smoke in

honor of Shakespeare. These I forbear to relate, lest my readers should

not be as curious in these matters as myself. Suffice it to say, the

neighbors, one and all, about Eastcheap, believe that Falstaff and his

merry crew actually lived and revelled there. Nay, there are several

legendary anecdotes concerning him still extant among the oldest

frequenters of the Mason’s Arms, which they give as transmitted down

from their forefathers; and Mr. M’Kash, an Irish hair-dresser, whose

shop stands on the site of the old Boar’s Head, has several dry jokes

of Fat Jack’s, not laid down in the books, with which he makes his

customers ready to die of laughter.

I now turned to my friend the sexton to make some further inquiries, but

I found him sunk in pensive meditation. His head had declined a little

on one side; a deep sigh heaved from the very bottom of his stomach,

and, though I could not see a tear trembling in his eye, yet a moisture

was evidently stealing from a corner of his mouth. I followed the

direction of his eye through the door which stood open, and found it

fixed wistfully on the savory breast of lamb, roasting in dripping

richness before the fire.

I now called to mind that in the eagerness of my recondite

investigation, I was keeping the poor man from his dinner. My bowels

yearned with sympathy, and putting in his hand a small token of my

gratitude and goodness, I departed with a hearty benediction on him,

Dame Honeyball, and the parish club of Crooked Lane--not forgetting my

shabby, but sententious friend, in the oil-cloth hat and copper nose.

Thus have I given a “tedious brief” account of this interesting

research, for which, if it prove too short and unsatisfactory, I can

only plead my inexperience in this branch of literature, so deservedly

popular at the present day. I am aware that a more skilful illustrator

of the immortal bard would have swelled the materials I have touched

upon to a good merchantable bulk, comprising the biographies of William

Walworth, Jack Straw, and Robert Preston; some notice of the eminent

fishmongers of St. Michael’s; the history of Eastcheap, great and

little; private anecdotes of Dame Honeyball and her pretty daughter,

whom I have not even mentioned; to say nothing of a damsel tending the

breast of lamb (and whom, by the way, I remarked to be a comely lass

with a neat foot and ankle);--the whole enlivened by the riots of Wat

Tyler, and illuminated by the great fire of London.

All this I leave, as a rich mine, to be worked by future commentators,

nor do I despair of seeing the tobacco-box, and the “parcel-gilt goblet”

which I have thus brought to light the subject of future engravings,

and almost as fruitful of voluminous dissertations and disputes as the

shield of Achilles or the far-famed Portland Vase.

THE MUTABILITY OF LITERATURE.

A COLLOQUY IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

I know that all beneath the moon decays,

And what by mortals in this world is brought,

In time’s great periods shall return to nought.

I know that all the muses’ heavenly rays,

With toil of sprite which are so dearly bought,

As idle sounds, of few or none are sought--

That there is nothing lighter than mere praise.

DRUMMOND OF HAWTHORNDEN.

THERE are certain half-dreaming moods of mind in which we naturally

steal away from noise and glare, and seek some quiet haunt where we may

indulge our reveries and build our air castles undisturbed. In such a

mood I was loitering about the old gray cloisters of Westminster Abbey,

enjoying that luxury of wandering thought which one is apt to dignify

with the name of reflection, when suddenly an irruption of madcap boys

from Westminster school, playing at football, broke in upon the monastic

stillness of the place, making the vaulted passages and mouldering tombs

echo with their merriment. I sought to take refuge from their noise by

penetrating still deeper into the solitudes of the pile, and applied to

one of the vergers for admission to the library. He conducted me through

a portal rich with the crumbling sculpture of former ages, which opened

upon a gloomy passage leading to the chapter-house and the chamber in

which Doomsday Book is deposited. Just within the passage is a small

door on the left. To this the verger applied a key; it was double

locked, and opened with some difficulty, as if seldom used. We now

ascended a dark narrow staircase, and, passing through a second door,

entered the library.

I found myself in a lofty antique hall, the roof supported by massive

joists of old English oak. It was soberly lighted by a row of Gothic

windows at a considerable height from the floor, and which apparently

opened upon the roofs of the cloisters. An ancient picture of some

reverend dignitary of the Church in his robes hung over the fireplace.

Around the hall and in a small gallery were the books, arranged in

carved oaken cases. They consisted principally of old polemical writers,

and were much more worn by time than use. In the centre of the library

was a solitary table with two or three books on it, an inkstand without

ink, and a few pens parched by long disuse. The place seemed fitted

for quiet study and profound meditation. It was buried deep among the

massive walls of the abbey and shut up from the tumult of the world.

I could only hear now and then the shouts of the school-boys faintly

swelling from the cloisters, and the sound of a bell tolling for prayers

echoing soberly along the roofs of the abbey. By degrees the shouts of

merriment grew fainter and fainter, and at length died away; the bell

ceased to toll, and a profound silence reigned through the dusky hall.

I had taken down a little thick quarto, curiously bound in parchment,

with brass clasps, and seated myself at the table in a venerable

elbow-chair. Instead of reading, however, I was beguiled by the solemn

monastic air and lifeless quiet of the place, into a train of musing.

As I looked around upon the old volumes in their mouldering covers, thus

ranged on the shelves and apparently never disturbed in their repose,

I could not but consider the library a kind of literary catacomb, where

authors, like mummies, are piously entombed and left to blacken and

moulder in dusty oblivion.

How much, thought I, has each of these volumes, now thrust aside with

such indifference, cost some aching head! how many weary days! how

many sleepless nights! How have their authors buried themselves in the

solitude of cells and cloisters, shut themselves up from the face of

man, and the still more blessed face of Nature; and devoted themselves

to painful research and intense reflection! And all for what? To occupy

an inch of dusty shelf--to have the titles of their works read now and

then in a future age by some drowsy churchman or casual straggler like

myself, and in another age to be lost even to remembrance. Such is the

amount of this boasted immortality. A mere temporary rumor, a local

sound; like the tone of that bell which has tolled among these towers,

filling the ear for a moment, lingering transiently in echo, and then

passing away, like a thing that was not!

While I sat half-murmuring, half-meditating, these unprofitable

speculations with my head resting on my hand, I was thrumming with the

other hand upon the quarto, until I accidentally loosened the clasps;

when, to my utter astonishment, the little book gave two or three yawns,

like one awaking from a deep sleep, then a husky hem, and at length

began to talk. At first its voice was very hoarse and broken, being much

troubled by a cobweb which some studious spider had woven across it, and

having probably contracted a cold from long exposure to the chills and

damps of the abbey. In a short time, however, it became more distinct,

and I soon found it an exceedingly fluent, conversable little tome.

Its language, to be sure, was rather quaint and obsolete, and its

pronunciation what, in the present day, would be deemed barbarous; but I

shall endeavor, as far as I am able, to render it in modern parlance.

It began with railings about the neglect of the world, about merit being

suffered to languish in obscurity, and other such commonplace topics of

literary repining, and complained bitterly that it had not been opened

for more than two centuries--that the dean only looked now and then into

the library, sometimes took down a volume or two, trifled with them for

a few moments, and then returned them to their shelves. “What a plague

do they mean?” said the little quarto, which I began to perceive was

somewhat choleric--“what a plague do they mean by keeping several

thousand volumes of us shut up here, and watched by a set of old

vergers, like so many beauties in a harem, merely to be looked at now

and then by the dean? Books were written to give pleasure and to be

enjoyed; and I would have a rule passed that the dean should pay each of

us a visit at least once a year; or, if he is not equal to the task, let

them once in a while turn loose the whole school of Westminster among

us, that at any rate we may now and then have an airing.”

“Softly, my worthy friend,” replied I; “you are not aware how much

better you are off than most books of your generation. By being stored

away in this ancient library you are like the treasured remains of those

saints and monarchs which lie enshrined in the adjoining chapels, while

the remains of their contemporary mortals, left to the ordinary course

of Nature, have long since returned to dust.”

“Sir,” said the little tome, ruffling his leaves and looking big, “I

was written for all the world, not for the bookworms of an abbey. I was

intended to circulate from hand to hand, like other great contemporary

works; but here have I been clasped up for more than two centuries, and

might have silently fallen a prey to these worms that are playing the

very vengeance with my intestines if you had not by chance given me an

opportunity of uttering a few last words before I go to pieces.”

“My good friend,” rejoined I, “had you been left to the circulation of

which you speak, you would long ere this have been no more. To judge

from your physiognomy, you are now well stricken in years: very few of

your contemporaries can be at present in existence, and those few owe

their longevity to being immured like yourself in old libraries; which,

suffer me to add, instead of likening to harems, you might more properly

and gratefully have compared to those infirmaries attached to religious

establishments for the benefit of the old and decrepit, and where, by

quiet fostering and no employment, they often endure to an amazingly

good-for-nothing old age. You talk of your contemporaries as if in

circulation. Where do we meet with their works? What do we hear of

Robert Grosteste of Lincoln? No one could have toiled harder than he for

immortality. He is said to have written nearly two hundred volumes. He

built, as it were, a pyramid of books to perpetuate his name: but,

alas! the pyramid has long since fallen, and only a few fragments are

scattered in various libraries, where they are scarcely disturbed

even by the antiquarian. What do we hear of Giraldus Cambrensis, the

historian, antiquary, philosopher, theologian, and poet? He declined two

bishoprics that he might shut himself up and write for posterity; but

posterity never inquires after his labors. What of Henry of Huntingdon,

who, besides a learned history of England, wrote a treatise on the

contempt of the world, which the world has revenged by forgetting him?

What is quoted of Joseph of Exeter, styled the miracle of his age in

classical composition? Of his three great heroic poems, one is lost

forever, excepting a mere fragment; the others are known only to a few

of the curious in literature; and as to his love verses and epigrams,

they have entirely disappeared. What is in current use of John Wallis

the Franciscan, who acquired the name of the tree of life? Of William

of Malmsbury--of Simeon of Durham--of Benedict of Peterborough--of John

Hanvill of St. Albans--of----”

“Prithee, friend,” cried the quarto in a testy tone, “how old do you

think me? You are talking of authors that lived long before my time, and

wrote either in Latin or French, so that they in a manner expatriated

themselves, and deserved to be forgotten;* but I, sir, was ushered into

the world from the press of the renowned Wynkyn de Worde. I was written

in my own native tongue, at a time when the language had become fixed;

and indeed I was considered a model of pure and elegant English.”

(I should observe that these remarks were couched in such intolerably

antiquated terms, that I have had infinite difficulty in rendering them

into modern phraseology.)

“I cry you mercy,” said I, “for mistaking your age; but it matters

little. Almost all the writers of your time have likewise passed into

forgetfulness, and De Worde’s publications are mere literary rarities

among book-collectors. The purity and stability of language, too, on

which you found your claims to perpetuity, have been the fallacious

dependence of authors of every age, even back to the times of the worthy

Robert of Gloucester, who wrote his history in rhymes of mongrel Saxon.+

Even now many talk of Spenser’s ‘well of pure English undefiled,’ as

if the language ever sprang from a well or fountain-head, and was not

rather a mere confluence of various tongues perpetually subject to

changes and intermixtures. It is this which has made English literature

so extremely mutable, and the reputation built upon it so fleeting.

Unless thought can be committed to something more permanent and

unchangeable than such a medium, even thought must share the fate of

everything else, and fall into decay. This should serve as a check

upon the vanity and exultation of the most popular writer. He finds

the language in which he has embarked his fame gradually altering and

subject to the dilapidations of time and the caprice of fashion. He

looks back and beholds the early authors of his country, once the

favorites of their day, supplanted by modern writers. A few short ages

have covered them with obscurity, and their merits can only be relished

by the quaint taste of the bookworm. And such, he anticipates, will be

the fate of his own work, which, however it may be admired in its day

and held up as a model of purity, will in the course of years grow

antiquated and obsolete, until it shall become almost as unintelligible

in its native land as an Egyptian obelisk or one of those Runic

inscriptions said to exist in the deserts of Tartary.” “I declare,” added

I, with some emotion, “when I contemplate a modern library, filled

with new works in all the bravery of rich gilding and binding, I feel

disposed to sit down and weep, like the good Xerxes, when he surveyed

his army, pranked out in all the splendor of military array, and

reflected that in one hundred years not one of them would be in

existence.”

* “In Latin and French hath many soueraine wittes had great

delyte to endite, and have many noble thinges fulfilde, but

certes there ben some that speaken their poisye in French,

of which speche the Frenchmen have as good a fantasye as w

ave in hearying of Frenchmen’s Englishe.”--CHAUCER’S

Testament of Love.

+ Holinshed in his Chronicle, observes, “Afterwards, also,

by diligent vell f Geffry Chaucer and John Gowre, in the

time of Richard the Second, and after them of John Scogan

and John Lydgate, monke of Berrie, our said toong was

brought to an excellent passe, notwithstanding that it never

came unto the type of perfection until the time of Queen

Elizabeth, wherein John Jewell, Bishop of Sarum, John Fox,

and sundrie learned and excellent writers, have fully

accomplished the ornature of the same to their great praise

and mortal commendation.”

“Ah,” said the little quarto, with a heavy sigh, “I see how it is: these

in modern scribblers have superseded all the good old authors. I suppose

nothing is read nowadays but Sir Philip Sidney’s Arcadia, Sackville’s

stately plays and Mirror for Magistrates, or the fine-spun euphuisms of

the ‘unparalleled John Lyly.’”

“There you are again mistaken,” said I; “the writers whom you suppose in

vogue, because they happened to be so when you were last in circulation,

have long since had their day. Sir Philip Sidney’s Arcadia, the

immortality of which was so fondly predicted by his admirers,* and

which, in truth, was full of noble thoughts, delicate images, and

graceful turns of language, is now scarcely ever mentioned. Sackville

has strutted into obscurity; and even Lyly, though his writings were

once the delight of a court, and apparently perpetuated by a proverb, is

now scarcely known even by name. A whole crowd of authors who wrote and

wrangled at the time, have likewise gone down with all their writings

and their controversies. Wave after wave of succeeding literature has

rolled over them, until they are buried so deep, that it is only now and

then that some industrious diver after fragments of antiquity brings up

a specimen for the gratification of the curious.

* “Live ever sweete booke; the simple image of his gentle

witt, and the golden pillar of his noble courage; and ever

notify unto the world that thy writer was the secretary of

eloquence, the breath of the muses, the honey bee of the

daintyest flowers of witt and arte, the pith of morale and

intellectual virtues, the arme of Bellona in the field, the

tongue of Suada in the chamber, the spirits of Practise in

esse, and the paragon of excellence in print.”--Harvey

Pierce’s Supererogation.

“For my part,” I continued, “I consider this mutability of language a

wise precaution of Providence for the benefit of the world at large, and

of authors in particular. To reason from analogy, we daily behold the

varied and beautiful tribes of vegetables springing up, flourishing,

adorning the fields for a short time, and then fading into dust, to

make way for their successors. Were not this the case, the fecundity of

nature would be a grievance instead of a blessing. The earth would groan

with rank and excessive vegetation, and its surface become a tangled

wilderness. In like manner, the works of genius and learning decline and

make way for subsequent productions. Language gradually varies, and with

it fade away the writings of authors who have flourished their allotted

time; otherwise the creative powers of genius would overstock the world,

and the mind would be completely bewildered in the endless mazes of

literature. Formerly there were some restraints on this excessive

multiplication. Works had to be transcribed by hand, which was a slow

and laborious operation; they were written either on parchment, which

was expensive, so that one work was often erased to make way for

another; or on papyrus, which was fragile and extremely perishable.

Authorship was a limited and unprofitable craft, pursued chiefly by

monks in the leisure and solitude of their cloisters. The accumulation

of manuscripts was slow and costly, and confined almost entirely to

monasteries. To these circumstances it may, in some measure, be owing

that we have not been inundated by the intellect of antiquity--that the

fountains of thought have not been broken up, and modern genius drowned

in the deluge. But the inventions of paper and the press have put an end

to all these restraints. They have made every one a writer, and enabled

every mind to pour itself into print, and diffuse itself over the

whole intellectual world. The consequences are alarming. The stream of

literature has swollen into a torrent--augmented into a river-expanded

into a sea. A few centuries since five or six hundred manuscripts

constituted a great library; but what would you say to libraries, such

as actually exist, containing three or four hundred thousand volumes;

legions of authors at the same time busy; and the press going on with

fearfully increasing activity, to double and quadruple the number?

Unless some unforeseen mortality should break out among the progeny of

the Muse, now that she has become so prolific, I tremble for posterity.

I fear the mere fluctuation of language will not be sufficient.

Criticism may do much; it increases with the increase of literature,

and resembles one of those salutary checks on population spoken of by

economists. All possible encouragement, therefore, should be given to

the growth of critics, good or bad. But I fear all will be in vain; let

criticism do what it may, writers will write, printers will print, and

the world will inevitably be overstocked with good books. It will soon

be the employment of a lifetime merely to learn their names. Many a man

of passable information at the present day reads scarcely anything but

reviews, and before long a man of erudition will be little better than a

mere walking catalogue.”

“My very good sir,” said the little quarto, yawning most drearily in my

face, “excuse my interrupting you, but I perceive you are rather given

to prose. I would ask the fate of an author who was making some noise

just as I left the world. His reputation, however, was considered quite

temporary. The learned shook their heads at him, for he was a poor,

half-educated varlet, that knew little of Latin, and nothing of Greek,

and had been obliged to run the country for deer-stealing. I think his

name was Shakespeare. I presume he soon sunk into oblivion.”

“On the contrary,” said I, “it is owing to that very man that the

literature of his period has experienced a duration beyond the ordinary

term of English literature. There rise authors now and then who seem

proof against the mutability of language because they have rooted

themselves in the unchanging principles of human nature. They are like

gigantic trees that we sometimes see on the banks of a stream, which

by their vast and deep roots, penetrating through the mere surface and

laying hold on the very foundations of the earth, preserve the soil

around them from being swept away by the ever-flowing current, and hold

up many a neighboring plant, and perhaps worthless weed, to perpetuity.

Such is the case with Shakespeare, whom we behold defying the

encroachments of time, retaining in modern use the language and

literature of his day, and giving duration to many an indifferent

author, merely from having flourished in his vicinity. But even he, I

grieve to say, is gradually assuming the tint of age, and his whole form

is overrun by a profusion of commentators, who, like clambering vines

and creepers, almost bury the noble plant that upholds them.”

Here the little quarto began to heave his sides and chuckle, until at

length he broke out into a plethoric fit of laughter that had wellnigh

choked him by reason of his excessive corpulency. “Mighty well!” cried

he, as soon as he could recover breath, “mighty well! and so you would

persuade me that the literature of an age is to be perpetuated by a

vagabond deer-stealer! by a man without learning! by a poet! forsooth--a

poet!” And here he wheezed forth another fit of laughter.

I confess that I felt somewhat nettled at this rudeness, which, however,

I pardoned on account of his having flourished in a less polished age. I

determined, nevertheless, not to give up my point.

“Yes,” resumed I positively, “a poet; for of all writers he has the best

chance for immortality. Others may write from the head, but he writes

from the heart, and the heart will always understand him. He is the

faithful portrayer of Nature, whose features are always the same and

always interesting. Prose writers are voluminous and unwieldy; their

pages crowded with commonplaces, and their thoughts expanded into

tediousness. But with the true poet every thing is terse, touching, or

brilliant. He gives the choicest thoughts in the choicest language. He

illustrates them by everything that he sees most striking in nature and

art. He enriches them by pictures of human life, such as it is passing

before him. His writings, therefore, contain the spirit, the aroma, if I

may use the phrase, of the age in which he lives. They are caskets which

inclose within a small compass the wealth of the language--its family

jewels, which are thus transmitted in a portable form to posterity. The

setting may occasionally be antiquated, and require now and then to be

renewed, as in the case of Chaucer; but the brilliancy and intrinsic

value of the gems continue unaltered. Cast a look back over the long

reach of literary history. What vast valleys of dulness, filled with

monkish legends and academical controversies! What bogs of theological

speculations! What dreary wastes of metaphysics! Here and there only

do we behold the heaven-illumined bards, elevated like beacons on

their widely-separated heights, to transmit the pure light of poetical

intelligence from age to age.” *

I was just about to launch forth into eulogiums upon the poets of the

day when the sudden opening of the door caused me to turn my head. It

was the verger, who came to inform me that it was time to close the

library. I sought to have a parting word with the quarto, but the worthy

little tome was silent; the clasps were closed: and it looked perfectly

unconscious of all that had passed. I have been to the library two

or three times since, and have endeavored to draw it into further

conversation, but in vain; and whether all this rambling colloquy

actually took place, or whether it was another of those old day-dreams

to which I am subject, I have never, to this moment, been able to

discover.

* Thorow earth and waters deepe,

The pen by skill doth passe:

And featly nyps the worldes abuse,

And shoes us in a glasse,

The vertu and the vice

Of every wight alyve;

The honey comb that bee doth make

Is not so sweet in hyve,

As are the golden leves

That drops from poet’s head!

Which doth surmount our common talke

As farre as dross doth lead.

Churchyard.

RURAL FUNERALS.

Here’s a few flowers! but about midnight more:

The herbs that have oil them cold dew o’ the night

Are strewings fitt’st for graves----

You were as flowers now withered; even so

These herblets shall, which we upon you strow.

CYMBELINE.

