The Rolliad Part 12

Then should his grace some vast expedient find, To govern tempests, and controul the wind; Should he, like great _Canute_, forbid the wave, T'approach his presence, or his foot to lave; Construct some bastion, or contrive some mound, The world's wide limits to encompa.s.s round; Rear a redoubt, that to the stars should rise, And lift himself, like Typhon, to the skies; Or should the mightier scheme engage his soul, To raise a platform on the _northern pole_, With foss, with rampart, stick, and stone, and clay, To build a breast-work on the _milky-way_, Or to protect his sovereign's blest abode, Bid numerous batteries guard the _turnpike road_; Lest foul Invasion in disguise approach, Or Treason lurk within the _Dover_ coach.

Oh, let the wiser duty then be thine, Thy skill, thy science, judgment to resign!

With patient ear, the high-wrapt tale attend, Nor snarl at fancies which no skill can mend.

So shall thy comforts with thy days increase, And all thy last, unlike thy first, be peace; No rude _courts martial_ shall thy fame decry, But half-pay plenty all thy wants supply.

It is difficult to determine which part of the above pa.s.sage possesses the superior claim to our admiration, whether its science, its resemblance, its benevolence, or its sublimity.--Each has its turn, and each is distinguished by some of our author's happiest touches.

The climax from the pole oft the heavens to the pole of a coach, and from the milky-way to a turnpike road, is conceived and exprest with admirable fancy and ability. The absurd story of the wooden horse in Virgil, is indeed remotely parodied in the line,

Or Treason lurk within the Dover coach,

but with what accession of beauty, nature, and probability, we leave judicious critics to determine. Indeed there is no other defence for the pa.s.sage alluded to in _Virgil_, but to suppose that the past commentators upon it have been egregiously mistaken, and that this famous _equus ligneus_, of which he speaks, was neither more nor less than the _stage coach_ of antiquity. What, under any other supposition, can be the meaning of the pa.s.sage

Aut hoc inclusi ligno occultantur _Achivi?_

Besides this, the term _machina_ we know is almost constantly used by _Virgil_ himself as a synonyme for this horse, as in the line

_Scandit fatalis_ machina _muros_, &c.

And do we not see that those authentic records of modern literature, the newspapers, are continually and daily announcing to us--"This day sets off from the Blue-boar Inn, precisely at half past five, the Bath and Bristol _machine_!" meaning thereby merely the _stage coaches_ to Bath and to Bristol. Again, immediately after the line last quoted (to wit, _scandit fatalis machina muros)_ come these words,

_Faeta armis_, i.e. filled with _arms_.

Now what can they possibly allude to, in the eye of sober judgment and rational criticism, but the _guard_, or armed _watchman_, who, in those days, went in the inside, or perhaps had a place in the _boot_, and was employed, as in our modern conveyances, to protect the pa.s.senger in his approximation to the metropolis. We trust the above authorities will be deemed conclusive upon the subject; and indeed, to say the truth, this idea does not occur to us now for the first time, as in some hints for a few critical lucubrations intended as farther _addenda_ to the _Virgilius Restauratus_ of the great Scriblerus, we find this remark precisely:--"In our judgment, this horse (meaning _Virgil_'s) may be very properly denominated--the DARDANIAN DILLY, or the POST COACH to PERGAMUS."

We know not whether it be worth adding as a matter of mere fact, that the great object of the n.o.ble Duke's erections at Chatham, which have not yet cost the nation a _million_, is simply and exclusively this--to _enfilade_ the turnpike road, in case of a foreign invasion.

The poet goes on--he forms a scientific and interesting presage of the n.o.ble Duke's future greatness.

With gorges, scaffolds, breaches, ditches, mines, With culverins, whole and demi, and gabines; With trench, with counterscarp, with esplanade, With curtain, moat, and rhombo, and chamade; With polygon, epaulement, hedge and bank, With angle salient, and with angle flank: Oh! thou shall prove, should all thy schemes prevail, An UNCLE TOBY on a larger scale.

While dapper, daisy, prating, puffing JIM, May haply personate good _Corporal Trim_.