AMONG the beautiful and simple-hearted customs of rural life which still

linger in some parts of England are those of strewing flowers before the

funerals and planting them at the graves of departed friends. These, it

is said, are the remains of some of the rites of the primitive Church;

but they are of still higher antiquity, having been observed among the

Greeks and Romans, and frequently mentioned by their writers, and were

no doubt the spontaneous tributes of unlettered affection, originating

long before art had tasked itself to modulate sorrow into song or story

it on the monument. They are now only to be met with in the most distant

and retired places of the kingdom, where fashion and innovation have not

been able to throng in and trample out all the curious and interesting

traces of the olden time.

In Glamorganshire, we are told, the bed whereon the corpse lies is

covered with flowers, a custom alluded to in one of the wild and

plaintive ditties of Ophelia:

White his shroud as the mountain snow,

Larded all with sweet flowers;

Which be-wept to the grave did go,

With true love showers.

There is also a most delicate and beautiful rite observed in some of

the remote villages of the south at the funeral of a female who has

died young and unmarried. A chaplet of white flowers is borne before

the corpse by a young girl nearest in age, size, and resemblance, and

is afterwards hung up in the church over the accustomed seat of the

deceased. These chaplets are sometimes made of white paper, in imitation

of flowers, and inside of them is generally a pair of white gloves. They

are intended as emblems of the purity of the deceased, and the crown of

glory which she has received in heaven.

In some parts of the country, also, the dead are carried to the grave

with the singing of psalms and hymns--a kind of triumph, “to show,” says

Bourne, “that they have finished their course with joy, and are become

conquerors.” This, I am informed, is observed in some of the northern

counties, particularly in Northumberland, and it has a pleasing, though

melancholy effect to hear of a still evening in some lonely country

scene the mournful melody of a funeral dirge swelling from a distance,

and to see the train slowly moving along the landscape.

Thus, thus, and thus, we compass round

Thy harmless and unhaunted ground,

And as we sing thy dirge, we will,

The daffodill

And other flowers lay upon

The altar of our love, thy stone.

HERRICK.

There is also a solemn respect paid by the traveller to the passing

funeral in these sequestered places; for such spectacles, occurring

among the quiet abodes of Nature, sink deep into the soul. As the

mourning train approaches he pauses, uncovered, to let it go by; he then

follows silently in the rear; sometimes quite to the grave, at other

times for a few hundred yards, and, having paid this tribute of respect

to the deceased, turns and resumes his journey.

The rich vein of melancholy which runs through the English character,

and gives it some of its most touching and ennobling graces, is finely

evidenced in these pathetic customs, and in the solicitude shown by the

common people for an honored and a peaceful grave. The humblest peasant,

whatever may be his lowly lot while living, is anxious that some little

respect may be paid to his remains. Sir Thomas Overbury, describing the

“faire and happy milkmaid,” observes, “thus lives she, and all her care

is, that she may die in the spring-time, to have store of flowers stucke

upon her winding-sheet.” The poets, too, who always breathe the feeling

of a nation, continually advert to this fond solicitude about the grave.

In The Maid’s Tragedy, by Beaumont and Fletcher, there is a beautiful

instance of the kind describing the capricious melancholy of a

broken-hearted girl:

When she sees a bank

Stuck full of flowers, she, with a sigh, will tell

Her servants, what a pretty place it were

To bury lovers in; and made her maids

Bluck ‘em, and strew her over like a corse.

The custom of decorating graves was once universally prevalent: osiers

were carefully bent over them to keep the turf uninjured, and about

them were planted evergreens and flowers. “We adorn their graves,” says

Evelyn, in his Sylva, “with flowers and redolent plants, just emblems

of the life of man, which has been compared in Holy Scriptures to those

fading beauties whose roots, being buried in dishonor, rise, again in

glory.” This usage has now become extremely rare in England; but it

may still be met with in the churchyards of retired villages, among the

Welsh mountains; and I recollect an instance of it at the small town of

Ruthven, which lies at the head of the beautiful vale of Clewyd. I have

been told also by a friend, who was present at the funeral of a young

girl in Glamorganshire, that the female attendants had their aprons full

of flowers, which, as soon as the body was interred, they stuck about

the grave.

He noticed several graves which had been decorated in the same manner.

As the flowers had been merely stuck in the ground, and not planted,

they had soon withered, and might be seen in various states of decay;

some drooping, others quite perished. They were afterwards to be

supplanted by holly, rosemary, and other evergreens, which on some

graves had grown to great luxuriance, and overshadowed the tombstones.

There was formerly a melancholy fancifulness in the arrangement of these

rustic offerings, that had something in it truly poetical. The rose

was sometimes blended with the lily, to form a general emblem of frail

mortality. “This sweet flower,” said Evelyn, “borne on a branch set with

thorns and accompanied with the lily, are natural hieroglyphics of our

fugitive, umbratile, anxious, and transitory life, which, making so

fair a show for a time, is not yet without its thorns and crosses.” The

nature and color of the flowers, and of the ribbons with which they were

tied, had often a particular reference to the qualities or story of the

deceased, or were expressive of the feelings of the mourner. In an

old poem, entitled “Corydon’s Doleful Knell,” a lover specifies the

decorations he intends to use:

A garland shall be framed

By art and nature’s skill,

Of sundry-colored flowers,

In token of good-will.

And sundry-colored ribbons

On it I will bestow;

But chiefly blacke and yellowe

With her to grave shall go.

I’ll deck her tomb with flowers

The rarest ever seen;

And with my tears as showers

I’ll keep them fresh and green.

The white rose, we are told, was planted at the grave of a virgin; her

chaplet was tied with white ribbons, in token of her spotless innocence,

though sometimes black ribbons were intermingled, to bespeak the grief

of the survivors. The red rose was occasionally used, in remembrance of

such as had been remarkable for benevolence; but roses in general were

appropriated to the graves of lovers. Evelyn tells us that the custom

was not altogether extinct in his time, near his dwelling in the county

of Surrey, “where the maidens yearly planted and decked the graves

of their defunct sweethearts with rose-bushes.” And Camden likewise

remarks, in his Britannia: “Here is also a certain custom, observed time

out of mind, of planting rose-trees upon the graves, especially by the

young men and maids who have lost their loves; so that this churchyard

is now full of them.”

When the deceased had been unhappy in their loves, emblems of a more

gloomy character were used, such as the yew and cypress, and if flowers

were strewn, they were of the most melancholy colors. Thus, in poems by

Thomas Stanley, Esq. (published in 1651), is the following stanza:

Yet strew

Upon my dismall grave

Such offerings as you have,

Forsaken cypresse and yewe;

For kinder flowers can take no birth

Or growth from such unhappy earth.

In The Maid’s Tragedy, a pathetic little air, is introduced,

illustrative of this mode of decorating the funerals of females who had

been disappointed in love:

Lay a garland on my hearse

Of the dismall yew,

Maidens, willow branches wear,

Say I died true.

My love was false, but I was firm,

From my hour of birth;

Upon my buried body lie

Lightly, gentle earth.

The natural effect of sorrow over the dead is to refine and elevate

the mind; and we have a proof of it in the purity of sentiment and the

unaffected elegance of thought which pervaded the whole of these

funeral observances. Thus it was an especial precaution that none but

sweet-scented evergreens and flowers should be employed. The intention

seems to have been to soften the horrors of the tomb, to beguile the

mind from brooding over the disgraces of perishing mortality, and

to associate the memory of the deceased with the most delicate and

beautiful objects in nature. There is a dismal process going on in the

grave, ere dust can return to its kindred dust, which the imagination

shrinks from contemplating; and we seek still to think of the form

we have loved, with those refined associations which it awakened when

blooming before us in youth and beauty. “Lay her i’ the earth,” says

Laertes, of his virgin sister,

And from her fair and unpolluted flesh

May violets spring.

Herrick, also, in his “Dirge of Jephtha,” pours forth a fragrant flow

of poetical thought and image, which in a manner embalms the dead in the

recollections of the living.

Sleep in thy peace, thy bed of spice,

And make this place all Paradise:

May sweets grow here! and smoke from hence

Fat frankincense.

Let balme and cassia send their scent

From out thy maiden monument.

* * * * *

May all shie maids at wonted hours

Come forth to strew thy tombe with flowers!

May virgins, when they come to mourn

Male incense burn

Upon thine altar! then return

And leave thee sleeping in thy urn.

I might crowd my pages with extracts from the older British poets, who

wrote when these rites were more prevalent, and delighted frequently

to allude to them; but I have already quoted more than is necessary. I

cannot, however, refrain from giving a passage from Shakespeare, even

though it should appear trite, which illustrates the emblematical

meaning often conveyed in these floral tributes, and at the same time

possesses that magic of language and appositeness of imagery for which

he stands pre-eminent.

With fairest flowers,

Whilst summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele,

I’ll sweeten thy sad grave; thou shalt not lack

The flower that’s like thy face, pale primrose; nor

The azured harebell like thy veins; no, nor

The leaf of eglantine; whom not to slander,

Outsweetened not thy breath.

There is certainly something more affecting in these prompt and

spontaneous offerings of Nature than in the most costly monuments of

art; the hand strews the flower while the heart is warm, and the tear

falls on the grave as affection is binding the osier round the sod; but

pathos expires under the slow labor of the chisel, and is chilled among

the cold conceits of sculptured marble.

It is greatly to be regretted that a custom so truly elegant and

touching has disappeared from general use, and exists only in the most

remote and insignificant villages. But it seems as if poetical custom

always shuns the walks of cultivated society. In proportion as people

grow polite they cease to be poetical. They talk of poetry, but they

have learnt to check its free impulses, to distrust its sallying

emotions, and to supply its most affecting and picturesque usages by

studied form and pompous ceremonial. Few pageants can be more stately

and frigid than an English funeral in town. It is made up of show and

gloomy parade: mourning carriages, mourning horses, mourning plumes,

and hireling mourners, who make a mockery of grief. “There is a grave

digged,” says Jeremy Taylor, “and a solemn mourning, and a great talk

in the neighborhood, and when the daies are finished, they shall be, and

they shall be remembered no more.” The associate in the gay and crowded

city is soon forgotten; the hurrying succession of new intimates and new

pleasures effaces him from our minds, and the very scenes and circles in

which he moved are incessantly fluctuating. But funerals in the country

are solemnly impressive. The stroke of death makes a wider space in

the village circle, and is an awful event in the tranquil uniformity

of rural life. The passing bell tolls its knell in every ear; it steals

with its pervading melancholy over hill and vale, and saddens all the

landscape.

The fixed and unchanging features of the country also perpetuate

the memory of the friend with whom we once enjoyed them, who was the

companion of our most retired walks, and gave animation to every lonely

scene. His idea is associated with every charm of Nature; we hear his

voice in the echo which he once delighted to awaken; his spirit haunts

the grove which he once frequented; we think of him in the wild upland

solitude or amidst the pensive beauty of the valley. In the freshness of

joyous morning we remember his beaming smiles and bounding gayety;

and when sober evening returns with its gathering shadows and subduing

quiet, we call to mind many a twilight hour of gentle talk and

sweet-souled melancholy.

Each lonely place shall him restore,

For him the tear be duly shed;

Beloved till life can charm no more,

And mourn’d till pity’s self be dead.

Another cause that perpetuates the memory of the deceased in the country

is that the grave is more immediately in sight of the survivors. They

pass it on their way to prayer; it meets their eyes when their hearts

are softened by the exercises of devotion; they linger about it on

the Sabbath, when the mind is disengaged from worldly cares and most

disposed to turn aside from present pleasures and present loves and

to sit down among the solemn mementos of the past. In North Wales the

peasantry kneel and pray over the graves of their deceased friends

for several Sundays after the interment; and where the tender rite of

strewing and planting flowers is still practised, it is always renewed

on Easter, Whitsuntide, and other festivals, when the season brings

the companion of former festivity more vividly to mind. It is also

invariably performed by the nearest relatives and friends; no menials

nor hirelings are employed, and if a neighbor yields assistance, it

would be deemed an insult to offer compensation.

I have dwelt upon this beautiful rural custom, because as it is one of

the last, so is it one of the holiest, offices of love. The grave is

the ordeal of true affection. It is there that the divine passion of the

soul manifests its superiority to the instinctive impulse of mere animal

attachment. The latter must be continually refreshed and kept alive by

the presence of its object, but the love that is seated in the soul can

live on long remembrance. The mere inclinations of sense languish and

decline with the charms which excited them, and turn with shuddering

disgust from the dismal precincts of the tomb; but it is thence that

truly spiritual affection rises, purified from every sensual desire, and

returns, like a holy flame, to illumine and sanctify the heart of the

survivor.

The sorrow for the dead is the only sorrow from which we refuse to be

divorced. Every other wound we seek to heal, every other affliction

to forget; but this wound we consider it a duty to keep open, this

affliction we cherish and brood over in solitude. Where is the mother

who would willingly forget the infant that perished like a blossom from

her arms though every recollection is a pang? Where is the child that

would willingly forget the most tender of parents, though to remember be

but to lament? Who, even in the hour of agony, would forget the friend

over whom he mourns? Who, even when the tomb is closing upon the remains

of her he most loved, when he feels his heart, as it were, crushed in

the closing of its portal, would accept of consolation that must be

bought by forgetfulness? No, the love which survives the tomb is one of

the noblest attributes of the soul. If it has its woes, it has likewise

its delights; and when the overwhelming burst of grief is calmed

into the gentle tear of recollection, when the sudden anguish and the

convulsive agony over the present ruins of all that we most loved is

softened away into pensive meditation on all that it was in the days of

its loveliness, who would root out such a sorrow from the heart? Though

it may sometimes throw a passing cloud over the bright hour of gayety,

or spread a deeper sadness over the hour of gloom, yet who would

exchange it even for the song of pleasure or the burst of revelry? No,

there is a voice from the tomb sweeter than song. There is a remembrance

of the dead to which we turn even from the charms of the living. Oh,

the grave! the grave! It buries every error, covers every defect,

extinguishes every resentment! From its peaceful bosom spring none but

fond regrets and tender recollections. Who can look down upon the grave

even of an enemy, and not feel a compunctious throb that he should ever

have warred with the poor handful of earth that lies mouldering before

him?

But the grave of those we loved--what a place for meditation! There

it is that we call up in long review the whole history of virtue

and gentleness, and the thousand endearments lavished upon us almost

unheeded in the daily intercourse of intimacy; there it is that we dwell

upon the tenderness, the solemn, awful tenderness, of the parting

scene. The bed of death, with all its stifled griefs--its noiseless

attendance--its mute, watchful assiduities. The last testimonies

of expiring love! The feeble, fluttering, thrilling--oh, how

thrilling!--pressure of the hand! The faint, faltering accents,

struggling in death to give one more assurance of affection! The last

fond look of the glazing eye, turning upon us even from the threshold of

existence!

Ay, go to the grave of buried love and meditate! There settle the

account with thy conscience for every past benefit unrequited--every

past endearment unregarded, of that departed being who can

never-never--never return to be soothed by thy contrition!

If thou art a child, and hast ever added a sorrow to the soul or a

furrow to the silvered brow of an affectionate parent; if thou art a

husband, and hast ever caused the fond bosom that ventured its whole

happiness in thy arms to doubt one moment of thy kindness or thy truth;

if thou art a friend, and hast ever wronged, in thought or word or deed,

the spirit that generously confided in thee; if thou art a lover, and

hast ever given one unmerited pang to that true heart which now lies

cold and still beneath thy feet,--then be sure that every unkind look,

every ungracious word, every ungentle action will come thronging back

upon thy memory and knocking dolefully at thy soul: then be sure that

thou wilt lie down sorrowing and repentant on the grave, and utter

the unheard groan and pour the unavailing tear, more deep, more bitter

because unheard and unavailing.

Then weave thy chaplet of flowers and strew the beauties of Nature about

the grave; console thy broken spirit, if thou canst, with these tender

yet futile tributes of regret; but take warning by the bitterness of

this thy contrite affliction over the dead, and henceforth be more

faithful and affectionate in the discharge of thy duties to the living.

* * * * *

In writing the preceding article it was not intended to give a full

detail of the funeral customs of the English peasantry, but merely to

furnish a few hints and quotations illustrative of particular rites, to

be appended, by way of note, to another paper, which has been withheld.

The article swelled insensibly into its present form, and this is

mentioned as an apology for so brief and casual a notice of these usages

after they have been amply and learnedly investigated in other works.

I must observe, also, that I am well aware that this custom of adorning

graves with flowers prevails in other countries besides England. Indeed,

in some it is much more general, and is observed even by the rich and

fashionable; but it is then apt to lose its simplicity and to degenerate

into affectation. Bright, in his travels in Lower Hungary, tells of

monuments of marble and recesses formed for retirement, with seats

placed among bowers of greenhouse plants, and that the graves generally

are covered with the gayest flowers of the season. He gives a casual

picture of filial piety which I cannot but transcribe; for I trust it is

as useful as it is delightful to illustrate the amiable virtues of the

sex. “When I was at Berlin,” says he, “I followed the celebrated Iffland

to the grave. Mingled with some pomp you might trace much real feeling.

In the midst of the ceremony my attention was attracted by a young

woman who stood on a mound of earth newly covered with turf, which she

anxiously protected from the feet of the passing crowd. It was the tomb

of her parent; and the figure of this affectionate daughter presented a

monument more striking than the most costly work of art.”

I will barely add an instance of sepulchral decoration that I once

met with among the mountains of Switzerland. It was at the village of

Gersau, which stands on the borders of the Lake of Lucerne, at the foot

of Mount Rigi. It was once the capital of a miniature republic shut up

between the Alps and the lake, and accessible on the land side only by

footpaths. The whole force of the republic did not exceed six hundred

fighting men, and a few miles of circumference, scooped out as it were

from the bosom of the mountains, comprised its territory. The village

of Gersau seemed separated from the rest of the world, and retained

the golden simplicity of a purer age. It had a small church, with a

burying-ground adjoining. At the heads of the graves were placed crosses

of wood or iron. On some were affixed miniatures, rudely executed, but

evidently attempts at likenesses of the deceased. On the crosses

were hung chaplets of flowers, some withering others fresh, as if

occasionally renewed. I paused with interest at this scene: I felt

that I was at the source of poetical description, for these were the

beautiful but unaffected offerings of the heart which poets are fain to

record. In a gayer and more populous place I should have suspected them

to have been suggested by factitious sentiment derived from books; but

the good people of Gersau knew little of books; there was not a novel

nor a love-poem in the village, and I question whether any peasant of

the place dreamt, while he was twining a fresh chaplet for the grave of

his mistress, that he was fulfilling one of the most fanciful rites of

poetical devotion, and that he was practically a poet.

THE INN KITCHEN.

Shall I not take mine ease in mine inn?

FALSTAFF.

DURING a journey that I once made through the Netherlands, I had arrived

one evening at the Pomme d’Or, the principal inn of a small Flemish

village. It was after the hour of the table d’hote, so that I was

obliged to make a solitary supper from the relics of its ampler board.

The weather was chilly; I was seated alone in one end of a great gloomy

dining-room, and, my repast being over, I had the prospect before me

of a long dull evening, without any visible means of enlivening it. I

summoned mine host and requested something to read; he brought me the

whole literary stock of his household, a Dutch family Bible, an almanac

in the same language, and a number of old Paris newspapers. As I sat

dozing over one of the latter, reading old news and stale criticisms,

my ear was now and then struck with bursts of laughter which seemed to

proceed from the kitchen. Every one that has travelled on the Continent

must know how favorite a resort the kitchen of a country inn is to the

middle and inferior order of travellers, particularly in that equivocal

kind of weather when a fire becomes agreeable toward evening. I threw

aside the newspaper and explored my way to the kitchen, to take a peep

at the group that appeared to be so merry. It was composed partly of

travellers who had arrived some hours before in a diligence, and partly

of the usual attendants and hangers-on of inns. They were seated round

a great burnished stove, that might have been mistaken for an altar at

which they were worshipping. It was covered with various kitchen vessels

of resplendent brightness, among which steamed and hissed a huge copper

tea-kettle. A large lamp threw a strong mass of light upon the group,

bringing out many odd features in strong relief. Its yellow rays

partially illumined the spacious kitchen, dying duskily away into remote

corners, except where they settled in mellow radiance on the broad side

of a flitch of bacon or were reflected back from well-scoured utensils

that gleamed from the midst of obscurity. A strapping Flemish lass,

with long golden pendants in her ears and a necklace with a golden heart

suspended to it, was the presiding priestess of the temple.

Many of the company were furnished with pipes, and most of them with

some kind of evening potation. I found their mirth was occasioned by

anecdotes which a little swarthy Frenchman, with a dry weazen face and

large whiskers, was giving of his love-adventures; at the end of each of

which there was one of those bursts of honest unceremonious laughter in

which a man indulges in that temple of true liberty, an inn.

As I had no better mode of getting through a tedious blustering evening,

I took my seat near the stove, and listened to a variety of travellers’

tales, some very extravagant and most very dull. All of them, however,

have faded from my treacherous memory except one, which I will endeavor

to relate. I fear, however, it derived its chief zest from the manner in

which it was told, and the peculiar air and appearance of the narrator.

He was a corpulent old Swiss, who had the look of a veteran traveller.

He was dressed in a tarnished green travelling-jacket, with a broad belt

round his waist, and a pair of overalls with buttons from the hips to

the ankles. He was of a full rubicund countenance, with a double chin,

aquiline nose, and a pleasant twinkling eye. His hair was light, and

curled from under an old green velvet travelling-cap stuck on one side

of his head. He was interrupted more than once by the arrival of guests

or the remarks of his auditors, and paused now and then to replenish his

pipe; at which times he had generally a roguish leer and a sly joke for

the buxom kitchen-maid.

I wish my readers could imagine the old fellow lolling in a huge

arm-chair, one arm a-kimbo, the other holding a curiously twisted

tobacco-pipe formed of genuine ecume de mer, decorated with silver chain

and silken tassel, his head cocked on one side, and a whimsical cut of

the eye occasionally as he related the following story.

THE SPECTRE BRIDEGROOM.

A TRAVELLER’S TALE.*

He that supper for is dight,

He lyes full cold, I trow, this night!

Yestreen to chamber I him led,

This night Gray-steel has made his bed!

SIR EGER, SIR GRAHAME, and SIR GRAY-STEEL.

ON the summit of one of the heights of the Odenwald, a wild and romantic

tract of Upper Germany that lies not far from the confluence of the

Main and the Rhine, there stood many, many years since the castle of the

Baron Von Landshort. It is now quite fallen to decay, and almost

buried among beech trees and dark firs; above which, however, its old

watch-tower may still be seen struggling, like the former possessor I

have mentioned, to carry a high head and look down upon the neighboring

country.

The baron was a dry branch of the great family of Katzenellenbogen,+

and inherited the relics of the property and all the pride, of his

ancestors. Though the warlike disposition of his predecessors had much

impaired the family possessions, yet the baron still endeavored to keep

up some show of former state. The times were peaceable, and the German

nobles in general had abandoned their inconvenient old castles, perched

like eagles’ nests among the mountains, and had built more convenient

residences in the valleys; still, the baron remained proudly drawn up in

his little fortress, cherishing with hereditary inveteracy all the

old family feuds, so that he was on ill terms with some of his nearest

neighbors, on account of disputes that had happened between their

great-great-grandfathers.

* The erudite reader, well versed in good-for-nothing lore,

will perceive that the above Tale must have been suggested

to the old Swiss by a little French anecdote, a circumstance

said to have taken place in Paris.

+ I.e., CAT’S ELBOW--the name of a family of those parts,

and very powerful in former times. The appellation, we are

told, was given in compliment to a peerless dame of the

family, celebrated for a fine arm.

The baron had but one child, a daughter, but Nature, when she grants but

one child, always compensates by making it a prodigy; and so it was with

the daughter of the baron. All the nurses, gossips, and country cousins

assured her father that she had not her equal for beauty in all Germany;

and who should know better than they? She had, moreover, been brought up

with great care under the superintendence of two maiden aunts, who had

spent some years of their early life at one of the little German courts,

and were skilled in all branches of knowledge necessary to the education

of a fine lady. Under their instructions she became a miracle of

accomplishments. By the time she was eighteen she could embroider to

admiration, and had worked whole histories of the saints in tapestry

with such strength of expression in their countenances that they

looked like so many souls in purgatory. She could read without great

difficulty, and had spelled her way through several Church legends and

almost all the chivalric wonders of the Heldenbuch. She had even made

considerable proficiency in writing; could sign her own name without

missing a letter, and so legibly that her aunts could read it without

spectacles. She excelled in making little elegant good-for-nothing,

lady-like knicknacks of all kinds, was versed in the most abstruse

dancing of the day, played a number of airs on the harp and guitar, and

knew all the tender ballads of the Minnelieders by heart.

Her aunts, too, having been great flirts and coquettes in their younger

days, were admirably calculated to be vigilant guardians and strict

censors of the conduct of their niece; for there is no duenna so rigidly

prudent and inexorably decorous as a superannuated coquette. She was

rarely suffered out of their sight; never went beyond the domains of

the castle unless well attended, or rather well watched; had continual

lectures read to her about strict decorum and implicit obedience; and,

as to the men--pah!--she was taught to hold them at such a distance and

in such absolute distrust that, unless properly authorized, she would

not have cast a glance upon the handsomest cavalier in the world--no,

not if he were even dying at her feet.

The good effects of this system were wonderfully apparent. The young

lady was a pattern of docility and correctness. While others were

wasting their sweetness in the glare of the world, and liable to be

plucked and thrown aside by every hand, she was coyly blooming into

fresh and lovely womanhood under the protection of those immaculate

spinsters, like a rosebud blushing forth among guardian thorns. Her

aunts looked upon her with pride and exultation, and vaunted that,

though all the other young ladies in the world might go astray, yet

thank Heaven, nothing of the kind could happen to the heiress of

Katzenellenbogen.

But, however scantily the Baron Von Landshort might be provided with

children, his household was by no means a small one; for Providence

had enriched him with abundance of poor relations. They, one and all,

possessed the affectionate disposition common to humble relatives--were

wonderfully attached to the baron, and took every possible occasion

to come in swarms and enliven the castle. All family festivals were

commemorated by these good people at the baron’s expense; and when they

were filled with good cheer they would declare that there was nothing

on earth so delightful as these family meetings, these jubilees of the

heart.

The baron, though a small man, had a large soul, and it swelled with

satisfaction at the consciousness of being the greatest man in the

little world about him. He loved to tell long stories about the stark

old warriors whose portraits looked grimly down from the walls around,

and he found no listeners equal to those who fed at his expense. He

was much given to the marvellous and a firm believer in all those

supernatural tales with which every mountain and valley in Germany

abounds. The faith of his guests exceeded even his own: they listened

to every tale of wonder with open eyes and mouth, and never failed to be

astonished, even though repeated for the hundredth time. Thus lived the

Baron Von Landshort, the oracle of his table, the absolute monarch of

his little territory, and happy, above all things, in the persuasion

that he was the wisest man of the age.

At the time of which my story treats there was a great family gathering

at the castle on an affair of the utmost importance: it was to receive

the destined bridegroom of the baron’s daughter. A negotiation had been

carried on between the father and an old nobleman of Bavaria to unite

the dignity of their houses by the marriage of their children. The

preliminaries had been conducted with proper punctilio. The young people

were betrothed without seeing each other, and the time was appointed for

the marriage ceremony. The young Count Von Altenburg had been recalled

from the army for the purpose, and was actually on his way to the

baron’s to receive his bride. Missives had even been received from him

from Wurtzburg, where he was accidentally detained, mentioning the day

and hour when he might be expected to arrive.

The castle was in a tumult of preparation to give him a suitable

welcome. The fair bride had been decked out with uncommon care. The two

aunts had superintended her toilet, and quarrelled the whole morning

about every article of her dress. The young lady had taken advantage of

their contest to follow the bent of her own taste; and fortunately

it was a good one. She looked as lovely as youthful bridegroom could

desire, and the flutter of expectation heightened the lustre of her

charms.

The suffusions that mantled her face and neck, the gentle heaving of

the bosom, the eye now and then lost in reverie, all betrayed the soft

tumult that was going on in her little heart. The aunts were continually

hovering around her, for maiden aunts are apt to take great interest in

affairs of this nature. They were giving her a world of staid counsel

how to deport herself, what to say, and in what manner to receive the

expected lover.

The baron was no less busied in preparations. He had, in truth, nothing

exactly to do; but he was naturally a fuming, bustling little man, and

could not remain passive when all the world was in a hurry. He worried

from top to bottom of the castle with an air of infinite anxiety; he

continually called the servants from their work to exhort them to be

diligent; and buzzed about every hall and chamber, as idly restless and

importunate as a blue-bottle fly on a warm summer’s day.

In the mean time the fatted calf had been killed; the forests had rung

with the clamor of the huntsmen; the kitchen was crowded with good

cheer; the cellars had yielded up whole oceans of Rhein-wein and

Ferre-wein; and even the great Heidelberg tun had been laid under

contribution. Everything was ready to receive the distinguished guest

with Saus und Braus in the true spirit of German hospitality; but the

guest delayed to make his appearance. Hour rolled after hour. The sun,

that had poured his downward rays upon the rich forest of the Odenwald,

now just gleamed along the summits of the mountains. The baron mounted

the highest tower and strained his eyes in hopes of catching a distant

sight of the count and his attendants. Once he thought he beheld them;

the sound of horns came floating from the valley, prolonged by the

mountain-echoes. A number of horsemen were seen far below slowly

advancing along the road; but when they had nearly reached the foot of

the mountain they suddenly struck off in a different direction. The last

ray of sunshine departed, the bats began to flit by in the twilight, the

road grew dimmer and dimmer to the view, and nothing appeared stirring

in it but now and then a peasant lagging homeward from his labor.

While the old castle of Landshort was in this state of perplexity a very

interesting scene was transacting in a different part of the Odenwald.

The young Count Von Altenburg was tranquilly pursuing his route in that

sober jog-trot way in which a man travels toward matrimony when his

friends have taken all the trouble and uncertainty of courtship off his

hands and a bride is waiting for him as certainly as a dinner at the

end of his journey. He had encountered at Wurtzburg a youthful

companion-in-arms with whom he had seen some service on the

frontiers--Herman Von Starkenfaust, one of the stoutest hands and

worthiest hearts of German chivalry--who was now returning from the

army. His father’s castle was not far distant from the old fortress of

Landshort, although an hereditary feud rendered the families hostile and

strangers to each other.

In the warm-hearted moment of recognition the young friends related all

their past adventures and fortunes, and the count gave the whole history

of his intended nuptials with a young lady whom he had never seen, but

of whose charms he had received the most enrapturing descriptions.

As the route of the friends lay in the same direction, they agreed to

perform the rest of their journey together, and that they might do it

the more leisurely, set off from Wurtzburg at an early hour, the count

having given directions for his retinue to follow and overtake him.

They beguiled their wayfaring with recollections of their military

scenes and adventures; but the count was apt to be a little tedious now

and then about the reputed charms of his bride and the felicity that

awaited him.

In this way they had entered among the mountains of the Odenwald, and

were traversing one of its most lonely and thickly wooded passes. It is

well known that the forests of Germany have always been as much infested

by robbers as its castles by spectres; and at this time the former were

particularly numerous, from the hordes of disbanded soldiers wandering

about the country. It will not appear extraordinary, therefore, that the

cavaliers were attacked by a gang of these stragglers, in the midst

of the forest. They defended themselves with bravery, but were nearly

overpowered when the count’s retinue arrived to their assistance. At

sight of them the robbers fled, but not until the count had received a

mortal wound. He was slowly and carefully conveyed back to the city

of Wurtzburg, and a friar summoned from a neighboring convent who was

famous for his skill in administering to both soul and body; but half

of his skill was superfluous; the moments of the unfortunate count were

numbered.

With his dying breath he entreated his friend to repair instantly to the

castle of Landshort and explain the fatal cause of his not keeping his

appointment with his bride. Though not the most ardent of lovers, he was

one of the most punctilious of men, and appeared earnestly solicitous

that his mission should be speedily and courteously executed. “Unless

this is done,” said he, “I shall not sleep quietly in my grave.” He

repeated these last words with peculiar solemnity. A request at a moment

so impressive admitted no hesitation. Starkenfaust endeavored to soothe

him to calmness, promised faithfully to execute his wish, and gave him

his hand in solemn pledge. The dying man pressed it in acknowledgment,

but soon lapsed into delirium--raved about his bride, his engagements,

his plighted word--ordered his horse, that he might ride to the castle

of Landshort, and expired in the fancied act of vaulting into the

saddle.

Starkenfaust bestowed a sigh and a soldier’s tear on the untimely

fate of his comrade and then pondered on the awkward mission he had

undertaken. His heart was heavy and his head perplexed; for he was to

present himself an unbidden guest among hostile people, and to damp

their festivity with tidings fatal to their hopes. Still, there were

certain whisperings of curiosity in his bosom to see this far-famed

beauty of Katzenellenbogen, so cautiously shut up from the world; for

he was a passionate admirer of the sex, and there was a dash of

eccentricity and enterprise in his character that made him fond of all

singular adventure.

Previous to his departure he made all due arrangements with the holy

fraternity of the convent for the funeral solemnities of his friend,

who was to be buried in the cathedral of Wurtzburg near some of his

illustrious relatives, and the mourning retinue of the count took charge

of his remains.

It is now high time that we should return to the ancient family of

Katzenellenbogen, who were impatient for their guest, and still more

for their dinner, and to the worthy little baron, whom we left airing

himself on the watch-tower.

Night closed in, but still no guest arrived. The baron descended from

the tower in despair. The banquet, which had been delayed from hour to

hour, could no longer be postponed. The meats were already overdone, the

cook in an agony, and the whole household had the look of a garrison,

that had been reduced by famine. The baron was obliged reluctantly to

give orders for the feast without the presence of the guest. All were

seated at table, and just on the point of commencing, when the sound of

a horn from without the gate gave notice of the approach of a stranger.

Another long blast filled the old courts of the castle with its echoes,

and was answered by the warder from the walls. The baron hastened to

receive his future son-in-law.

The drawbridge had been let down, and the stranger was before the

gate. He was a tall gallant cavalier, mounted on a black steed. His

countenance was pale, but he had a beaming, romantic eye and an air of

stately melancholy. The baron was a little mortified that he should

have come in this simple, solitary style. His dignity for a moment was

ruffled, and he felt disposed to consider it a want of proper respect

for the important occasion and the important family with which he was to

be connected. He pacified himself, however, with the conclusion that it

must have been youthful impatience which had induced him thus to spur on

sooner than his attendants.

“I am sorry,” said the stranger, “to break in upon you thus

unseasonably----”

Here the baron interrupted him with a world of compliments and

greetings, for, to tell the truth, he prided himself upon his courtesy

and eloquence. The stranger attempted once or twice to stem the torrent

of words, but in vain, so he bowed his head and suffered it to flow on.

By the time the baron had come to a pause they had reached the inner

court of the castle, and the stranger was again about to speak, when he

was once more interrupted by the appearance of the female part of the

family, leading forth the shrinking and blushing bride. He gazed on her

for a moment as one entranced; it seemed as if his whole soul beamed

forth in the gaze and rested upon that lovely form. One of the maiden

aunts whispered something in her ear; she made an effort to speak; her

moist blue eye was timidly raised, gave a shy glance of inquiry on the

stranger, and was cast again to the ground. The words died away, but

there was a sweet smile playing about her lips, and a soft dimpling of

the cheek that showed her glance had not been unsatisfactory. It was

impossible for a girl of the fond age of eighteen, highly predisposed

for love and matrimony, not to be pleased with so gallant a cavalier.

The late hour at which the guest had arrived left no time for parley.

The baron was peremptory, and deferred all particular conversation until

the morning, and led the way to the untasted banquet.

It was served up in the great hall of the castle. Around the walls

hung the hard-favored portraits of the heroes of the house of

Katzenellenbogen, and the trophies which they had gained in the field,

and in the chase. Hacked corselets, splintered jousting-spears, and

tattered banners were mingled with the spoils of sylvan warfare: the

jaws of the wolf and the tusks of the boar grinned horribly among

crossbows and battle-axes, and a huge pair of antlers branched

immediately over the head of the youthful bridegroom.

The cavalier took but little notice of the company or the entertainment.

He scarcely tasted the banquet, but seemed absorbed in admiration of his

bride. He conversed in a low tone that could not be overheard, for the

language of love is never loud; but where is the female ear so dull that

it cannot catch the softest whisper of the lover? There was a mingled

tenderness and gravity in his manner that appeared to have a powerful

effect upon the young lady. Her color came and went as she listened with

deep attention. Now and then she made some blushing reply, and when his

eye was turned away she would steal a sidelong glance at his romantic

countenance, and heave a gentle sigh of tender happiness. It was evident

that the young couple were completely enamored. The aunts, who were

deeply versed in the mysteries of the heart, declared that they had

fallen in love with each other at first sight.

The feast went on merrily, or at least noisily, for the guests were

all blessed with those keen appetites that attend upon light purses and

mountain air. The baron told his best and longest stories, and never had

he told them so well or with such great effect. If there was anything

marvellous, his auditors were lost in astonishment; and if anything

facetious, they were sure to laugh exactly in the right place. The

baron, it is true, like most great men, was too dignified to utter any

joke but a dull one; it was always enforced, however, by a bumper of

excellent Hockheimer, and even a dull joke at one’s own table, served

up with jolly old wine, is irresistible. Many good things were said by

poorer and keener wits that would not bear repeating, except on similar

occasions; many sly speeches whispered in ladies’ ears that almost

convulsed them with suppressed laughter; and a song or two roared out

by a poor but merry and broad-faced cousin of the baron that absolutely

made the maiden aunts hold up their fans.

Amidst all this revelry the stranger guest maintained a most singular

and unseasonable gravity. His countenance assumed a deeper cast of

dejection as the evening advanced, and, strange as it may appear, even

the baron’s jokes seemed only to render him the more melancholy. At

times he was lost in thought, and at times there was a perturbed and

restless wandering of the eye that bespoke a mind but ill at ease.

His conversations with the bride became more and more earnest and

mysterious. Lowering clouds began to steal over the fair serenity of her

brow, and tremors to run through her tender frame.

All this could not escape the notice of the company. Their gayety was

chilled by the unaccountable gloom of the bridegroom; their spirits were

infected; whispers and glances were interchanged, accompanied by shrugs

and dubious shakes of the head. The song and the laugh grew less and

less frequent: there were dreary pauses in the conversation, which were

at length succeeded by wild tales and supernatural legends. One

dismal story produced another still more dismal, and the baron nearly

frightened some of the ladies into hysterics with the history of the

goblin horseman that carried away the fair Leonora--a dreadful story

which has since been put into excellent verse, and is read and believed

by all the world.

The bridegroom listened to this tale with profound attention. He kept

his eyes steadily fixed on the baron, and, as the story drew to a close,

began gradually to rise from his seat, growing taller and taller, until

in the baron’s entranced eye he seemed almost to tower into a giant.

The moment the tale was finished he heaved a deep sigh and took a

solemn farewell of the company. They were all amazement. The baron was

perfectly thunderstruck.

“What! going to leave the castle at midnight? Why, everything was

prepared for his reception; a chamber was ready for him if he wished to

retire.”

The stranger shook his head mournfully and mysteriously: “I must lay my

head in a different chamber to-night.”

There was something in this reply and the tone in which it was uttered

that made the baron’s heart misgive him; but he rallied his forces and

repeated his hospitable entreaties.

The stranger shook his head silently, but positively, at every offer,

and, waving his farewell to the company, stalked slowly out of the hall.

The maiden aunts were absolutely petrified; the bride hung her head and

a tear stole to her eye.

The baron followed the stranger to the great court of the castle, where

the black charger stood pawing the earth and snorting with impatience.

When they had reached the portal, whose deep archway was dimly lighted

by a cresset, the stranger paused, and addressed the baron in a hollow

tone of voice, which the vaulted roof rendered still more sepulchral.

“Now that we are a lone,” said he, “I will impart to you the reason of

my going. I have a solemn, an indispensable engagement----”

“Why,” said the baron, “cannot you send some one in your place?”

“It admits of no substitute--I must attend it in person; I must away to

Wurtzburg cathedral----”

“Ay,” said the baron, plucking up spirit, “but not until

to-morrow--to-morrow you shall take your bride there.”

“No! no!” replied the stranger, with tenfold solemnity, “my engagement

is with no bride--the worms! the worms expect me! I am a dead man--I

have been slain by robbers--my body lies at Wurtzburg--at midnight I am

to be buried--the grave is waiting for me--I must keep my appointment!”

He sprang on his black charger, dashed over the drawbridge, and the

clattering of his horse’s hoofs was lost in the whistling of the night

blast.

The baron returned to the hall in the utmost consternation, and related

what had passed. Two ladies fainted outright, others sickened at the

idea of having banqueted with a spectre. It was the opinion of some that

this might be the wild huntsman, famous in German legend. Some talked of

mountain-sprites, of wood-demons, and of other supernatural beings with

which the good people of Germany have been so grievously harassed since

time immemorial. One of the poor relations ventured to suggest that it

might be some sportive evasion of the young cavalier, and that the

very gloominess of the caprice seemed to accord with so melancholy a

personage. This, however, drew on him, the indignation of the whole

company, and especially of the baron, who looked upon him as little

better than an infidel; so that he was fain to abjure his heresy as

speedily as possible and come into the faith of the true believers.

But, whatever may have been the doubts entertained, they were completely

put to an end by the arrival next day of regular missives confirming the

intelligence of the young count’s murder and his interment in Wurtzburg

cathedral.

The dismay at the castle may well be imagined. The baron shut himself up

in his chamber. The guests, who had come to rejoice with him, could not

think of abandoning him in his distress. They wandered about the courts

or collected in groups in the hall, shaking their heads and shrugging

their shoulders at the troubles of so good a man, and sat longer than

ever at table, and ate and drank more stoutly than ever, by way of

keeping up their spirits. But the situation of the widowed bride was

the most pitiable. To have lost a husband before she had even embraced

him--and such a husband! If the very spectre could be so gracious and

noble, what must have been the living man? She filled the house with

lamentations.

On the night of the second day of her widowhood she had retired to her

chamber, accompanied by one of her aunts, who insisted on sleeping with

her. The aunt, who was one of the best tellers of ghost-stories in all

Germany, had just been recounting one of her longest, and had fallen

asleep in the very midst of it. The chamber was remote and overlooked a

small garden. The niece lay pensively gazing at the beams of the rising

moon as they trembled on the leaves of an aspen tree before the lattice.

The castle clock had just tolled midnight when a soft strain of music

stole up from the garden. She rose hastily from her bed and stepped

lightly to the window. A tall figure stood among the shadows of

the trees. As it raised its head a beam of moonlight fell upon the

countenance. Heaven and earth! she beheld the Spectre Bridegroom! A loud

shriek at that moment burst upon her ear, and her aunt, who had been

awakened by the music and had followed her silently to the window, fell

into her arms. When she looked again the spectre had disappeared.