Every reader will antic.i.p.ate us in the recollection, that the person here honoured with our author's distinction, by the abbreviated appellative of _Jim_, can be no other than the Hon. James Luttrel himself, surveyor-general to the ordnance, the famous friends, defender, and _commis_ of the Duke of Richmond. The words _dapper_ and _daisy_, in the last line of the above pa.s.sage, approximate perhaps more nearly to the familiarity of common life, than is usual with our author; but it is to be observed in the defence of them, that our language supplies no terms in any degree so peculiarly characteristic of the object to whom they are addressed. As for the remaining part of the line, to wit, "_prating, puffing Jim_," it will require no vindication or ill.u.s.tration with those who have heard this honourable gentleman's speeches in parliament, and who have read the subsequent representations of them in the diurnal prints.

Our immortal author, whose province it is to give poetical construction, and _local habitation_ to the inspired effusions of the _dying drummer_ (exactly as _Virgil_ did to the predictions of _Anchises_), proceeds to finish the portrait exhibited in the above pa.s.sage by the following lines--

As like your _prototypes_ as pea to pea, Save in the weakness of--_humanity_; Congenial quite in every other part, The same in _head_, but differing in the heart.

_NUMBER IV._

We resume with great pleasure our critical lucubrations on that most interesting part of this divine poem, which pourtrays the character, and transmits to immortality the name of the _Duke of_ RICHMOND.--Our author, who sometimes condescends to a casual imitation of ancient writers, employs more than usual pains in the elaborate delineation of this ill.u.s.trious personage. Thus, in Virgil, we find whole pages devoted to the description of _aeneas_, while _Glacus_ and _Thersilochus_, like the _Luttrels_, the _Palkes_, or the _Macnamaras_ of modern times, are honoured only with the transient distinction of a simple mention. He proceeds to ridicule the superst.i.tion which exists in this country, and, as he informs us, had also prevailed in one of the most famous states of antiquity, that a navy could be any source of security to a great empire, or that shipping could in any way be considered as the _natural_ defence of an _island_.

Th' Athenian sages, once of old, 'tis said, Urg'd by their country's love--by wisdom led, Besought the _Delphic_ oracle to show What best should save them from the neighb'ring foe --With holy fervor first the _priestess_ burn'd, Then fraught with presage, this reply return'd: "_Your city, men of Athens, ne'er will fall, If wisely guarded by a_ WOODEN WALL."

--Thus have our fathers indiscreetly thought, By ancient practice--ancient safety taught, That this, Great Britain, still should prove to thee Thy first, thy best, thy last security; That what in thee we find or great or good, Had ow'd its being to this WALL of WOOD.-- Above such weakness see great _Lenox_ soar, This fence prescriptive guards us now no more Of such gross ignorance asham'd and sick, Richmond protects us with a _wall--of brick_; Contemns the prejudice of former time, And saves his countrymen by _lath_ and _lime_.

It is our intention to embarra.s.s this part of the _Rolliad_ as little as possible with any commentaries of our own. We cannot, however, resist the temptation which the occasion suggests, of p.r.o.nouncing a particular panegyric upon the delicacy as well as dexterity of our author, who, in speaking upon the subject of the Duke of _Richmond_, that is, upon a man who knows no more of the history, writings, or languages of antiquity than the _Marquis of Lansdown_ himself, or great _Rollo_'s groom, has yet contrived to collect a great portion of his ill.u.s.trations from the sources of ancient literature. By this admirable expedient, the immediate ignorance of the hero is inveloped and concealed in the vast erudition of the author, and the unhappy truth that his Grace never proceeded farther in his _Latinity_, than through the neat and simple pages of _Corderius_, is so far thrown into the back ground as to be hardly observable, and to const.i.tute no essential blemish to the general brilliancy of the _picture_.

The poet proceeds to speak of a tribunal which was inst.i.tuted in the _aera_ he is describing, for an investigation into the professional merits of the n.o.ble Duke, and of which he himself was very properly the head. The author mentions the individuals who composed this inquisition, as men of _opulent, independent, disinterested_ characters, three only excepted, whom he regrets as apostates to the general character of the arbitrators. He speaks, however--such is the omnipotence of truth--even of them, with a sort of reluctant tendency to panegyric. He says,

Keen without show, with modest learning, sly, The subtle comment speaking in his eye; Of manners polish'd, yet of stubborn soul, Which Hope allures not--nor which fears control; See _Burgoyne_ rapt in all a soldier's pride, d.a.m.n with a shrug, and with a look deride; While coa.r.s.e _Macbride_ a busier task a.s.sumes, And tears with graceless rage our hero's plumes; Blunts his rude science in the _chieftain_'s face, Nor deems--forgive him, _Pitt!_--a truth, disgrace: And _Percy_ too, of lineage justly vain, Surveys the system with a mild disdain.