Of the two females, the aunt now required the most soothing, for she was

perfectly beside herself with terror. As to the young lady, there was

something even in the spectre of her lover that seemed endearing. There

was still the semblance of manly beauty, and, though the shadow of a man

is but little calculated to satisfy the affections of a lovesick girl,

yet where the substance is not to be had even that is consoling. The

aunt declared she would never sleep in that chamber again; the niece,

for once, was refractory, and declared as strongly that she would sleep

in no other in the castle: the consequence was, that she had to sleep in

it alone; but she drew a promise from her aunt not to relate the story

of the spectre, lest she should be denied the only melancholy pleasure

left her on earth--that of inhabiting the chamber over which the

guardian shade of her lover kept its nightly vigils.

How long the good old lady would have observed this promise is

uncertain, for she dearly loved to talk of the marvellous, and there is

a triumph in being the first to tell a frightful story; it is, however,

still quoted in the neighborhood as a memorable instance of female

secrecy that she kept it to herself for a whole week, when she was

suddenly absolved from all further restraint by intelligence brought to

the breakfast-table one morning that the young lady was not to be found.

Her room was empty--the bed had not been slept in--the window was open

and the bird had flown!

The astonishment and concern with which the intelligence was received

can only be imagined by those who have witnessed the agitation which the

mishaps of a great man cause among his friends. Even the poor relations

paused for a moment from the indefatigable labors of the trencher, when

the aunt, who had at first been struck speechless, wrung her hands

and shrieked out, “The goblin! the goblin! she’s carried away by the

goblin!”

In a few words she related the fearful scene of the garden, and

concluded that the spectre must have carried off his bride. Two of the

domestics corroborated the opinion, for they had heard the clattering of

a horse’s hoofs down the mountain about midnight, and had no doubt that

it was the spectre on his black charger bearing her away to the tomb.

All present were struck with the direful probability for events of

the kind are extremely common in Germany, as many well-authenticated

histories bear witness.

What a lamentable situation was that of the poor baron! What a

heartrending dilemma for a fond father and a member of the great family

of Katzenellenbogen! His only daughter had either been rapt away to the

grave, or he was to have some wood-demon for a son-in-law, and perchance

a troop of goblin grandchildren. As usual, he was completely bewildered,

and all the castle in an uproar. The men were ordered to take horse and

scour every road and path and glen of the Odenwald. The baron himself

had just drawn on his jack-boots, girded on his sword, and was about

to mount his steed to sally forth on the doubtful quest, when he was

brought to a pause by a new apparition. A lady was seen approaching the

castle mounted on a palfrey, attended by a cavalier on horseback. She

galloped up to the gate, sprang from her horse, and, falling at the

baron’s feet, embraced his knees. It was his lost daughter, and her

companion--the Spectre Bridegroom! The baron was astounded. He looked

at his daughter, then at the spectre, and almost doubted the evidence of

his senses. The latter, too, was wonderfully improved in his appearance

since his visit to the world of spirits. His dress was splendid, and

set off a noble figure of manly symmetry. He was no longer pale and

melancholy. His fine countenance was flushed with the glow of youth, and

joy rioted in his large dark eye.

The mystery was soon cleared up. The cavalier (for, in truth, as you

must have known all the while, he was no goblin) announced himself as

Sir Herman Von Starkenfaust. He related his adventure with the young

count. He told how he had hastened to the castle to deliver the

unwelcome tidings, but that the eloquence of the baron had interrupted

him in every attempt to tell his tale. How the sight of the bride had

completely captivated him and that to pass a few hours near her he

had tacitly suffered the mistake to continue. How he had been sorely

perplexed in what way to make a decent retreat, until the baron’s

goblin stories had suggested his eccentric exit. How, fearing the feudal

hostility of the family, he had repeated his visits by stealth--had

haunted the garden beneath the young lady’s window--had wooed--had

won--had borne away in triumph--and, in a word, had wedded the fair.

Under any other circumstances the baron would have been inflexible, for

he was tenacious of paternal authority and devoutly obstinate in all

family feuds; but he loved his daughter; he had lamented her as lost;

he rejoiced to find her still alive; and, though her husband was of

a hostile house, yet, thank Heaven! he was not a goblin. There was

something, it must be acknowledged, that did not exactly accord with his

notions of strict veracity in the joke the knight had passed upon him of

his being a dead man; but several old friends present, who had served

in the wars, assured him that every stratagem was excusable in love,

and that the cavalier was entitled to especial privilege, having lately

served as a trooper.

Matters, therefore, were happily arranged. The baron pardoned the young

couple on the spot. The revels at the castle were resumed. The

poor relations overwhelmed this new member of the family with

loving-kindness; he was so gallant, so generous--and so rich. The

aunts, it is true, were somewhat scandalized that their system of strict

seclusion and passive obedience should be so badly exemplified, but

attributed it all to their negligence in not having the windows grated.

One of them was particularly mortified at having her marvellous story

marred, and that the only spectre she had ever seen should turn out a

counterfeit; but the niece seemed perfectly happy at having found him

substantial flesh and blood. And so the story ends.

WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

When I behold, with deep astonishment,

To famous Westminster how there resorte,

Living in brasse or stoney monument,

The princes and the worthies of all sorte;

Doe not I see reformde nobilitie,

Without contempt, or pride, or ostentation,

And looke upon offenselesse majesty,

Naked of pomp or earthly domination?

And how a play-game of a painted stone

Contents the quiet now and silent sprites,

Whome all the world which late they stood upon

Could not content nor quench their appetites.

Life is a frost of cold felicitie,

And death the thaw of all our vanitie.

CHRISTOLERO’S EPIGRAMS, BY T. B. 1598.

ON one of those sober and rather melancholy days in the latter part of

autumn when the shadows of morning and evening almost mingle together,

and throw a gloom over the decline of the year, I passed several hours

in rambling about Westminster Abbey. There was something congenial to

the season in the mournful magnificence of the old pile, and as I passed

its threshold it seemed like stepping back into the regions of antiquity

and losing myself among the shades of former ages.

I entered from the inner court of Westminster School, through a long,

low, vaulted passage that had an almost subterranean look, being dimly

lighted in one part by circular perforations in the massive walls.

Through this dark avenue I had a distant view of the cloisters, with

the figure of an old verger in his black gown moving along their shadowy

vaults, and seeming like a spectre from one of the neighboring tombs.

The approach to the abbey through these gloomy monastic remains prepares

the mind for its solemn contemplation. The cloisters still retain

something of the quiet and seclusion of former days. The gray walls are

discolored by damps and crumbling with age; a coat of hoary moss has

gathered over the inscriptions of the mural monuments, and obscured the

death’s heads and other funeral emblems. The sharp touches of the chisel

are gone from the rich tracery of the arches; the roses which adorned

the keystones have lost their leafy beauty; everything bears marks of

the gradual dilapidations of time, which yet has something touching and

pleasing in its very decay.

The sun was pouring down a yellow autumnal ray into the square of

the cloisters, beaming upon a scanty plot of grass in the centre,

and lighting up an angle of the vaulted passage with a kind of dusky

splendor. From between the arcades the eye glanced up to a bit of blue

sky or a passing cloud, and beheld the sun-gilt pinnacles of the abbey

towering into the azure heaven.

As I paced the cloisters, sometimes contemplating this mingled

picture of glory and decay, and sometimes endeavoring to decipher the

inscriptions on the tombstones which formed the pavement beneath my

feet, my eye was attracted to three figures rudely carved in relief,

but nearly worn away by the footsteps of many generations. They were

the effigies of three of the early abbots; the epitaphs were entirely

effaced; the names alone remained, having no doubt been renewed in later

times (Vitalis. Abbas. 1082, and Gislebertus Crispinus. Abbas. 1114,

and Laurentius. Abbas. 1176). I remained some little while, musing over

these casual relics of antiquity thus left like wrecks upon this distant

shore of time, telling no tale but that such beings had been and had

perished, teaching no moral but the futility of that pride which hopes

still to exact homage in its ashes and to live in an inscription. A

little longer, and even these faint records will be obliterated and the

monument will cease to be a memorial. Whilst I was yet looking down

upon the gravestones I was roused by the sound of the abbey clock,

reverberating from buttress to buttress and echoing among the cloisters.

It is almost startling to hear this warning of departed time sounding

among the tombs and telling the lapse of the hour, which, like a billow,

has rolled us onward towards the grave. I pursued my walk to an

arched door opening to the interior of the abbey. On entering here the

magnitude of the building breaks fully upon the mind, contrasted with

the vaults of the cloisters. The eyes gaze with wonder at clustered

columns of gigantic dimensions, with arches springing from them to such

an amazing height, and man wandering about their bases, shrunk into

insignificance in comparison with his own handiwork. The spaciousness

and gloom of this vast edifice produce a profound and mysterious awe.

We step cautiously and softly about, as if fearful of disturbing the

hallowed silence of the tomb, while every footfall whispers along the

walls and chatters among the sepulchres, making us more sensible of the

quiet we have interrupted.

It seems as if the awful nature of the place presses down upon the soul

and hushes the beholder into noiseless reverence. We feel that we are

surrounded by the congregated bones of the great men of past times, who

have filled history with their deeds and the earth with their renown.

And yet it almost provokes a smile at the vanity of human ambition

to see how they are crowded together and jostled in the dust; what

parsimony is observed in doling out a scanty nook, a gloomy corner, a

little portion of earth, to those whom, when alive, kingdoms could not

satisfy, and how many shapes and forms and artifices are devised to

catch the casual notice of the passenger, and save from forgetfulness

for a few short years a name which once aspired to occupy ages of the

world’s thought and admiration.

I passed some time in Poet’s Corner, which occupies an end of one of

the transepts or cross aisles of the abbey. The monuments are generally

simple, for the lives of literary men afford no striking themes for

the sculptor. Shakespeare and Addison have statues erected to their

memories, but the greater part have busts, medallions, and sometimes

mere inscriptions. Notwithstanding the simplicity of these memorials,

I have always observed that the visitors to the abbey remained longest

about them. A kinder and fonder feeling takes place of that cold

curiosity or vague admiration with which they gaze on the splendid

monuments of the great and the heroic. They linger about these as about

the tombs of friends and companions, for indeed there is something of

companionship between the author and the reader. Other men are known

to posterity only through the medium of history, which is continually

growing faint and obscure; but the intercourse between the author and

his fellowmen is ever new, active, and immediate. He has lived for them

more than for himself; he has sacrificed surrounding enjoyments, and

shut himself up from the delights of social life, that he might the more

intimately commune with distant minds and distant ages. Well may the

world cherish his renown, for it has been purchased not by deeds of

violence and blood, but by the diligent dispensation of pleasure.

Well may posterity be grateful to his memory, for he has left it an

inheritance not of empty names and sounding actions, but whole treasures

of wisdom, bright gems of thought, and golden veins of language.

From Poet’s Corner I continued my stroll towards that part of the abbey

which contains the sepulchres of the kings. I wandered among what once

were chapels, but which are now occupied by the tombs and monuments

of the great. At every turn I met with some illustrious name or the

cognizance of some powerful house renowned in history. As the eye

darts into these dusky chambers of death it catches glimpses of quaint

effigies--some kneeling in niches, as if in devotion; others stretched

upon the tombs, with hands piously pressed together; warriors in armor,

as if reposing after battle; prelates, with crosiers and mitres; and

nobles in robes and coronets, lying as it were in state. In glancing

over this scene, so strangely populous, yet where every form is so still

and silent, it seems almost as if we were treading a mansion of that

fabled city where every being had been suddenly transmuted into stone.

I paused to contemplate a tomb on which lay the effigy of a knight in

complete armor. A large buckler was on one arm; the hands were pressed

together in supplication upon the breast; the face was almost covered by

the morion; the legs were crossed, in token of the warrior’s having been

engaged in the holy war. It was the tomb of a crusader, of one of those

military enthusiasts who so strangely mingled religion and romance,

and whose exploits form the connecting link between fact and fiction,

between the history and the fairytale. There is something extremely

picturesque in the tombs of these adventurers, decorated as they are

with rude armorial bearings and Gothic sculpture. They comport with the

antiquated chapels in which they are generally found; and in considering

them the imagination is apt to kindle with the legendary associations,

the romantic fiction, the chivalrous pomp and pageantry which poetry has

spread over the wars for the sepulchre of Christ. They are the relics

of times utterly gone by, of beings passed from recollection, of customs

and manners with which ours have no affinity. They are like objects from

some strange and distant land of which we have no certain knowledge,

and about which all our conceptions are vague and visionary. There is

something extremely solemn and awful in those effigies on Gothic tombs,

extended as if in the sleep of death or in the supplication of the dying

hour. They have an effect infinitely more impressive on my feelings

than the fanciful attitudes, the over wrought conceits, the allegorical

groups which abound on modern monuments. I have been struck, also, with

the superiority of many of the old sepulchral inscriptions. There was a

noble way in former times of saying things simply, and yet saying

them proudly; and I do not know an epitaph that breathes a loftier

consciousness of family worth and honorable lineage than one which

affirms of a noble house that “all the brothers were brave and all the

sisters virtuous.”

In the opposite transept to Poet’s Corner stands a monument which is

among the most renowned achievements of modern art, but which to

me appears horrible rather than sublime. It is the tomb of Mrs.

Nightingale, by Roubillac. The bottom of the monument is represented

as throwing open its marble doors, and a sheeted skeleton is starting

forth. The shroud is falling from his fleshless frame as he launches his

dart at his victim. She is sinking into her affrighted husband’s arms,

who strives with vain and frantic effort to avert the blow. The whole

is executed with terrible truth and spirit; we almost fancy we hear

the gibbering yell of triumph bursting from the distended jaws of the

spectre. But why should we thus seek to clothe death with unnecessary

terrors, and to spread horrors round the tomb of those we love? The

grave should be surrounded by everything that might inspire tenderness

and veneration for the dead, or that might win the living to virtue. It

is the place not of disgust and dismay, but of sorrow and meditation.

While wandering about these gloomy vaults and silent aisles, studying

the records of the dead, the sound of busy existence from without

occasionally reaches the ear--the rumbling of the passing equipage, the

murmur of the multitude, or perhaps the light laugh of pleasure. The

contrast is striking with the deathlike repose around; and it has a

strange effect upon the feelings thus to hear the surges of active life

hurrying along and beating against the very walls of the sepulchre.

I continued in this way to move from tomb to tomb and from chapel

to chapel. The day was gradually wearing away; the distant tread of

loiterers about the abbey grew less and less frequent; the sweet-tongued

bell was summoning to evening prayers; and I saw at a distance the

choristers in their white surplices crossing the aisle and entering

the choir. I stood before the entrance to Henry the Seventh’s chapel. A

flight of steps leads up to it through a deep and gloomy but magnificent

arch. Great gates of brass, richly and delicately wrought, turn heavily

upon their hinges, as if proudly reluctant to admit the feet of common

mortals into this most gorgeous of sepulchres.

On entering the eye is astonished by the pomp of architecture and the

elaborate beauty of sculptured detail. The very walls are wrought into

universal ornament encrusted with tracery, and scooped into niches

crowded with the statues of saints and martyrs. Stone seems, by the

cunning labor of the chisel, to have been robbed of its weight and

density, suspended aloft as if by magic, and the fretted roof achieved

with the wonderful minuteness and airy security of a cobweb.

Along the sides of the chapel are the lofty stalls of the Knights of

the Bath, richly carved of oak, though with the grotesque decorations

of Gothic architecture. On the pinnacles of the stalls are affixed the

helmets and crests of the knights, with their scarfs and swords,

and above them are suspended their banners, emblazoned with armorial

bearings, and contrasting the splendor of gold and purple and crimson

with the cold gray fretwork of the roof. In the midst of this grand

mausoleum stands the sepulchre of its founder--his effigy, with that of

his queen, extended on a sumptuous tomb--and the whole surrounded by a

superbly-wrought brazen railing.

There is a sad dreariness in this magnificence, this strange mixture of

tombs and trophies, these emblems of living and aspiring ambition,

close beside mementos which show the dust and oblivion in which all

must sooner or later terminate. Nothing impresses the mind with a deeper

feeling of loneliness than to tread the silent and deserted scene of

former throng and pageant. On looking round on the vacant stalls of

the knights and their esquires, and on the rows of dusty but gorgeous

banners that were once borne before them, my imagination conjured up the

scene when this hall was bright with the valor and beauty of the land,

glittering with the splendor of jewelled rank and military array, alive

with the tread of many feet and the hum of an admiring multitude. All

had passed away; the silence of death had settled again upon the place,

interrupted only by the casual chirping of birds, which had found

their way into the chapel and built their nests among its friezes and

pendants--sure signs of solitariness and desertion.

When I read the names inscribed on the banners, they were those of men

scattered far and wide about the world--some tossing upon distant seas:

some under arms in distant lands; some mingling in the busy intrigues

of courts and cabinets,--all seeking to deserve one more distinction in

this mansion of shadowy honors--the melancholy reward of a monument.

Two small aisles on each side of this chapel present a touching instance

of the equality of the grave, which brings down the oppressor to a

level with the oppressed and mingles the dust of the bitterest enemies

together. In one is the sepulchre of the haughty Elizabeth; in the other

is that of her victim, the lovely and unfortunate Mary. Not an hour in

the day but some ejaculation of pity is uttered over the fate of

the latter, mingled with indignation at her oppressor. The walls of

Elizabeth’s sepulchre continually echo with the sighs of sympathy heaved

at the grave of her rival.

A peculiar melancholy reigns over the aisle where Mary lies buried. The

light struggles dimly through windows darkened by dust. The greater part

of the place is in deep shadow, and the walls are stained and tinted by

time and weather. A marble figure of Mary is stretched upon the tomb,

round which is an iron railing, much corroded, bearing her national

emblem--the thistle. I was weary with wandering, and sat down to

rest myself by the monument, revolving in my mind the chequered and

disastrous story of poor Mary.

The sound of casual footsteps had ceased from the abbey. I could only

hear, now and then, the distant voice of the priest repeating the

evening service and the faint responses of the choir; these paused for

a time, and all was hushed. The stillness, the desertion, and obscurity

that were gradually prevailing around gave a deeper and more solemn

interest to the place;

For in the silent grave no conversation,

No joyful tread of friends, no voice of lovers,

No careful father’s counsel--nothing’s heard,

For nothing is, but all oblivion,

Dust, and an endless darkness.

Suddenly the notes of the deep-laboring organ burst upon the ear,

falling with doubled and redoubled intensity, and rolling, as it were,

huge billows of sound. How well do their volume and grandeur accord

with this mighty building! With what pomp do they swell through its vast

vaults, and breathe their awful harmony through these caves of death,

and make the silent sepulchre vocal! And now they rise in triumphant

acclamation, heaving higher and higher their accordant notes and piling

sound on sound. And now they pause, and the soft voices of the choir

break out into sweet gushes of melody; they soar aloft and warble along

the roof, and seem to play about these lofty vaults like the pure

airs of heaven. Again the pealing organ heaves its thrilling thunders,

compressing air into music, and rolling it forth upon the soul. What

long-drawn cadences! What solemn sweeping concords! It grows more and

more dense and powerful; it fills the vast pile and seems to jar the

very walls--the ear is stunned--the senses are overwhelmed. And now it

is winding up in full jubilee--it is rising from the earth to heaven;

the very soul seems rapt away and floated upwards on this swelling tide

of harmony!

I sat for some time lost in that kind of reverie which a strain of

music is apt sometimes to inspire: the shadows of evening were gradually

thickening round me; the monuments began to cast deeper and deeper

gloom; and the distant clock again gave token of the slowly waning day.

I rose and prepared to leave the abbey. As I descended the flight of

steps which lead into the body of the building, my eye was caught by the

shrine of Edward the Confessor, and I ascended the small staircase that

conducts to it, to take from thence a general survey of this wilderness

of tombs. The shrine is elevated upon a kind of platform, and close

around it are the sepulchres of various kings and queens. From this

eminence the eye looks down between pillars and funeral trophies to

the chapels and chambers below, crowded with tombs, where warriors,

prelates, courtiers, and statesmen lie mouldering in their “beds of

darkness.” Close by me stood the great chair of coronation, rudely

carved of oak in the barbarous taste of a remote and Gothic age. The

scene seemed almost as if contrived with theatrical artifice to produce

an effect upon the beholder. Here was a type of the beginning and the

end of human pomp and power; here it was literally but a step from the

throne to the sepulchre. Would not one think that these incongruous

mementos had been gathered together as a lesson to living greatness?--to

show it, even in the moment of its proudest exaltation, the neglect

and dishonor to which it must soon arrive--how soon that crown which

encircles its brow must pass away, and it must lie down in the dust and

disgraces of the tomb, and be trampled upon by the feet of the meanest

of the multitude. For, strange to tell, even the grave is here no longer

a sanctuary. There is a shocking levity in some natures which leads them

to sport with awful and hallowed things, and there are base minds

which delight to revenge on the illustrious dead the abject homage and

grovelling servility which they pay to the living. The coffin of Edward

the Confessor has been broken open, and his remains despoiled of their

funereal ornaments; the sceptre has been stolen from the hand of the

imperious Elizabeth; and the effigy of Henry the Fifth lies headless.

Not a royal monument but bears some proof how false and fugitive is the

homage of mankind. Some are plundered, some mutilated, some covered with

ribaldry and insult,--all more or less outraged and dishonored.

The last beams of day were now faintly streaming through the painted

windows in the high vaults above me; the lower parts of the abbey were

already wrapped in the obscurity of twilight. The chapels and aisles

grew darker and darker. The effigies of the kings faded into shadows;

the marble figures of the monuments assumed strange shapes in the

uncertain light; the evening breeze crept through the aisles like the

cold breath of the grave; and even the distant footfall of a verger,

traversing the Poet’s Corner, had something strange and dreary in its

sound. I slowly retraced my morning’s walk, and as I passed out at the

portal of the cloisters, the door, closing with a jarring noise behind

me, filled the whole building with echoes.

I endeavored to form some arrangement in my mind of the objects I

had been contemplating, but found they were already falling into

indistinctness and confusion. Names, inscriptions, trophies, had all

become confounded in my recollection, though I had scarcely taken my

foot from off the threshold. What, thought I, is this vast assemblage

of sepulchres but a treasury of humiliation--a huge pile of reiterated

homilies on the emptiness of renown and the certainty of oblivion? It

is, indeed, the empire of death; his great shadowy palace where he sits

in state mocking at the relics of human glory and spreading dust and

forgetfulness on the monuments of princes. How idle a boast, after all,

is the immortality of a name! Time is ever silently turning over his

pages; we are too much engrossed by the story of the present to think

of the characters and anecdotes that gave interest to the past; and

each age is a volume thrown aside to be speedily forgotten. The idol of

to-day pushes the hero of yesterday out of our recollection, and will in

turn be supplanted by his successor of tomorrow. “Our fathers,” says Sir

Thomas Browne, “find their graves in our short memories, and sadly tell

us how we may be buried in our survivors.” History fades into fable;

fact becomes clouded with doubt and controversy; the inscription

moulders from the tablet; the statue falls from the pedestal. Columns,

arches, pyramids, what are they but heaps of sand, and their epitaphs

but characters written in the dust? What is the security of a tomb or

the perpetuity of an embalmment? The remains of Alexander the Great have

been scattered to the wind, and his empty sarcophagus is now the mere

curiosity of a museum. “The Egyptian mummies, which Cambyses or time

hath spared, avarice now consumeth; Mizraim cures wounds, and Pharaoh is

sold for balsams.” *

What then is to ensure this pile which now towers above me from sharing

the fate of mightier mausoleums? The time must come when its gilded

vaults which now spring so loftily, shall lie in rubbish beneath the

feet; when instead of the sound of melody and praise the wind shall

whistle through the broken arches and the owl hoot from the shattered

tower; when the garish sunbeam shall break into these gloomy mansions of

death, and the ivy twine round the fallen column; and the fox-glove hang

its blossoms about the nameless urn, as if in mockery of the dead.

Thus man passes away; his name passes from record and recollection; his

history is as a tale that is told, and his very monument becomes a ruin.

* Sir T. Browne.

CHRISTMAS.

But is old, old, good old Christmas gone? Nothing but the hair of his

good, gray old head and beard left? Well, I will have that, seeing I

cannot have more of him. HUE AND CRY AFTER CHRISTMAS.

A man might then behold

At Christmas, in each hall

Good fires to curb the cold,

And meat for great and small.

The neighbors were friendly bidden,

And all had welcome true,

The poor from the gates were not chidden

When this old cap was new.

OLD SONG.

NOTHING in England exercises a more delightful spell over my imagination

than the lingerings of the holiday customs and rural games of former

times. They recall the pictures my fancy used to draw in the May morning

of life, when as yet I only knew the world through books, and believed

it to be all that poets had painted it; and they bring with them the

flavor of those honest days of yore, in which, perhaps with equal

fallacy, I am apt to think the world was more homebred, social, and

joyous than at present. I regret to say that they are daily growing

more and more faint, being gradually worn away by time, but still more

obliterated by modern fashion. They resemble those picturesque morsels

of Gothic architecture which we see crumbling in various parts of the

country, partly dilapidated by the waste of ages and partly lost in the

additions and alterations of latter days. Poetry, however, clings with

cherishing fondness about the rural game and holiday revel from which

it has derived so many of its themes, as the ivy winds its rich foliage

about the Gothic arch and mouldering tower, gratefully repaying their

support by clasping together their tottering remains, and, as it were,

embalming them in verdure.

Of all the old festivals, however, that of Christmas awakens the

strongest and most heartfelt associations. There is a tone of solemn and

sacred feeling that blends with our conviviality and lifts the spirit to

a state of hallowed and elevated enjoyment. The services of the Church

about this season are extremely tender and inspiring. They dwell on the

beautiful story of the origin of our faith and the pastoral scenes that

accompanied its announcement. They gradually increase in fervor and

pathos during the season of Advent, until they break forth in full

jubilee on the morning that brought peace and good-will to men. I do not

know a grander effect of music on the moral feelings than to hear the

full choir and the pealing organ performing a Christmas anthem in a

cathedral, and filling every part of the vast pile with triumphant

harmony.

It is a beautiful arrangement, also, derived from days of yore, that

this festival, which commemorates the announcement of the religion

of peace and love, has been made the season for gathering together of

family connections, and drawing closer again those bands of kindred

hearts which the cares and pleasures and sorrows of the world are

continually operating to cast loose; of calling back the children of a

family who have launched forth in life and wandered widely asunder, once

more to assemble about the paternal hearth, that rallying-place of the

affections, there to grow young and loving again among the endearing

mementos of childhood.

There is something in the very season of the year that gives a charm to

the festivity of Christmas. At other times we derive a great portion of

our pleasures from the mere beauties of Nature. Our feelings sally forth

and dissipate themselves over the sunny landscape, and we “live abroad

and everywhere.” The song of the bird, the murmur of the stream, the

breathing fragrance of spring, the soft voluptuousness of summer, the

golden pomp of autumn, earth with its mantle of refreshing green, and

heaven with it deep delicious blue and its cloudy magnificence,--all

fill us with mute but exquisite delight, and we revel in the luxury of

mere sensation. But in the depth of winter, when Nature lies despoiled

of every charm and wrapped in her shroud of sheeted snow, we turn for

our gratifications to moral sources. The dreariness and desolation of

the landscape, the short gloomy days and darksome nights, while they

circumscribe our wanderings, shut in our feelings also from rambling

abroad, and make us more keenly disposed for the pleasure of the social

circle. Our thoughts are more concentrated; our friendly sympathies more

aroused. We feel more sensibly the charm of each other’s society,

and are brought more closely together by dependence on each other for

enjoyment. Heart calleth unto heart, and we draw our pleasures from the

deep wells of loving-kindness which lie in the quiet recesses of our

bosoms, and which, when resorted to, furnish forth the pure element of

domestic felicity.

The pitchy gloom without makes the heart dilate on entering the room

filled with the glow and warmth of the evening fire. The ruddy blaze

diffuses an artificial summer and sunshine through the room, and lights

up each countenance in a kindlier welcome. Where does the honest face of

hospitality expand into a broader and more cordial smile, where is the

shy glance of love more sweetly eloquent, than by the winter fireside?

and as the hollow blast of wintry wind rushes through the hall, claps

the distant door, whistles about the casement, and rumbles down the

chimney, what can be more grateful than that feeling of sober and

sheltered security with which we look round upon the comfortable chamber

and the scene of domestic hilarity?

The English, from the great prevalence of rural habit throughout

every class of society, have always been found of those festivals and

holidays, which agreeably interrupt the stillness of country life, and

they were, in former days, particularly observant of the religious and

social rites of Christmas. It is inspiring to read even the dry details

which some antiquaries have given of the quaint humors, the burlesque

pageants, the complete abandonment to mirth and good-fellowship with

which this festival was celebrated. It seemed to throw open every door

and unlock every heart. It brought the peasant and the peer together,

and blended all ranks in one warm, generous flow of joy and kindness.

The old halls of castles and manor-houses resounded with the harp and

the Christmas carol, and their ample boards groaned under the weight of

hospitality. Even the poorest cottage welcomed the festive season with

green decorations of bay and holly--the cheerful fire glanced its rays

through the lattice, inviting the passengers to raise the latch and join

the gossip knot huddled round the hearth beguiling the long evening with

legendary jokes and oft-told Christmas tales.

One of the least pleasing effects of modern refinement is the havoc it

has made among the hearty old holiday customs. It has completely taken

off the sharp touchings and spirited reliefs of these embellishments

of life, and has worn down society into a more smooth and polished,

but certainly a less characteristic, surface. Many of the games and

ceremonials of Christmas have entirely disappeared, and, like the

sherris sack of old Falstaff, are become matters of speculation and

dispute among commentators. They flourished in times full of spirit

and lustihood, when men enjoyed life roughly, but heartily and

vigorously--times wild and picturesque, which have furnished poetry with

its richest materials and the drama with its most attractive variety of

characters and manners. The world has become more worldly. There is

more of dissipation, and less of enjoyment. Pleasure has expanded into a

broader, but a shallower stream, and has forsaken many of those deep

and quiet channels where it flowed sweetly through the calm bosom of

domestic life. Society has acquired a more enlightened and elegant tone,

but it has lost many of its strong local peculiarities, its homebred

feelings, its honest fireside delights. The traditionary customs

of golden-hearted antiquity, its feudal hospitalities, and lordly

wassailings, have passed away with the baronial castles and stately

manor-houses in which they were celebrated. They comported with the

shadowy hall, the great oaken gallery, and the tapestried parlor, but

are unfitted to the light showy saloons and gay drawing-rooms of the

modern villa.

Shorn, however, as it is, of its ancient and festive honors, Christmas

is still a period of delightful excitement in England. It is gratifying

to see that home-feeling completely aroused which holds so powerful a

place in every English bosom. The preparations making on every side

for the social board that is again to unite friends and kindred; the

presents of good cheer passing and repassing, those tokens of regard and

quickeners of kind feelings; the evergreens distributed about houses

and churches, emblems of peace and gladness,--all these have the most

pleasing effect in producing fond associations and kindling benevolent

sympathies. Even the sound of the Waits, rude as may be their

minstrelsy, breaks upon the mid-watches of a winter night with the

effect of perfect harmony. As I have been awakened by them in that still

and solemn hour “when deep sleep falleth upon man,” I have listened

with a hushed delight, and, connecting them with the sacred and

joyous occasion, have almost fancied them into another celestial choir

announcing peace and good-will to mankind.

How delightfully the imagination, when wrought upon by these moral

influences, turns everything to melody and beauty! The very crowing

of the cock, heard sometimes in the profound repose of the country,

“telling the night-watches to his feathery dames,” was thought by the

common people to announce the approach of this sacred festival.

“Some say that ever ‘gainst that season comes

Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated,

This bird of dawning singeth all night long;

And then, they say, no spirit dares stir abroad,

The nights are wholesome--then no planets strike,

No fairy takes, no witch hath power to charm,

So hallow’d and so gracious is the time.”

Amidst the general call to happiness, the bustle of the spirits, and

stir of the affections which prevail at this period what bosom can

remain insensible? It is, indeed, the season of regenerated feeling--the

season for kindling not merely the fire of hospitality in the hall, but

the genial flame of charity in the heart.

The scene of early love again rises green to memory beyond the sterile

waste of years; and the idea of home, fraught with the fragrance of

home-dwelling joys, reanimates the drooping spirit, as the Arabian

breeze will sometimes waft the freshness of the distant fields to the

weary pilgrim of the desert.

Stranger and sojourner as I am in the land, though for me no social

hearth may blaze, no hospitable roof throw open its doors, nor the

warm grasp of friendship welcome me at the threshold, yet I feel the

influence of the season beaming into my soul from the happy looks of

those around me. Surely happiness is reflective, like the light of

heaven, and every countenance, bright with smiles and glowing with

innocent enjoyment, is a mirror transmitting to others the rays of a

supreme and ever-shining benevolence. He who can turn churlishly away

from contemplating the felicity of his fellow-beings, and can sit down

darkling and repining in his loneliness when all around is joyful, may

have his moments of strong excitement and selfish gratification, but he

wants the genial and social sympathies which constitute the charm of a

merry Christmas.

THE STAGE-COACH.

Omne bene

Sine poena

Tempua est ludendi.

Venit hora

Absque mora

Libros deponendi.

OLD HOLIDAY SCHOOL-SONG.

IN the preceding paper I have made some general observations on the

Christmas festivities of England, and am tempted to illustrate them by

some anecdotes of a Christmas passed in the country; in perusing which

I would most courteously invite my reader to lay aside the austerity of

wisdom, and to put on that genuine holiday spirit which is tolerant of

folly and anxious only for amusement.

In the course of a December tour in Yorkshire, I rode for a long

distance in one of the public coaches on the day preceding Christmas.

The coach was crowded, both inside and out, with passengers who, by

their talk, seemed principally bound to the mansions of relations or

friends to eat the Christmas dinner. It was loaded also with hampers of

game and baskets and boxes of delicacies, and hares hung dangling their

long ears about the coachman’s box, presents from distant friends for

the impending feast. I had three fine rosy-cheeked school boys for my

fellow-passengers inside, full of the buxom health and manly spirit

which I have observed in the children of this country. They were

returning home for the holidays in high glee, and promising themselves a

world of enjoyment. It was delightful to hear the gigantic plans of the

little rogues, and the impracticable feats they were to perform during

their six weeks’ emancipation from the abhorred thraldom of book, birch,

and pedagogue. They were full of anticipations of the meeting with the

family and household, down to the very cat and dog, and of the joy

they were to give their little sisters by the presents with which their

pockets were crammed; but the meeting to which they seemed to look

forward with the greatest impatience was with Bantam, which I found to

be a pony, and, according to their talk, possessed of more virtues than

any steed since the days of Bucephalus. How he could trot! how he could

run! and then such leaps as he would take!--there was not a hedge in the

whole country that he could not clear.

They were under the particular guardianship of the coachman, to whom,

whenever an opportunity presented, they addressed a host of questions,

and pronounced him one of the best fellows in the world. Indeed, I could

not but notice the more than ordinary air of bustle and importance of

the coachman, who wore his hat a little on one side and had a large

bunch of Christmas greens stuck in the buttonhole of his coat. He

is always a personage full of mighty care and business, but he is

particularly so during this season, having so many commissions to

execute in consequence of the great interchange of presents. And here,

perhaps, it may not be unacceptable to my untravelled readers to have a

sketch that may serve as a general representation of this very numerous

and important class of functionaries, who have a dress, a manner, a

language, an air peculiar to themselves and prevalent throughout the

fraternity; so that wherever an English stage-coachman may be seen he

cannot be mistaken for one of any other craft or mystery.

He has commonly a broad, full face, curiously mottled with red, as if

the blood had been forced by hard feeding into every vessel of the

skin; he is swelled into jolly dimensions by frequent potations of malt

liquors, and his bulk is still further increased by a multiplicity of

coats, in which he is buried like a cauliflower, the upper one reaching

to his heels. He wears a broad-brimmed, low-crowned hat; a huge roll of

colored handkerchief about his neck, knowingly knotted and tucked in

at the bosom; and has in summer-time a large bouquet of flowers in his

buttonhole, the present, most probably, of some enamored country

lass. His waistcoat is commonly of some bright color, striped, and his

small-clothes extend far below the knees, to meet a pair of jockey boots

which reach about halfway up his legs.

All this costume is maintained with much precision; he has a pride in

having his clothes of excellent materials, and, notwithstanding the

seeming grossness of his appearance, there is still discernible

that neatness and propriety of person which is almost inherent in an

Englishman. He enjoys great consequence and consideration along the

road; has frequent conferences with the village housewives, who look

upon him as a man of great trust and dependence; and he seems to have

a good understanding with every bright-eyed country lass. The moment

he arrives where the horses are to be changed, he throws down the reins

with something of an air and abandons the cattle to the care of the

ostler, his duty being merely to drive from one stage to another. When

off the box his hands are thrust into the pockets of his great coat, and

he rolls about the inn-yard with an air of the most absolute lordliness.

Here he is generally surrounded by an admiring throng of ostlers,

stableboys, shoeblacks, and those nameless hangers-on that infest

inns and taverns, and run errands and do all kind of odd jobs for the

privilege of battening on the drippings of the kitchen and the leakage

of the tap-room. These all look up to him as to an oracle, treasure up

his cant phrases, echo his opinions about horses and other topics of

jockey lore, and, above all, endeavor to imitate his air and carriage.

Every ragamuffin that has a coat to his back thrusts his hands in the

pockets, rolls in his gait, talks slang, and is an embryo Coachey.

Perhaps it might be owing to the pleasing serenity that reigned in

my own mind that I fancied I saw cheerfulness in every countenance

throughout the journey. A stage-coach, however, carries animation always

with it, and puts the world in motion as it whirls along. The horn,

sounded at the entrance of the village, produces a general bustle. Some

hasten forth to meet friends; some with bundles and bandboxes to secure

places, and in the hurry of the moment can hardly take leave of the

group that accompanies them. In the meantime the coachman has a world of

small commissions to execute. Sometimes he delivers a hare or pheasant;

sometimes jerks a small parcel or newspaper to the door of a public

house; and sometimes, with knowing leer and words of sly import,

hands to some half-blushing, half-laughing house-maid an odd-shaped

billet-doux from some rustic admirer. As the coach rattles through the

village every one runs to the window, and you have glances on every side

of fresh country faces and blooming giggling girls. At the corners are

assembled juntos of village idlers and wise men, who take their stations

there for the important purpose of seeing company pass; but the sagest

knot is generally at the blacksmith’s, to whom the passing of the coach

is an event fruitful of much speculation. The smith, with the horse’s

heel in his lap, pauses as the vehicle whirls by; the cyclops round the

anvil suspend their ringing hammers and suffer the iron to grow cool;

and the sooty spectre in brown paper cap laboring at the bellows leans

on the handle for a moment, and permits the asthmatic engine to heave a

long-drawn sigh, while he glares through the murky smoke and sulphurous

gleams of the smithy.

Perhaps the impending holiday might have given a more than usual

animation to the country, for it seemed to me as if everybody was in

good looks and good spirits. Game, poultry, and other luxuries of

the table were in brisk circulation in the villages; the grocers’,

butchers’, and fruiterers’ shops were thronged with customers. The

housewives were stirring briskly about, putting their dwellings in

order, and the glossy branches of holly with their bright-red berries

began to appear at the windows. The scene brought to mind an old

writer’s account of Christmas preparation: “Now capons and hens, besides

turkeys, geese, and ducks, with beef and mutton, must all die, for in

twelve days a multitude of people will not be fed with a little. Now

plums and spice, sugar and honey, square it among pies and broth. Now

or never must music be in tune, for the youth must dance and sing to

get them a heat, while the aged sit by the fire. The country maid leaves

half her market, and must be sent again if she forgets a pack of cards

on Christmas Eve. Great is the contention of holly and ivy whether

master or dame wears the breeches. Dice and cards benefit the butler;

and if the cook do not lack wit, he will sweetly lick his fingers.”

I was roused from this fit of luxurious meditation by a shout from

my little travelling companions. They had been looking out of the

coach-windows for the last few miles, recognizing every tree and cottage

as they approached home, and now there was a general burst of joy.

“There’s John! and there’s old Carlo! and there’s Bantam!” cried the

happy little rogues, clapping their hands.

At the end of a lane there was an old sober-looking servant in livery

waiting for them; he was accompanied by a superannuated pointer and by

the redoubtable Bantam, a little old rat of a pony with a shaggy mane

and long rusty tail, who stood dozing quietly by the roadside, little

dreaming of the bustling times that awaited him.

I was pleased to see the fondness with which the little fellows leaped

about the steady old footman and hugged the pointer, who wriggled his

whole body for joy. But Bantam was the great object of interest; all

wanted to mount at once, and it was with some difficulty that John

arranged that they should ride by turns and the eldest should ride

first.

Off they set at last, one on the pony, with the dog bounding and barking

before him, and the others holding John’s hands, both talking at

once and overpowering him with questions about home and with school

anecdotes. I looked after them with a feeling in which I do not know

whether pleasure or melancholy predominated; for I was reminded of those

days when, like them, I had known neither care nor sorrow and a holiday

was the summit of earthly felicity. We stopped a few moments afterwards

to water the horses, and on resuming our route a turn of the road

brought us in sight of a neat country-seat. I could just distinguish the

forms of a lady and two young girls in the portico, and I saw my

little comrades, with Bantam, Carlo, and old John, trooping along the

carriage-road. I leaned out of the coach-window, in hopes of witnessing

the happy meeting, but a grove of trees shut it from my sight.

In the evening we reached a village where I had determined to pass the

night. As we drove into the great gateway of the inn, I saw on one side

the light of a rousing kitchen-fire beaming through a window. I entered,

and admired, for the hundredth time, that picture of convenience,

neatness, and broad honest enjoyment, the kitchen of an English inn.

It was of spacious dimensions, hung round with copper and tin vessels

highly polished, and decorated here and there with a Christmas green.

Hams, tongues, and flitches of bacon were suspended from the ceiling; a

smoke-jack made its ceaseless clanking beside the fireplace, and a clock

ticked in one corner. A well-scoured deal table extended along one side

of the kitchen, with a cold round of beef and other hearty viands

upon it, over which two foaming tankards of ale seemed mounting guard.