He consoles the reader, however, for the pain given him by the contemplation of such weakness and injustice, by hastening to inform him of the better and wiser dispositions of the other members of the tribunal;

--But ah! not so the rest--unlike to these, They try each anxious blandishment to please; No skill uncivil e'er from them escapes, Their modest wisdom courts no dang'rous sc.r.a.pes; But pure regard comes glowing from the heart, To take a friend's--to take a master's part; Nor let Suspicion with her sneers convey, That paltry Int'rest could with such bear sway.

Can _Richmond_'s brother be attach'd to gold?

Can _Luttrell_'s friendship, like a vote, be sold?

O can such petty, such ign.o.ble crimes, Stain the fair _aera_ of these golden times, When _Pitt_ to all perfection points the way, And pure _Dundas_ exemplifies his lay?

When _Wilkes_ to loyalty makes bold pretence, _Arden_ to law, the _Cabinet_ to sense; When _Prettyman_ affects for truth a zeal, And _Macnamaras_ guard the common-weal; When _lawyers_ argue from the holy writ, And _Hill_ would vie with _Sheridan_ in wit; When _Camden_, first of Whigs, in struggles past, _Teiz'd_ and _tormented_ quits the cause at last; When _Thurlow_ strives commercial skill to show, And even _Sydney_ something seems to know; When honest _Jack_ declines in men to trade, And court majorities by truth are sway'd; When _Baker, Conway, Cavendish, or Byng_, No more an obloquy o'er senates fling; When------

But where could a period be put to the enumeration of the _uncommon_ appearances of the epoch in question?--The application of the term _honest_, prefixed to the name of the person described in the last line of the above pa.s.sage but three, sufficiently circ.u.mscribes the number of those particular _Jacks_ who were at this moment in the contemplation of our author, and lets us with facility into the secret that he could mean no other than the worthy Mr. _John Robinson_ himself.--The peculiar species of traffic that the poet represents Mr. Robinson to have dealt in, is supposed to allude to a famous occurrence of these times, when Mr. R. and another contractor agreed, in a ministerial emergency, to furnish government with _five hundred and fifty-eight_ ready, willing, obedient, well-trained men, at so much per head per man, whom they engaged to be _perfectly fit for any work the minister could put them to_. Tradition says, they failed in their contract by somewhat about _two hundred_.--We have not heard of what particular complexion the first order were of, but suppose them to have been _blacks_.

We collect from history, that the n.o.ble Duke had been exposed to much empty ridicule on account of his having been, as they termed it, a judge in his own cause, by being the President of that Court, whose exclusive jurisdiction it was to enquire into supposed official errors imputed to himself. The author scouts the venom of those impotent gibers, and with great triumph exclaims,

If it be virtue but yourself to _know_, Yourself to _judge_, is sure a virtue too.

Nothing can be more obvious--all judgment depends upon knowledge; and how can any other person be supposed to know a man so well as he does himself? We hope soon to see this evidently equitable principle of criminal jurisprudence fully established at the _Old Baily_; and we are very much inclined to think, that if every _house-breaker, &c._ was in like manner permitted to judge himself, the susceptible heart would not be altogether so often shocked with spectacles of human ma.s.sacre before the gates of Newgate, as, to the great disgrace of our penal system, it now is.

Our author now proceeds to speak of a transaction which he seems to touch upon with reluctance. It respects a young n.o.bleman of these times, of the name of _Rawdon_. It is very remarkable, that the last couplet of this pa.s.sage is printed with a scratch through the lines, as if it had been the author's intention to have erazed them. Whether he thought the event alluded to in this distich was too disgraceful for justification--or that the justification suggested was incomplete--that the image contained in them was too familiar and puerile for the general sublimity of his great poem, or whatever he thought, we know not, but such is the fact. The pa.s.sage is as follows:--after relating the circ.u.mstance, he says

a.s.sociation forms the mind's great chain, By plastic union many a thought we gain, [Struck-through: (Thus _Raw_ suggested _Raw head_, and the _Don_, Haply reminded him of _b.l.o.o.d.y bone)_.]