Travellers of inferior order were preparing to attack this stout repast,

while others sat smoking and gossiping over their ale on two high-backed

oaken settles beside the fire. Trim housemaids were hurrying backwards

and forwards under the directions of a fresh bustling landlady, but

still seizing an occasional moment to exchange a flippant word and have

a rallying laugh with the group round the fire. The scene completely

realized Poor Robin’s humble idea of the comforts of midwinter:

Now trees their leafy hats do bare

To reverence Winter’s silver hair;

A handsome hostess, merry host,

A pot of ale now and a toast,

Tobacco and a good coal fire,

Are things this season doth require.*

* Poor Robin’s Almanack, 1684.

I had not been long at the inn when a post-chaise drove up to the door.

A young gentleman stept out, and by the light of the lamps I caught a

glimpse of a countenance which I thought I knew. I moved forward to

get a nearer view, when his eye caught mine. I was not mistaken; it was

Frank Bracebridge, a sprightly, good-humored young fellow with whom I

had once travelled on the Continent. Our meeting was extremely cordial,

for the countenance of an old fellow-traveller always brings up

the recollection of a thousand pleasant scenes, odd adventures, and

excellent jokes. To discuss all these in a transient interview at an

inn was impossible; and, finding that I was not pressed for time and was

merely making a tour of observation, he insisted that I should give him

a day or two at his father’s country-seat, to which he was going to pass

the holidays and which lay at a few miles’ distance. “It is better

than eating a solitary Christmas dinner at an inn,” said he, “and I can

assure you of a hearty welcome in something of the old-fashioned style.”

His reasoning was cogent, and I must confess the preparation I had seen

for universal festivity and social enjoyment had made me feel a little

impatient of my loneliness. I closed, therefore, at once with his

invitation; the chaise drove up to the door, and in a few moments I was

on my way to the family mansion of the Bracebridges.

CHRISTMAS EVE.

Saint Francis and Saint Benedight

Blesse this house from wicked wight;

From the night-mare and the goblin,

That is hight good fellow Robin;

Keep it from all evil spirits,

Fairies, weezels, rats, and ferrets:

From curfew time

To the next prime.

CARTWRIGHT.

IT was a brilliant moonlight night, but extremely cold; our chaise

whirled rapidly over the frozen ground; the postboy smacked his whip

incessantly, and a part of the time his horses were on a gallop. “He

knows where he is going,” said my companion, laughing, “and is eager to

arrive in time for some of the merriment and good cheer of the servants’

hall. My father, you must know, is a bigoted devotee of the old school,

and prides himself upon keeping up something of old English hospitality.

He is a tolerable specimen of what you will rarely meet with nowadays

in its purity, the old English country gentleman; for our men of fortune

spend so much of their time in town, and fashion is carried so much into

the country, that the strong rich peculiarities of ancient rural life

are almost polished away. My father, however, from early years, took

honest Peacham* for his textbook, instead of Chesterfield; he determined

in his own mind that there was no condition more truly honorable and

enviable than that of a country gentleman on his paternal lands, and

therefore passes the whole of his time on his estate. He is a strenuous

advocate for the revival of the old rural games and holiday observances,

and is deeply read in the writers, ancient and modern, who have treated

on the subject. Indeed, his favorite range of reading is among the

authors who flourished at least two centuries since, who, he insists,

wrote and thought more like true Englishmen than any of their

successors. He even regrets sometimes that he had not been born a few

centuries earlier, when England was itself and had its peculiar manners

and customs. As he lives at some distance from the main road, in rather

a lonely part of the country, without any rival gentry near him, he has

that most enviable of all blessings to an Englishman--an opportunity

of indulging the bent of his own humor without molestation. Being

representative of the oldest family in the neighborhood, and a great

part of the peasantry being his tenants, he is much looked up to, and

in general is known simply by the appellation of ‘The Squire’--a title

which has been accorded to the head of the family since time immemorial.

I think it best to give you these hints about my worthy old father, to

prepare you for any eccentricities that might otherwise appear absurd.”

* Peacham’s Complete Gentleman, 1622.

We had passed for some time along the wall of a park, and at length the

chaise stopped at the gate. It was in a heavy, magnificent old style,

of iron bars fancifully wrought at top into flourishes and flowers.

The huge square columns that supported the gate were surmounted by the

family crest. Close adjoining was the porter’s lodge, sheltered under

dark fir trees and almost buried in shrubbery.

The postboy rang a large porter’s bell, which resounded though the still

frosty air, and was answered by the distant barking of dogs, with which

the mansion-house seemed garrisoned. An old woman immediately appeared

at the gate. As the moonlight fell strongly upon her, I had a full view

of a little primitive dame, dressed very much in the antique taste, with

a neat kerchief and stomacher, and her silver hair peeping from under a

cap of snowy whiteness. She came curtseying forth, with many expressions

of simple joy at seeing her young master. Her husband, it seemed, was up

at the house keeping Christmas Eve in the servants’ hall; they could

not do without him, as he was the best hand at a song and story in the

household.

My friend proposed that we should alight and walk through the park to

the hall, which was at no great distance, while the chaise should follow

on. Our road wound through a noble avenue of trees, among the naked

branches of which the moon glittered as she rolled through the deep

vault of a cloudless sky. The lawn beyond was sheeted with a slight

covering of snow, which here and there sparkled as the moonbeams caught

a frosty crystal, and at a distance might be seen a thin transparent

vapor stealing up from the low grounds and threatening gradually to

shroud the landscape.

My companion looked around him with transport. “How often,” said he,

“have I scampered up this avenue on returning home on school vacations!

How often have I played under these trees when a boy! I feel a degree of

filial reverence for them, as we look up to those who have cherished us

in childhood. My father was always scrupulous in exacting our holidays

and having us around him on family festivals. He used to direct and

superintend our games with the strictness that some parents do the

studies of their children. He was very particular that we should play

the old English games according to their original form, and consulted

old books for precedent and authority for every ‘merrie disport;’ yet I

assure you there never was pedantry so delightful. It was the policy

of the good old gentleman to make his children feel that home was the

happiest place in the world; and I value this delicious home-feeling as

one of the choicest gifts a parent could bestow.”

We were interrupted by the clamor of a troop of dogs of all sorts and

sizes, “mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound, and curs of lower degree,”

that disturbed by the ring of the porter’s bell and the rattling of the

chaise, came bounding, open-mouthed, across the lawn.

“‘----The little dogs and all, Tray, Blanch,

and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me!’”

cried Bracebridge, laughing. At the sound of his voice the bark was

changed into a yelp of delight, and in a moment he was surrounded and

almost overpowered by the caresses of the faithful animals.

We had now come in full view of the old family mansion, partly thrown in

deep shadow and partly lit up by the cold moonshine. It was an irregular

building of some magnitude, and seemed to be of the architecture of

different periods. One wing was evidently very ancient, with heavy

stone-shafted bow windows jutting out and overrun with ivy, from among

the foliage of which the small diamond-shaped panes of glass glittered

with the moonbeams. The rest of the house was in the French taste of

Charles the Second’s time, having been repaired and altered, as my

friend told me, by one of his ancestors who returned with that monarch

at the Restoration. The grounds about the house were laid out in the

old formal manner of artificial flower-beds, clipped shrubberies, raised

terraces, and heavy stone balustrades, ornamented with urns, a leaden

statue or two, and a jet of water. The old gentleman, I was told, was

extremely careful to preserve this obsolete finery in all its

original state. He admired this fashion in gardening; it had an air

of magnificence, was courtly and noble, and befitting good old family

style. The boasted imitation of Nature in modern gardening had sprung

up with modern republican notions, but did not suit a monarchical

government; it smacked of the leveling system. I could not help smiling

at this introduction of politics into gardening, though I expressed some

apprehension that I should find the old gentleman rather intolerant

in his creed. Frank assured me, however, that it was almost the only

instance in which he had ever heard his father meddle with politics; and

he believed that he had got this notion from a member of Parliament who

once passed a few weeks with him. The squire was glad of any argument

to defend his clipped yew trees and formal terraces, which had been

occasionally attacked by modern landscape gardeners.

As we approached the house we heard the sound of music, and now and

then a burst of laughter from one end of the building. This, Bracebridge

said, must proceed from the servants’ hall, where a great deal of

revelry was permitted, and even encouraged, by the squire throughout the

twelve days of Christmas, provided everything was done conformably to

ancient usage. Here were kept up the old games of hoodman blind, shoe

the wild mare, hot cockles, steal the white loaf, bob apple, and snap

dragon; the Yule-clog and Christmas candle were regularly burnt, and the

mistletoe with its white berries hung up, to the imminent peril of all

the pretty housemaids.*

* The mistletoe is still hung up in farm-houses and kitchens

at Christmas, and the young men have the privilege of

kissing the girls under it, plucking each time a berry from

the bush. When the berries are all plucked the privilege

ceases.

So intent were the servants upon their sports that we had to ring

repeatedly before we could make ourselves heard. On our arrival being

announced the squire came out to receive us, accompanied by his two

other sons--one a young officer in the army, home on a leave of absence;

the other an Oxonian, just from the university. The squire was a fine

healthy-looking old gentleman, with silver hair curling lightly round an

open florid countenance, in which the physiognomist, with the advantage,

like myself, of a previous hint or two, might discover a singular

mixture of whim and benevolence.

The family meeting was warm and affectionate; as the evening was far

advanced, the squire would not permit us to change our travelling

dresses, but ushered us at once to the company, which was assembled in

a large old-fashioned hall. It was composed of different branches of a

numerous family connection, where there were the usual proportion of old

uncles and aunts, comfortable married dames, superannuated spinsters,

blooming country cousins, half-fledged striplings, and bright-eyed

boarding-school hoydens. They were variously occupied--some at a round

game of cards; others conversing around the fireplace; at one end of the

hall was a group of the young folks, some nearly grown up, others of

a more tender and budding age, fully engrossed by a merry game; and a

profusion of wooden horses, penny trumpets, and tattered dolls about

the floor showed traces of a troop of little fairy beings who, having

frolicked through a happy day, had been carried off to slumber through a

peaceful night.

While the mutual greetings were going on between young Bracebridge and

his relatives I had time to scan the apartment. I have called it a hall,

for so it had certainly been in old times, and the squire had evidently

endeavored to restore it to something of its primitive state. Over

the heavy projecting fireplace was suspended a picture of a warrior

in armor, standing by a white horse, and on the opposite wall hung a

helmet, buckler, and lance. At one end an enormous pair of antlers were

inserted in the wall, the branches serving as hooks on which to suspend

hats, whips, and spurs, and in the corners of the apartment were

fowling-pieces, fishing-rods, and other sporting implements. The

furniture was of the cumbrous workmanship of former days, though some

articles of modern convenience had been added and the oaken floor had

been carpeted, so that the whole presented an odd mixture of parlor and

hall.

The grate had been removed from the wide overwhelming fireplace to

make way for a fire of wood, in the midst of which was an enormous log

glowing and blazing, and sending forth a vast volume of light and heat:

this, I understood, was the Yule-clog, which the squire was particular

in having brought in and illumined on a Christmas Eve, according to

ancient custom.*

* The Yule-clog is a great log of wood, sometimes the root

of a tree, brought into the house with great ceremony on

Christmas Eve, laid in the fireplace, and lighted with the

brand of last year’s clog. While it lasted there was great

drinking, singing, and telling of tales. Sometimes it was

accompanied by Christmas candles; but in the cottages the

only light was from the ruddy blaze of the great wood fire.

The Yule-clog was to burn all night; if it went out, it was

considered a sign of ill luck.

Herrick mentions it in one of his songs:

Come, bring with a noise,

My metric, merrie boys,

The Christmas Log to the firing;

While my good dame, she

Bids ye all be free,

And drink to your hearts’ desiring.

The Yule-clog is still burnt in many farm-houses and kitchens in

England, particularly in the north, and there are several superstitions

connected with it among the peasantry. If a squinting person come to the

house while it is burning, or a person barefooted, it is considered an

ill omen. The brand remaining from the Yule-clog is carefully put away

to light the next year’s Christmas fire.

It was really delightful to see the old squire seated in his hereditary

elbow-chair by the hospitable fireside of his ancestors, and looking

around him like the sun of a system, beaming warmth and gladness to

every heart. Even the very dog that lay stretched at his feet, as he

lazily shifted his position and yawned would look fondly up in his

master’s face, wag his tail against the floor, and stretch himself again

to sleep, confident of kindness and protection. There is an emanation

from the heart in genuine hospitality which cannot be described, but is

immediately felt and puts the stranger at once at his ease. I had not

been seated many minutes by the comfortable hearth of the worthy old

cavalier before I found myself as much at home as if I had been one of

the family.

Supper was announced shortly after our arrival. It was served up in a

spacious oaken chamber, the panels of which shone with wax, and around

which were several family portraits decorated with holly and ivy.

Besides the accustomed lights, two great wax tapers, called Christmas

candles, wreathed with greens, were placed on a highly polished beaufet

among the family plate. The table was abundantly spread with substantial

fare; but the squire made his supper of frumenty, a dish made of wheat

cakes boiled in milk with rich spices, being a standing dish in old

times for Christmas Eve. I was happy to find my old friend, minced pie,

in the retinue of the feast and, finding him to be perfectly orthodox,

and that I need not be ashamed of my predilection, I greeted him with

all the warmth wherewith we usually greet an old and very genteel

acquaintance.

The mirth of the company was greatly promoted by the humors of an

eccentric personage whom Mr. Bracebridge always addressed with the

quaint appellation of Master Simon. He was a tight brisk little man,

with the air of an arrant old bachelor. His nose was shaped like the

bill of a parrot; his face slightly pitted with the small-pox, with a

dry perpetual bloom on it, like a frostbitten leaf in autumn. He had an

eye of great quickness and vivacity, with a drollery and lurking waggery

of expression that was irresistible. He was evidently the wit of the

family, dealing very much in sly jokes and innuendoes with the ladies,

and making infinite merriment by harping upon old themes, which,

unfortunately, my ignorance of the family chronicles did not permit

me to enjoy. It seemed to be his great delight during supper to keep

a young girl next to him in a continual agony of stifled laughter, in

spite of her awe of the reproving looks of her mother, who sat opposite.

Indeed, he was the idol of the younger part of the company, who laughed

at everything he said or did and at every turn of his countenance.

I could not wonder at it; for he must have been a miracle of

accomplishments in their eyes. He could imitate Punch and Judy; make

an old woman of his hand, with the assistance of a burnt cork and

pocket-handkerchief; and cut an orange into such a ludicrous caricature

that the young folks were ready to die with laughing.

I was let briefly into his history by Frank Bracebridge. He was an old

bachelor, of a small independent income, which by careful management was

sufficient for all his wants. He revolved through the family system

like a vagrant comet in its orbit, sometimes visiting one branch, and

sometimes another quite remote, as is often the case with gentlemen of

extensive connections and small fortunes in England. He had a chirping,

buoyant disposition, always enjoying the present moment; and his

frequent change of scene and company prevented his acquiring those

rusty, unaccommodating habits with which old bachelors are so

uncharitably charged. He was a complete family chronicle, being versed

in the genealogy, history, and intermarriages of the whole house of

Bracebridge, which made him a great favorite with the old folks; he was

a beau of all the elder ladies and superannuated spinsters, among whom

he was habitually considered rather a young fellow; and he was master

of the revels among the children, so that there was not a more popular

being in the sphere in which he moved than Mr. Simon Bracebridge. Of

late years he had resided almost entirely with the squire, to whom he

had become a factotum, and whom he particularly delighted by jumping

with his humor in respect to old times and by having a scrap of an

old song to suit every occasion. We had presently a specimen of his

last-mentioned talent, for no sooner was supper removed and spiced wines

and other beverages peculiar to the season introduced, than Master Simon

was called on for a good old Christmas song. He bethought himself for a

moment, and then, with a sparkle of the eye and a voice that was by no

means bad, excepting that it ran occasionally into a falsetto like the

notes of a split reed, he quavered forth a quaint old ditty:

Now Christmas is come,

Let us beat up the drum,

And call all our neighbors together;

And when they appear,

Let us make them such cheer,

As will keep out the wind and the weather, &c.

The supper had disposed every one to gayety, and an old harper was

summoned from the servants’ hall, where he had been strumming all the

evening, and to all appearance comforting himself with some of the

squire’s home-brewed. He was a kind of hanger-on, I was told, of the

establishment, and, though ostensibly a resident of the village, was

oftener to be found in the squire’s kitchen than his own home, the old

gentleman being fond of the sound of “harp in hall.”

The dance, like most dances after supper, was a merry one: some of the

older folks joined in it, and the squire himself figured down several

couple with a partner with whom he affirmed he had danced at every

Christmas for nearly half a century. Master Simon, who seemed to be a

kind of connecting link between the old times and the new, and to

be withal a little antiquated in the taste of his accomplishments,

evidently piqued himself on his dancing, and was endeavoring to gain

credit by the heel and toe, rigadoon, and other graces of the ancient

school; but he had unluckily assorted himself with a little romping girl

from boarding-school, who by her wild vivacity kept him continually on

the stretch and defeated all his sober attempts at elegance: such are

the ill-sorted matches to which antique gentlemen are unfortunately

prone.

The young Oxonian, on the contrary, had led out one of his maiden aunts,

on whom the rogue played a thousand little knaveries with impunity: he

was full of practical jokes, and his delight was to tease his aunts and

cousins, yet, like all madcap youngsters, he was a universal favorite

among the women. The most interesting couple in the dance was the

young officer and a ward of the squire’s, a beautiful blushing girl of

seventeen. From several shy glances which I had noticed in the course of

the evening I suspected there was a little kindness growing up between

them; and indeed the young soldier was just the hero to captivate a

romantic girl. He was tall, slender, and handsome, and, like most

young British officers of late years, had picked up various small

accomplishments on the Continent: he could talk French and Italian, draw

landscapes, sing very tolerably, dance divinely, but, above all, he had

been wounded at Waterloo. What girl of seventeen, well read in poetry

and romance, could resist such a mirror of chivalry and perfection?

The moment the dance was over he caught up a guitar, and, lolling

against the old marble fireplace in an attitude which I am half inclined

to suspect was studied, began the little French air of the Troubadour.

The squire, however, exclaimed against having anything on Christmas Eve

but good old English; upon which the young minstrel, casting up his eye

for a moment as if in an effort of memory, struck into another strain,

and with a charming air of gallantry gave Herrick’s “Night-Piece to

Julia:”

Her eyes the glow-worm lend thee,

The shooting stars attend thee,

And the elves also,

Whose little eyes glow

Like the sparks of fire, befriend thee.

No Will-o’-the-Wisp mislight thee;

Nor snake nor slow-worm bite thee;

But on thy way,

Not making a stay,

Since ghost there is none to affright thee,

Then let not the dark thee cumber;

What though the moon does slumber,

The stars of the night

Will lend thee their light,

Like tapers clear without number.

Then, Julia, let me woo thee,

Thus, thus to come unto me,

And when I shall meet

Thy silvery feet,

My soul I’ll pour into thee.

The song might or might not have been intended in compliment to the

fair Julia, for so I found his partner was called; she, however, was

certainly unconscious of any such application, for she never looked

at the singer, but kept her eyes cast upon the floor. Her face was

suffused, it is true, with a beautiful blush, and there was a gentle

heaving of the bosom, but all that was doubtless caused by the exercise

of the dance; indeed, so great was her indifference that she amused

herself with plucking to pieces a choice bouquet of hot-house flowers,

and by the time the song was concluded the nosegay lay in ruins on the

floor.

The party now broke up for the night with the kind-hearted old custom of

shaking hands. As I passed through the hall on my way to my chamber, the

dying embers of the Yule-clog still sent forth a dusky glow, and had it

not been the season when “no spirit dares stir abroad,” I should have

been half tempted to steal from my room at midnight and peep whether the

fairies might not be at their revels about the hearth.

My chamber was in the old part of the mansion, the ponderous furniture

of which might have been fabricated in the days of the giants. The room

was panelled, with cornices of heavy carved work, in which flowers and

grotesque faces were strangely intermingled, and a row of black-looking

portraits stared mournfully at me from the walls. The bed was of rich

though faded damask, with a lofty tester, and stood in a niche opposite

a bow window. I had scarcely got into bed when a strain of music seemed

to break forth in the air just below the window. I listened, and found

it proceeded from a band which I concluded to be the Waits from some

neighboring village. They went round the house, playing under the

windows. I drew aside the curtains to hear them more distinctly.

The moonbeams fell through the upper part of the casement; partially

lighting up the antiquated apartment. The sounds, as they receded,

became more soft and aerial, and seemed to accord with the quiet and

moonlight. I listened and listened--they became more and more tender and

remote, and, as they gradually died away, my head sunk upon the pillow

and I fell asleep.

CHRISTMAS DAY.

Dark and dull night, flie hence away,

And give the honor to this day

That sees December turn’d to May.

. . . . . . .

Why does the chilling winter’s morne

Smile like a field beset with corn?

Or smell like to a meade new-shorne,

Thus on the sudden?--come and see

The cause why things thus fragrant be.

HERRICK.

WHEN I woke the next morning it seemed as if all the events of the

preceding evening had been a dream, and nothing but the identity of the

ancient chamber convinced me of their reality. While I lay musing on my

pillow I heard the sound of little feet pattering outside of the door,

and a whispering consultation. Presently a choir of small voices chanted

forth an old Christmas carol, the burden of which was--

Rejoice, our Saviour he was born

On Christmas Day in the morning.