To the justice of the disgrace thrown upon the above couplet, we by no means concede.--What it wants in poetical construction, it amply makes up in the deep knowledge which it contains of the more latent feelings of the human heart, and its philosophic detection of some of the true sources of human action. We all know how long, and how tenaciously, original prejudices stick by us. No man lives long enough to get rid of his nursery. That the n.o.ble duke therefore might not be free from the common influence of a very common sensation, no one can reasonably wonder at, and the best proof that he was not so is, that we defy any person to show us, upon what possible principle, if not upon this, the conduct of the n.o.ble Duke, in the transaction alluded to, is to be explained or defended. The Duke of Richmond--a gentleman by a thousand pretensions--a soldier--a legislator--a peer--in two countries a duke--in a third a prince--a man whose honour is not a mere point of speculative courtesy, but is his _oath_--impeaches the reputation of another individual of pure and unblemished character; and with the same publicity that he had applied the original imputation, this peer, prince, legislator, and soldier, _eats_ every syllable he had said, and retracts every _item_ of his charge. Is this to be credited without a resort to some principle of a very paramount nature in the heart of man indeed? Is the original depravity, in the first instance, of publicly attempting to sully the fair honour of that interesting and sacred character, a youthful soldier, or the meanness in the second, of an equally public and unprecedentedly pusillanimous retraction of the whole of the calumny, to be believed in so high a personage as the Duke of _Richmond_, without a reference to a cause of a very peculiar kind, to an impulse of more than ordinary potency? Evidently not.--And what is there, as we have before observed, that adheres so closely, or controuls so absolutely, as the legends of our boyish days, of the superst.i.tions of a nursery? For these reasons, therefore, we give our most decided suffrage for the full re-establishment of the couplet to the fair legitimate honours that are due to it.

The poet concludes his portrait of this ill.u.s.trious person, with the following lines--

The triple honours that adorn his head, A three-fold influence o'er his virtue shed; As _Gallia_'s prince, behold him proud and vain; Thrifty and close as _Caledonia_'s thane; In _Richmond_'s duke, we trace our own JOHN BULL, Of schemes enamour'd--and of schemes--the GULL.

_NUMBER V._

The author of the Rolliad has, in his last edition, introduced so considerable an alteration, that we should hold ourselves inexcusable, after the very favourable reception our commentaries have been honoured with, in omitting to seize the earliest opportunity of pointing it out to the public.

Finding the variety and importance of the characters he is called upon to describe, likely to demand a greater portion both of time and words than an expiring man can be reasonably supposed to afford, instead of leaving the whole description of that ill.u.s.trious a.s.sembly, of which the dying drummer has already delineated some of the princ.i.p.al ornaments, to the same character, he has made an addition to the vision in which the House of Commons is represented, at the conclusion of the Sixth Book, by contriving that the lantern of Merlin should be shifted in such a manner, as to display at once to the eager eye of Rollo, the whole interior of the Upper House; to gain a seat in which the hero immediately expresses a laudable impatience, as well as a just indignation, on beholding persons, far less worthy than himself, among those whom the late very numerous creations prevent our calling--

----_pauci--quos aequus amavit Jupiter_--

With still less propriety, perhaps we should add--

--_Aut ardens evexit ad aethera virtus._ VIRG.

The hero's displeasure is thus forcibly described:

Zounds! quoth great _Rollo_, with indignant frown, 'Mid British n.o.bles shall a base-born clown, With air imperious ape a monarch's nod, Less fit to sit there than my groom, by G-d[1]?

Longinus, in his chapter on interrogations, proves them to be a source of the sublime. They are, indeed, says Dr. Young, the proper style of majesty incensed. Where, therefore, can they be with more propriety introduced, than from the mouth of our offended hero? Merlin, after sympathizing with him in the justice of these feelings, proceeds to a description of the august a.s.sembly they are viewing. The author's reverence for the religion of his country naturally disposes him first to take notice of the spiritual lords of Parliament--

Yon rev'rend prelates, rob'd in sleeves of lawn, Too meek to murmur, and too proud to fawn, Who still submissive to their Maker's nod, Adore their sov'reign, and respect their G.o.d; And wait, good men! all worldly things forgot, In humble hope of Enoch's happy lot.