I rose softly, slipt on my clothes, opened the door suddenly, and beheld

one of the most beautiful little fairy groups that a painter could

imagine. It consisted of a boy and two girls, the eldest not more than

six, and lovely as seraphs. They were going the rounds of the house and

singing at every chamber door, but my sudden appearance frightened them

into mute bashfulness. They remained for a moment playing on their lips

with their fingers, and now and then stealing a shy glance from under

their eyebrows, until, as if by one impulse, they scampered away, and as

they turned an angle of the gallery I heard them laughing in triumph at

their escape.

Everything conspired to produce kind and happy feelings in this

stronghold of old-fashioned hospitality. The window of my chamber looked

out upon what in summer would have been a beautiful landscape. There was

a sloping lawn, a fine stream winding at the foot of it, and a tract of

park beyond, with noble clumps of trees and herds of deer. At a distance

was a neat hamlet, with the smoke from the cottage chimneys hanging over

it, and a church with its dark spire in strong relief against the clear

cold sky. The house was surrounded with evergreens, according to the

English custom, which would have given almost an appearance of summer;

but the morning was extremely frosty; the light vapor of the preceding

evening had been precipitated by the cold, and covered all the trees and

every blade of grass with its fine crystalizations. The rays of a bright

morning sun had a dazzling effect among the glittering foliage. A robin,

perched upon the top of a mountain-ash that hung its clusters of red

berries just before my window, was basking himself in the sunshine

and piping a few querulous notes, and a peacock was displaying all

the glories of his train and strutting with the pride and gravity of a

Spanish grandee on the terrace walk below.

I had scarcely dressed myself when a servant appeared to invite me to

family prayers. He showed me the way to a small chapel in the old wing

of the house, where I found the principal part of the family already

assembled in a kind of gallery furnished with cushions, hassocks, and

large prayer-books; the servants were seated on benches below. The old

gentleman read prayers from a desk in front of the gallery, and Master

Simon acted as clerk and made the responses; and I must do him the

justice to say that he acquitted himself with great gravity and decorum.

The service was followed by a Christmas carol, which Mr. Bracebridge

himself had constructed from a poem of his favorite author, Herrick, and

it had been adapted to an old church melody by Master Simon. As there

were several good voices among the household, the effect was extremely

pleasing, but I was particularly gratified by the exaltation of heart

and sudden sally of grateful feeling with which the worthy squire

delivered one stanza, his eye glistening and his voice rambling out of

all the bounds of time and tune:

“‘Tis Thou that crown’st my glittering hearth

With guiltless mirth,

And givest me Wassaile bowles to drink

Spiced to the brink;

Lord, ‘tis Thy plenty-dropping hand

That soiles my land:

And giv’st me for my bushell sowne,

Twice ten for one.”

I afterwards understood that early morning service was read on every

Sunday and saint’s day throughout the year, either by Mr. Bracebridge or

by some member of the family. It was once almost universally the case

at the seats of the nobility and gentry of England, and it is much to

be regretted that the custom is falling into neglect; for the dullest

observer must be sensible of the order and serenity prevalent in those

households where the occasional exercise of a beautiful form of worship

in the morning gives, as it were, the keynote to every temper for the

day and attunes every spirit to harmony.

Our breakfast consisted of what the squire denominated true old English

fare. He indulged in some bitter lamentations over modern breakfasts

of tea and toast, which he censured as among the causes of modern

effeminacy and weak nerves and the decline of old English heartiness;

and, though he admitted them to his table to suit the palates of his

guests, yet there was a brave display of cold meats, wine, and ale on

the sideboard.

After breakfast I walked about the grounds with Frank Bracebridge

and Master Simon, or Mr. Simon, as he was called by everybody but the

squire. We were escorted by a number of gentlemanlike dogs, that seemed

loungers about the establishment, from the frisking spaniel to the

steady old stag-hound, the last of which was of a race that had been

in the family time out of mind; they were all obedient to a dog-whistle

which hung to Master Simon’s buttonhole, and in the midst of their

gambols would glance an eye occasionally upon a small switch he carried

in his hand.

The old mansion had a still more venerable look in the yellow sunshine

than by pale moonlight; and I could not but feel the force of the

squire’s idea that the formal terraces, heavily moulded balustrades, and

clipped yew trees carried with them an air of proud aristocracy. There

appeared to be an unusual number of peacocks about the place, and I was

making some remarks upon what I termed a flock of them that were basking

under a sunny wall, when I was gently corrected in my phraseology

by Master Simon, who told me that according to the most ancient and

approved treatise on hunting I must say a muster of peacocks. “In the

same way,” added he, with a slight air of pedantry, “we say a flight

of doves or swallows, a bevy of quails, a herd of deer, of wrens, or

cranes, a skulk of foxes, or a building of rooks.” He went on to inform

me that, according to Sir Anthony Fitzherbert, we ought to ascribe to

this bird “both understanding and glory; for, being praised, he will

presently set up his tail, chiefly against the sun, to the intent you

may the better behold the beauty thereof. But at the fall of the leaf,

when his tail falleth, he will mourn and hide himself in corners till

his tail come again as it was.”

I could not help smiling at this display of small erudition on so

whimsical a subject; but I found that the peacocks were birds of some

consequence at the hall, for Frank Bracebridge informed me that they

were great favorites with his father, who was extremely careful to keep

up the breed; partly because they belonged to chivalry, and were in

great request at the stately banquets of the olden time, and partly

because they had a pomp and magnificence about them highly becoming an

old family mansion. Nothing, he was accustomed to say, had an air of

greater state and dignity than a peacock perched upon an antique stone

balustrade.

Master Simon had now to hurry off, having an appointment at the parish

church with the village choristers, who were to perform some music of

his selection. There was something extremely agreeable in the cheerful

flow of animal spirits of the little man; and I confess I had been

somewhat surprised at his apt quotations from authors who certainly

were not in the range of every-day reading. I mentioned this last

circumstance to Frank Bracebridge, who told me with a smile that Master

Simon’s whole stock of erudition was confined to some half a dozen old

authors, which the squire had put into his hands, and which he read over

and over whenever he had a studious fit, as he sometimes had on a

rainy day or a long winter evening. Sir Anthony Fitzherbert’s Book of

Husbandry, Markham’s Country Contentments, the Tretyse of Hunting, by

Sir Thomas Cockayne, Knight, Isaac Walton’s Angler, and two or three

more such ancient worthies of the pen were his standard authorities;

and, like all men who know but a few books, he looked up to them with a

kind of idolatry and quoted them on all occasions. As to his songs,

they were chiefly picked out of old books in the squire’s library, and

adapted to tunes that were popular among the choice spirits of the last

century. His practical application of scraps of literature, however, had

caused him to be looked upon as a prodigy of book-knowledge by all the

grooms, huntsmen, and small sportsmen of the neighborhood.

While we were talking we heard the distant toll of the village bell,

and I was told that the squire was a little particular in having his

household at church on a Christmas morning, considering it a day of

pouring out of thanks and rejoicing; for, as old Tusser observed,--

“At Christmas be merry, and thankful withal,

And feast thy poor neighbors, the great with the small.”

“If you are disposed to go to church,” said Frank Bracebridge, “I can

promise you a specimen of my cousin Simon’s musical achievements. As the

church is destitute of an organ, he has formed a band from the village

amateurs, and established a musical club for their improvement; he has

also sorted a choir, as he sorted my father’s pack of hounds, according

to the directions of Jervaise Markham in his Country Contentments: for

the bass he has sought out all the ‘deep, solemn mouths,’ and for the

tenor the ‘loud-ringing mouths,’ among the country bumpkins, and for

‘sweet-mouths,’ he has culled-with curious taste among the prettiest

lasses in the neighborhood; though these last, he affirms, are the most

difficult to keep in tune, your pretty female singer being exceedingly

wayward and capricious, and very liable to accident.”

As the morning, though frosty, was remarkably fine and clear, the most

of the family walked to the church, which was a very old building of

gray stone, and stood near a village about half a mile from the park

gate. Adjoining it was a low snug parsonage which seemed coeval with the

church. The front of it was perfectly matted with a yew tree that had

been trained against its walls, through the dense foliage of which

apertures had been formed to admit light into the small antique

lattices. As we passed this sheltered nest the parson issued forth and

preceded us.

I had expected to see a sleek well-conditioned pastor, such as is often

found in a snug living in the vicinity of a rich patron’s table, but I

was disappointed. The parson was a little, meagre, black-looking man,

with a grizzled wig that was too wide and stood off from each ear; so

that his head seemed to have shrunk away within it, like a dried filbert

in its shell. He wore a rusty coat, with great skirts and pockets that

would have held the church Bible and prayer-book: and his small legs

seemed still smaller from being planted in large shoes decorated with

enormous buckles.

I was informed by Frank Bracebridge that the parson had been a chum of

his father’s at Oxford, and had received this living shortly after the

latter had come to his estate. He was a complete black-letter hunter,

and would scarcely read a work printed in the Roman character. The

editions of Caxton and Wynkyn de Worde were his delight, and he was

indefatigable in his researches after such old English writers as have

fallen into oblivion from their worthlessness. In deference, perhaps, to

the notions of Mr. Bracebridge he had made diligent investigations into

the festive rites and holiday customs of former times, and had been as

zealous in the inquiry as if he had been a boon companion; but it was

merely with that plodding spirit with which men of adust temperament

follow up any track of study, merely because it is denominated learning;

indifferent to its intrinsic nature, whether it be the illustration of

the wisdom or of the ribaldry and obscenity of antiquity. He had pored

over these old volumes so intensely that they seemed to have been

reflected into his countenance; which, if the face be indeed an index of

the mind, might be compared to a title-page of black-letter.

On reaching the church-porch we found the parson rebuking the

gray-headed sexton for having used mistletoe among the greens with which

the church was decorated. It was, he observed, an unholy plant, profaned

by having been used by the Druids in their mystic ceremonies; and,

though it might be innocently employed in the festive ornamenting of

halls and kitchens, yet it had been deemed by the Fathers of the Church

as unhallowed and totally unfit for sacred purposes. So tenacious was

he on this point that the poor sexton was obliged to strip down a great

part of the humble trophies of his taste before the parson would consent

to enter upon the service of the day.

The interior of the church was venerable, but simple; on the walls were

several mural monuments of the Bracebridges, and just beside the altar

was a tomb of ancient workmanship, on which lay the effigy of a warrior

in armor with his legs crossed, a sign of his having been a crusader. I

was told it was one of the family who had signalized himself in the Holy

Land, and the same whose picture hung over the fireplace in the hall.

During service Master Simon stood up in the pew and repeated the

responses very audibly, evincing that kind of ceremonious devotion

punctually observed by a gentleman of the old school and a man of old

family connections. I observed too that he turned over the leaves of a

folio prayer-book with something of a flourish; possibly to show off an

enormous seal-ring which enriched one of his fingers and which had the

look of a family relic. But he was evidently most solicitous about

the musical part of the service, keeping his eye fixed intently on the

choir, and beating time with much gesticulation and emphasis.

The orchestra was in a small gallery, and presented a most whimsical

grouping of heads piled one above the other, among which I particularly

noticed that of the village tailor, a pale fellow with a retreating

forehead and chin, who played on the clarinet, and seemed to have blown

his face to a point; and there was another, a short pursy man, stooping

and laboring at a bass-viol, so as to show nothing but the top of a

round bald head, like the egg of an ostrich. There were two or three

pretty faces among the female singers, to which the keen air of a frosty

morning had given a bright rosy tint; but the gentlemen choristers had

evidently been chosen, like old Cremona fiddles, more for tone than

looks; and as several had to sing from the same book, there were

clusterings of odd physiognomies not unlike those groups of cherubs we

sometimes see on country tombstones.

The usual services of the choir were managed tolerably well, the vocal

parts generally lagging a little behind the instrumental, and some

loitering fiddler now and then making up for lost time by travelling

over a passage with prodigious celerity and clearing more bars than the

keenest fox-hunter to be in at the death. But the great trial was an

anthem that had been prepared and arranged by Master Simon, and on which

he had founded great expectation. Unluckily, there was a blunder at the

very outset: the musicians became flurried; Master Simon was in a fever;

everything went on lamely and irregularly until they came to a chorus

beginning, “Now let us sing with one accord,” which seemed to be a

signal for parting company: all became discord and confusion: each

shifted for himself, and got to the end as well--or, rather, as soon--as

he could, excepting one old chorister in a pair of horn spectacles

bestriding and pinching a long sonorous nose, who happened to stand

a little apart, and, being wrapped up in his own melody, kept on a

quavering course, wriggling his head, ogling his book, and winding all

up by a nasal solo of at least three bars’ duration.

The parson gave us a most erudite sermon on the rites and ceremonies

of Christmas, and the propriety of observing it not merely as a day

of thanksgiving but of rejoicing, supporting the correctness of his

opinions by the earliest usages of the Church, and enforcing them by the

authorities of Theophilus of Caesarea, St. Cyprian, St. Chrysostom, St.

Augustine, and a cloud more of saints and fathers, from whom he made

copious quotations. I was a little at a loss to perceive the necessity

of such a mighty array of forces to maintain a point which no one

present seemed inclined to dispute; but I soon found that the good man

had a legion of ideal adversaries to contend with, having in the course

of his researches on the subject of Christmas got completely embroiled

in the sectarian controversies of the Revolution, when the Puritans made

such a fierce assault upon the ceremonies of the Church, and poor old

Christmas was driven out of the land by proclamation of Parliament.*

The worthy parson lived but with times past, and knew but little of the

present.

Shut up among worm-eaten tomes in the retirement of his antiquated

little study, the pages of old times were to him as the gazettes of the

day, while the era of the Revolution was mere modern history. He forgot

that nearly two centuries had elapsed since the fiery persecution of

poor mince-pie throughout the land; when plum porridge was denounced as

“mere popery,” and roast beef as anti-christian, and that Christmas had

been brought in again triumphantly with the merry court of King Charles

at the Restoration. He kindled into warmth with the ardor of his contest

and the host of imaginary foes with whom he had to combat; he had a

stubborn conflict with old Prynne and two or three other forgotten

champions of the Roundheads on the subject of Christmas festivity;

and concluded by urging his hearers, in the most solemn and affecting

manner, to stand to the traditional customs of their fathers and feast

and make merry on this joyful anniversary of the Church.

* From the “Flying Eagle,” a small gazette, published

December 24, 1652: “The House spent much time this day about

the business of the Navy, for settling the affairs at sea,

and before they rose, were presented with a terrible

remonstrance against Christmas day, grounded upon divine

Scriptures, 2 Cor. v. 16; I Cor. xv. 14, 17; and in honor of

the Lord’s Day, grounded upon these Scriptures, John xx. I;

Rev. i. 10; Psalms cxviii. 24; Lev. xxiii. 7, 11; Mark xv.

8; Psalms lxxxiv. 10, in which Christmas is called Anti-

christ’s masse, and those Masse-mongers and Papists who

observe it, etc. In consequence of which parliament spent

some time in consultation about the abolition of Christmas

day, passed orders to that effect, and resolved to sit on

the following day, which was commonly called Christmas day.”

I have seldom known a sermon attended apparently with more immediate

effects, for on leaving the church the congregation seemed one and

all possessed with the gayety of spirit so earnestly enjoined by their

pastor. The elder folks gathered in knots in the churchyard, greeting

and shaking hands, and the children ran about crying Ule! Ule! and

repeating some uncouth rhymes,* which the parson, who had joined us,

informed me had been handed down from days of yore. The villagers doffed

their hats to the squire as he passed, giving him the good wishes of the

season with every appearance of heartfelt sincerity, and were invited by

him to the hall to take something to keep out the cold of the weather;

and I heard blessings uttered by several of the poor, which convinced

me that, in the midst of his enjoyments, the worthy old cavalier had not

forgotten the true Christmas virtue of charity.

* “Ule! Ule!

Three puddings in a pule;

Crack nuts and cry ule!”

On our way homeward his heart seemed overflowed with generous and happy

feelings. As we passed over a rising ground which commanded something

of a prospect, the sounds of rustic merriment now and then reached our

ears: the squire paused for a few moments and looked around with an

air of inexpressible benignity. The beauty of the day was of itself

sufficient to inspire philanthropy. Notwithstanding the frostiness of

the morning the sun in his cloudless journey had acquired sufficient

power to melt away the thin covering of snow from every southern

declivity, and to bring out the living green which adorns an English

landscape even in mid-winter. Large tracts of smiling verdure contrasted

with the dazzling whiteness of the shaded slopes and hollows. Every

sheltered bank on which the broad rays rested yielded its silver rill of

cold and limpid water, glittering through the dripping grass, and sent

up slight exhalations to contribute to the thin haze that hung just

above the surface of the earth. There was something truly cheering in

this triumph of warmth and verdure over the frosty thraldom of winter;

it was, as the squire observed, an emblem of Christmas hospitality

breaking through the chills of ceremony and selfishness and thawing

every heart into a flow. He pointed with pleasure to the indications of

good cheer reeking from the chimneys of the comfortable farm-houses and

low thatched cottages. “I love,” said he, “to see this day well kept

by rich and poor; it is a great thing to have one day in the year,

at least, when you are sure of being welcome wherever you go, and of

having, as it were, the world all thrown open to you; and I am almost

disposed to join with Poor Robin in his malediction on every churlish

enemy to this honest festival:

“‘Those who at Christmas do repine,

And would fain hence dispatch him,

May they with old Duke Humphry dine,

Or else may Squire Ketch catch’em.’”

The squire went on to lament the deplorable decay of the games and

amusements which were once prevalent at this season among the lower

orders and countenanced by the higher, when the old halls of castles and

manor-houses were thrown open at daylight; when the tables were covered

with brawn and beef and humming ale; when the harp and the carol

resounded all day long; and when rich and poor were alike welcome to

enter and make merry.* “Our old games and local customs,” said he, “had

a great effect in making the peasant fond of his home, and the promotion

of them by the gentry made him fond of his lord. They made the times

merrier and kinder and better, and I can truly say, with one of our old

poets,

“‘I like them well: the curious preciseness

And all-pretended gravity of those

That seek to banish hence these harmless sports,

Have thrust away much ancient honesty.’”

“The nation,” continued he, “is altered; we have almost lost our

simple true-hearted peasantry. They have broken asunder from the higher

classes, and seem to think their interests are separate. They have

become too knowing, and begin to read newspapers, listen to ale-house

politicians, and talk of reform. I think one mode to keep them in

good-humor in these hard times would be for the nobility and gentry to

pass more time on their estates, mingle more among the country-people,

and set the merry old English games going again.”

* “An English gentleman, at the opening of the great day--

i.e. on Christmas Day in the morning--had all his tenants

and neighbors enter his hall by daybreak. The strong beer

was broached, and the black-jacks went plentifully about,

with toast, sugar and nutmeg, and good Cheshire cheese. The

Hackin (the great sausage) must be boiled by daybreak, or

else two young men must take the maiden (i.e. the cook) by

the arms and run her round the market-place till she is

shamed of her laziness.”--Round about our Sea-Coal Fire.

Such was the good squire’s project for mitigating public discontent:

and, indeed, he had once attempted to put his doctrine in practice, and

a few years before had kept open house during the holidays in the old

style. The country-people, however, did not understand how to play their

parts in the scene of hospitality; many uncouth circumstances occurred;

the manor was overrun by all the vagrants of the country, and more

beggars drawn into the neighborhood in one week than the parish officers

could get rid of in a year. Since then he had contented himself with

inviting the decent part of the neighboring peasantry to call at the

hall on Christmas Day, and with distributing beef, and bread, and ale

among the poor, that they might make merry in their own dwellings.

We had not been long home when the sound of music was heard from a

distance. A band of country lads, without coats, their shirt-sleeves

fancifully tied with ribbons, their hats decorated with greens, and

clubs in their hands, was seen advancing up the avenue, followed by a

large number of villagers and peasantry. They stopped before the hall

door, where the music struck up a peculiar air, and the lads performed

a curious and intricate dance, advancing, retreating, and striking their

clubs together, keeping exact time to the music; while one, whimsically

crowned with a fox’s skin, the tail of which flaunted down his back,

kept capering round the skirts of the dance and rattling a Christmas box

with many antic gesticulations.

The squire eyed this fanciful exhibition with great interest and

delight, and gave me a full account of its origin, which he traced to

the times when the Romans held possession of the island, plainly proving

that this was a lineal descendant of the sword dance of the ancients.

“It was now,” he said, “nearly extinct, but he had accidentally met

with traces of it in the neighborhood, and had encouraged its revival;

though, to tell the truth, it was too apt to be followed up by the rough

cudgel play and broken heads in the evening.”

After the dance was concluded the whole party was entertained with brawn

and beef and stout home-brewed. The squire himself mingled among the

rustics, and was received with awkward demonstrations of deference and

regard. It is true I perceived two or three of the younger peasants, as

they were raising their tankards to their mouths, when the squire’s

back was turned making something of a grimace, and giving each other the

wink; but the moment they caught my eye they pulled grave faces and were

exceedingly demure. With Master Simon, however, they all seemed more

at their ease. His varied occupations and amusements had made him well

known throughout the neighborhood. He was a visitor at every farmhouse

and cottage, gossiped with the farmers and their wives, romped with

their daughters, and, like that type of a vagrant bachelor, the

humblebee, tolled the sweets from all the rosy lips of the country

round.

The bashfulness of the guests soon gave way before good cheer and

affability. There is something genuine and affectionate in the gayety

of the lower orders when it is excited by the bounty and familiarity of

those above them; the warm glow of gratitude enters into their mirth,

and a kind word or a small pleasantry frankly uttered by a patron

gladdens the heart of the dependant more than oil and wine. When the

squire had retired the merriment increased, and there was much joking

and laughter, particularly between Master Simon and a hale, ruddy-faced,

white-headed farmer who appeared to be the wit of the village; for I

observed all his companions to wait with open months for his retorts,

and burst into a gratuitous laugh before they could well understand

them.

The whole house indeed seemed abandoned to merriment: as I passed to my

room to dress for dinner, I heard the sound of music in a small court,

and, looking through a window that commanded it, I perceived a band

of wandering musicians with pandean pipes and tambourine; a pretty

coquettish housemaid was dancing a jig with a smart country lad, while

several of the other servants were looking on. In the midst of her sport

the girl caught a glimpse of my face at the window, and, coloring up,

ran off with an air of roguish affected confusion.

THE CHRISTMAS DINNER.

Lo, now is come our joyful’st feast!

Let every man be jolly.

Eache roome with yvie leaves is drest,

And every post with holly.

Now all our neighbours’ chimneys smoke,

And Christmas blocks are burning;

Their ovens they with bak’t meats choke

And all their spits are turning.

Without the door let sorrow lie,

And if, for cold, it hap to die,

Wee’l bury ‘t in a Christmas pye,

And evermore be merry.

WITHERS, Juvenilia.

I HAD finished my toilet, and was loitering with Frank Bracebridge in

the library, when we heard a distant thwacking sound, which he informed

me was a signal for the serving up of the dinner. The squire kept up old

customs in kitchen as well as hall, and the rolling-pin, struck upon the

dresser by the cook, summoned the servants to carry in the meats.

Just in this nick the cook knock’d thrice,

And all the waiters in a trice

His summons did obey;

Each serving-man, with dish in hand,

March’d boldly up, like our train-band,

Presented and away.*

* Sir John Suckling.

The dinner was served up in the great hall, where the squire always held

his Christmas banquet. A blazing crackling fire of logs had been heaped

on to warm the spacious apartment, and the flame went sparkling and

wreathing up the wide-mouthed chimney. The great picture of the crusader

and his white horse had been profusely decorated with greens for the

occasion, and holly and ivy had like-wise been wreathed round the helmet

and weapons on the opposite wall, which I understood were the arms of

the same warrior. I must own, by the by, I had strong doubts about

the authenticity of the painting and armor as having belonged to the

crusader, they certainly having the stamp of more recent days; but I was

told that the painting had been so considered time out of mind; and that

as to the armor, it had been found in a lumber-room and elevated to its

present situation by the squire, who at once determined it to be the

armor of the family hero; and as he was absolute authority on all

such subjects in his own household, the matter had passed into current

acceptation. A sideboard was set out just under this chivalric trophy,

on which was a display of plate that might have vied (at least in

variety) with Belshazzar’s parade of the vessels of the temple:

“flagons, cans, cups, beakers, goblets, basins, and ewers,” the gorgeous

utensils of good companionship that had gradually accumulated through

many generations of jovial housekeepers. Before these stood the two Yule

candles, beaming like two stars of the first magnitude; other lights

were distributed in branches, and the whole array glittered like a

firmament of silver.

We were ushered into this banqueting scene with the sound of minstrelsy,

the old harper being seated on a stool beside the fireplace and

twanging, his instrument with a vast deal more power than melody. Never

did Christmas board display a more goodly and gracious assemblage of

countenances; those who were not handsome were at least happy, and

happiness is a rare improver of your hard-favored visage. I always

consider an old English family as well worth studying as a collection of

Holbein’s portraits or Albert Durer’s prints. There is much antiquarian

lore to be acquired, much knowledge of the physiognomies of former

times. Perhaps it may be from having continually before their eyes those

rows of old family portraits, with which the mansions of this country

are stocked; certain it is that the quaint features of antiquity are

often most faithfully perpetuated in these ancient lines, and I have

traced an old family nose through a whole picture-gallery, legitimately

handed down from generation to generation almost from the time of the

Conquest. Something of the kind was to be observed in the worthy company

around me. Many of their faces had evidently originated in a Gothic

age, and been merely copied by succeeding generations; and there was one

little girl in particular, of staid demeanor, with a high Roman nose

and an antique vinegar aspect, who was a great favorite of the squire’s,

being, as he said, a Bracebridge all over, and the very counterpart of

one of his ancestors who figured in the court of Henry VIII.

The parson said grace, which was not a short familiar one, such as is

commonly addressed to the Deity in these unceremonious days, but a long,

courtly, well-worded one of the ancient school. There was now a pause,

as if something was expected, when suddenly the butler entered the hall

with some degree of bustle: he was attended by a servant on each side

with a large wax-light, and bore a silver dish on which was an enormous

pig’s head decorated with rosemary, with a lemon in its mouth, which was

placed with great formality at the head of the table. The moment this

pageant made its appearance the harper struck up a flourish; at the

conclusion of which the young Oxonian, on receiving a hint from the

squire, gave, with an air of the most comic gravity, an old carol, the

first verse of which was as follows

Caput apri defero

Reddens laudes Domino.

The boar’s head in hand bring I,

With garlands gay and rosemary.

I pray you all synge merily

Qui estis in convivio.

Though prepared to witness many of these little eccentricities, from

being apprised of the peculiar hobby of mine host, yet I confess the

parade with which so odd a dish was introduced somewhat perplexed me,

until I gathered from the conversation of the squire and the parson that

it was meant to represent the bringing in of the boar’s head, a dish

formerly served up with much ceremony and the sound of minstrelsy and

song at great tables on Christmas Day. “I like the old custom,” said the

squire, “not merely because it is stately and pleasing in itself,

but because it was observed at the college at Oxford at which I was

educated. When I hear the old song chanted it brings to mind the time

when I was young and gamesome, and the noble old college hall, and my

fellow-students loitering about in their black gowns; many of whom, poor

lads! are now in their graves.”

The parson, however, whose mind was not haunted by such associations,

and who was always more taken up with the text than the sentiment,

objected to the Oxonian’s version of the carol, which he affirmed

was different from that sung at college. He went on, with the dry

perseverance of a commentator, to give the college reading, accompanied

by sundry annotations, addressing himself at first to the company at

large; but, finding their attention gradually diverted to other talk and

other objects, he lowered his tone as his number of auditors diminished,

until he concluded his remarks in an under voice to a fat-headed old

gentleman next him who was silently engaged in the discussion of a huge

plateful of turkey.*

* The old ceremony of serving up the boar’s head on

Christmas Day is still observed in the hall of Queen’s

College, Oxford. I was favored by the parson with a copy of

the carol as now sung, and as it may be acceptable to such

of my readers as are curious in these grave and learned

matters, I give it entire:

The boar’s head in hand bear I,

Bedeck’d with bays and rosemary

And I pray you, my masters, be merry

Quot estis in convivio

Caput apri defero,

Reddens laudes domino.

The boar’s head, as I understand,

Is the rarest dish in all this land,

Which thus bedeck’d with a gay garland

Let us servire cantico.

Caput apri defero, etc.

Our steward hath provided this

In honor of the King of Bliss,

Which on this day to be served is

In Reginensi Atrio.

Caput apri defero, etc., etc., etc.

The table was literally loaded with good cheer, and presented an

epitome of country abundance in this season of overflowing larders.

A distinguished post was allotted to “ancient sirloin,” as mine host

termed it, being, as he added, “the standard of old English hospitality,

and a joint of goodly presence, and full of expectation.” There were

several dishes quaintly decorated, and which had evidently something

traditional in their embellishments, but about which, as I did not like

to appear overcurious, I asked no questions.

I could not, however, but notice a pie magnificently decorated with

peacock’s feathers, in imitation of the tail of that bird, which

overshadowed a considerable tract of the table. This, the squire

confessed with some little hesitation, was a pheasant pie, though a

peacock pie was certainly the most authentical; but there had been such

a mortality among the peacocks this season that he could not prevail

upon himself to have one killed.*

* The peacock was anciently in great demand for stately

entertainments. Sometimes it was made into a pie, at one end

of which the head appeared above the crust in all its

plumage, with the beak richly gilt; at the other end the

tail was displayed. Such pies were served up at the solemn

banquets of chivalry, when knights-errant pledged themselves

to undertake any perilous enterprise, whence came the

ancient oath, used by Justice Shallow, “by cock and pie.”

The peacock was also an important dish for the Christmas feast; and

Massinger, in his “City Madam,” gives some idea of the extravagance

with which this, as well as other dishes, was prepared for the gorgeous

revels of the olden times:

Men may talk of Country Christmasses,

Their thirty pound butter’d eggs, their pies of carps’ tongues;

Their pheasants drench’d with ambergris: the carcases of three

fat wethers bruised for gravy to make sauce for a single peacock!

It would be tedious, perhaps, to my wiser readers, who may not have

that foolish fondness for odd and obsolete things to which I am a

little given, were I to mention the other makeshifts or this worthy old

humorist, by which he was endeavoring to follow up, though at humble

distance, the quaint customs of antiquity. I was pleased, however, to

see the respect shown to his whims by his children and relatives; who,

indeed, entered readily into the full spirit of them, and seemed all

well versed in their parts, having doubtless been present at many a

rehearsal. I was amused, too, at the air of profound gravity with which

the butler and other servants executed the duties assigned them, however

eccentric. They had an old-fashioned look, having, for the most part,

been brought up in the household and grown into keeping with the

antiquated mansion and the humors of its lord, and most probably looked

upon all his whimsical regulations as the established laws of honorable

housekeeping.

When the cloth was removed the butler brought in a huge silver vessel

of rare and curious workmanship, which he placed before the squire.

Its appearance was hailed with acclamation, being the Wassail Bowl, so

renowned in Christmas festivity. The contents had been prepared by the

squire himself; for it was a beverage in the skilful mixture of which

he particularly prided himself, alleging that it was too abstruse and

complex for the comprehension of an ordinary servant. It was a potation,

indeed, that might well make the heart of a toper leap within him, being

composed of the richest and raciest wines, highly spiced and sweetened,

with roasted apples bobbing about the surface.*

* The Wassail Bowl was sometimes composed of ale instead of

wine, with nutmeg, sugar, toast, ginger, and roasted crabs;

in this way the nut-brown beverage is still prepared in some

old families and round the hearths of substantial farmers at

Christmas. It is also called Lamb’s Wool, and is celebrated

by Herrick in his “Twelfth Night”:

Next crowne the bowle full

With gentle Lamb’s Wool;

Add sugar, nutmeg, and ginger,

With store of ale too,

And thus ye must doe

To make the Wassaile a swinger.

The old gentleman’s whole countenance beamed with a serene look of

indwelling delight as he stirred this mighty bowl. Having raised it to

his lips, with a hearty wish of a merry Christmas to all present, he

sent it brimming round the board, for every one to follow his example,

according to the primitive style, pronouncing it “the ancient fountain

of good feeling, where all hearts met together.” *

* “The custom of drinking out of the same cup gave place to

each having his cup. When the steward came to the doore with

the Wassel, he was to cry three times, Wassel, Wassel,

Wassel, and then the chappell (chaplain) was to answer with

a song.”--Archaeologia.

There was much laughing and rallying as the honest emblem of Christmas

joviality circulated and was kissed rather coyly by the ladies. When it

reached Master Simon, he raised it in both hands, and with the air of a

boon companion struck up an old Wassail Chanson:

The brown bowle,

The merry brown bowle,

As it goes round-about-a,

Fill

Still,

Let the world say what it will,

And drink your fill all out-a.

The deep canne,

The merry deep canne,

As thou dost freely quaff-a,

Sing

Fling,

Be as merry as a king,

And sound a lusty laugh-a.*

* From Poor Robin’s Almanack.

Much of the conversation during dinner turned upon family topics, to

which I was a stranger. There was, however, a great deal of rallying of

Master Simon about some gay widow with whom he was accused of having

a flirtation. This attack was commenced by the ladies, but it was

continued throughout the dinner by the fat-headed old gentleman next

the parson with the persevering assiduity of a slow hound, being one of

those long-winded jokers who, though rather dull at starting game, are

unrivalled for their talents in hunting it down. At every pause in the

general conversation he renewed his bantering in pretty much the same

terms, winking hard at me with both eyes whenever he gave Master Simon

what he considered a home thrust. The latter, indeed, seemed fond of

being teased on the subject, as old bachelors are apt to be, and he took

occasion to inform me, in an undertone, that the lady in question was a

prodigiously fine woman and drove her own curricle.

The dinner-time passed away in this flow of innocent hilarity, and,

though the old hall may have resounded in its time with many a scene

of broader rout and revel, yet I doubt whether it ever witnessed more

honest and genuine enjoyment. How easy it is for one benevolent being to

diffuse pleasure around him! and how truly is a kind heart a fountain of

gladness, making everything in its vicinity to freshen into smiles! The

joyous disposition of the worthy squire was perfectly contagious; he was

happy himself, and disposed to make all the world happy, and the little

eccentricities of his humor did but season, in a manner, the sweetness

of his philanthropy.

When the ladies had retired, the conversation, as usual, became still

more animated; many good things were broached which had been thought

of during dinner, but which would not exactly do for a lady’s ear; and,

though I cannot positively affirm that there was much wit uttered, yet

I have certainly heard many contests of rare wit produce much less

laughter. Wit, after all, is a mighty tart, pungent ingredient, and much

too acid for some stomachs; but honest good-humor is the oil and wine

of a merry meeting, and there is no jovial companionship equal to that

where the jokes are rather small and the laughter abundant.

The squire told several long stories of early college pranks and

adventures, in some of which the parson had been a sharer, though in

looking at the latter it required some effort of imagination to figure

such a little dark anatomy of a man into the perpetrator of a madcap

gambol. Indeed, the two college chums presented pictures of what men

may be made by their different lots in life. The squire had left the

university to live lustily on his paternal domains in the vigorous

enjoyment of prosperity and sunshine, and had flourished on to a hearty

and florid old age; whilst the poor parson, on the contrary, had dried

and withered away among dusty tomes in the silence and shadows of his

study. Still, there seemed to be a spark of almost extinguished fire

feebly glimmering in the bottom of his soul; and as the squire hinted

at a sly story of the parson and a pretty milkmaid whom they once met

on the banks of the Isis, the old gentleman made an “alphabet of faces,”

which, as far as I could decipher his physiognomy, I verily believe was

indicative of laughter; indeed, I have rarely met with an old gentleman

that took absolute offence at the imputed gallantries of his youth.

I found the tide of wine and wassail fast gaining on the dry land of

sober judgment. The company grew merrier and louder as their jokes grew

duller. Master Simon was in as chirping a humor as a grasshopper filled

with dew; his old songs grew of a warmer complexion, and he began to

talk maudlin about the widow. He even gave a long song about the wooing

of a widow which he informed me he had gathered from an excellent

black-letter work entitled Cupid’s Solicitor for Love, containing store

of good advice for bachelors, and which he promised to lend me; the

first verse was to effect.

He that will woo a widow must not dally

He must make hay while the sun doth shine;

He must not stand with her, shall I, shall I,

But boldly say, Widow, thou must be mine.

This song inspired the fat-headed old gentleman, who made several

attempts to tell a rather broad story out of Joe Miller that was pat to

the purpose; but he always stuck in the middle, everybody recollecting

the latter part excepting himself. The parson, too, began to show the

effects of good cheer, having gradually settled down into a doze and his

wig sitting most suspiciously on one side. Just at this juncture we were

summoned to the drawing room, and I suspect, at the private instigation

of mine host, whose joviality seemed always tempered with a proper love

of decorum.

After the dinner-table was removed the hall was given up to the younger

members of the family, who, prompted to all kind of noisy mirth by the

Oxonian and Master Simon, made its old walls ring with their merriment

as they played at romping games. I delight in witnessing the gambols of

children, and particularly at this happy holiday season, and could not

help stealing out of the drawing-room on hearing one of their peals of

laughter. I found them at the game of blindman’s-buff. Master Simon, who

was the leader of their revels, and seemed on all occasions to fulfill

the office of that ancient potentate, the Lord of Misrule,* was blinded

in the midst of the hall. The little beings were as busy about him as

the mock fairies about Falstaff, pinching him, plucking at the skirts of

his coat, and tickling him with straws. One fine blue-eyed girl of about

thirteen, with her flaxen hair all in beautiful confusion, her frolic

face in a glow, her frock half torn off her shoulders, a complete

picture of a romp, was the chief tormentor; and, from the slyness with

which Master Simon avoided the smaller game and hemmed this wild little

nymph in corners, and obliged her to jump shrieking over chairs,

I suspected the rogue of being not a whit more blinded than was

convenient.

* At Christmasse there was in the Kinges house, wheresoever

hee was lodged, a lorde of misrule or mayster of merie

disportes, and the like had ye in the house of every

nobleman of honor, or good worshipper were he spirituall or

temporall.--STOW.

When I returned to the drawing-room I found the company seated round the

fire listening to the parson, who was deeply ensconced in a high-backed

oaken chair, the work of some cunning artificer of yore, which had been

brought from the library for his particular accommodation. From this

venerable piece of furniture, with which his shadowy figure and dark

weazen face so admirably accorded, he was dealing out strange accounts

of the popular superstitions and legends of the surrounding country,

with which he had become acquainted in the course of his antiquarian

researches. I am half inclined to think that the old gentleman was

himself somewhat tinctured with superstition, as men are very apt to

be who live a recluse and studious life in a sequestered part of the

country and pore over black-letter tracts, so often filled with the

marvelous and supernatural. He gave us several anecdotes of the fancies

of the neighboring peasantry concerning the effigy of the crusader which

lay on the tomb by the church altar. As it was the only monument of

the kind in that part of the country, it had always been regarded with

feelings of superstition by the good wives of the village. It was said

to get up from the tomb and walk the rounds of the churchyard in stormy

nights, particularly when it thundered; and one old woman, whose cottage

bordered on the churchyard, had seen it through the windows of the

church, when the moon shone, slowly pacing up and down the aisles.

It was the belief that some wrong had been left unredressed by the

deceased, or some treasure hidden, which kept the spirit in a state of

trouble and restlessness. Some talked of gold and jewels buried in the

tomb, over which the spectre kept watch; and there was a story current

of a sexton in old times who endeavored to break his way to the coffin

at night, but just as he reached it received a violent blow from

the marble hand of the effigy, which stretched him senseless on the

pavement. These tales were often laughed at by some of the sturdier

among the rustics, yet when night came on there were many of the

stoutest unbelievers that were shy of venturing alone in the footpath

that led across the churchyard.

From these and other anecdotes that followed the crusader appeared to be

the favorite hero of ghost-stories throughout the vicinity. His picture,

which hung up in the hall, was thought by the servants to have something

supernatural about it; for they remarked that in whatever part of the

hall you went the eyes of the warrior were still fixed on you. The old

porter’s wife, too, at the lodge, who had been born and brought up in

the family, and was a great gossip among the maid-servants, affirmed

that in her young days she had often heard say that on Midsummer Eve,

when it was well known all kinds of ghosts, goblins, and fairies become

visible and walk abroad, the crusader used to mount his horse, come down

from his picture, ride about the house, down the avenue, and so to the

church to visit the tomb; on which occasion the church-door most civilly

swung open of itself; not that he needed it, for he rode through closed

gates, and even stone walls, and had been seen by one of the dairymaids

to pass between two bars of the great park gate, making himself as thin

as a sheet of paper.

All these superstitions I found had been very much countenanced by the

squire, who, though not superstitious himself, was very fond of seeing

others so. He listened to every goblin tale of the neighboring gossips

with infinite gravity, and held the porter’s wife in high favor on

account of her talent for the marvellous. He was himself a great reader

of old legends and romances, and often lamented that he could not

believe in them; for a superstitious person, he thought, must live in a

kind of fairy-land.

Whilst we were all attention to the parson’s stories, our ears were

suddenly assailed by a burst of heterogeneous sounds from the hall, in

which were mingled something like the clang of rude minstrelsy with the

uproar of many small voices and girlish laughter. The door suddenly flew

open, and a train came trooping into the room that might almost

have been mistaken for the breaking up of the court of Faery. That

indefatigable spirit, Master Simon, in the faithful discharge of his

duties as lord of misrule, had conceived the idea of a Christmas mummery

or masking; and having called in to his assistance the Oxonian and the

young officer, who were equally ripe for anything that should occasion

romping and merriment, they had carried it into instant effect. The old

housekeeper had been consulted; the antique clothespresses and wardrobes

rummaged and made to yield up the relics of finery that had not seen the

light for several generations; the younger part of the company had been

privately convened from the parlor and hall, and the whole had been

bedizened out into a burlesque imitation of an antique mask.*

* Maskings or mummeries were favorite sports at Christmas in

old times, and the wardrobes at halls and manor-houses were

often laid under contribution to furnish dresses and

fantastic disguisings. I strongly suspect Master Simon to

have taken the idea of his from Ben Jonson’s “Masque of

Christmas.”

Master Simon led the van, as “Ancient Christmas,” quaintly apparelled in

a ruff, a short cloak, which had very much the aspect of one of the old

housekeeper’s petticoats, and a hat that might have served for a

village steeple, and must indubitably have figured in the days of the

Covenanters. From under this his nose curved boldly forth, flushed with

a frost-bitten bloom that seemed the very trophy of a December blast. He

was accompanied by the blue-eyed romp, dished up, as “Dame Mince Pie,”

in the venerable magnificence of a faded brocade, long stomacher, peaked

hat, and high-heeled shoes. The young officer appeared as Robin Hood, in

a sporting dress of Kendal green and a foraging cap with a gold tassel.

The costume, to be sure, did not bear testimony to deep research, and