Chapter XIV (1)

I question if the Gascon character has been duly appreciated. A Gascon is a braggadocio; so we settle it. Now the Gascons are great in this line, it's undeniable. But that which really distinguishes a Gascon, is grandiloquence on all subjects. Whatever the topic of conversation, his style is exaggerated. Tell a Gascon any extraordinary fact, he instantly caps it--tells you something more extraordinary of the same kind. If he happens to be speaking of himself, he still employs the same style of amplification, but only as he would in discussing any subject besides. He possesses also, in an eminent degree, that--(what? frankness, shall I call it?)--at any rate, that peculiar quality, which at once makes you feel as much at ease with him as with an old acquaintance. All the French have this, but the Gascon has it pre-eminently.

My billet for the night was at a seedsman's. Five minutes after my arrival I felt domesticated. He puzzled me not a little though, by eagerly inquiring whether I had ever met in England with a plant called Chou d'Yorck. Its fame had reached him, but the long war had prevented his obtaining a sample. He rejoiced in the prospect of a peace, which would enable him to obtain some Chou d'Yorck. In form he was stiff and stumpy, but in speech and manner lively. To assist him in his shop, he had a youth--age eighteen or nineteen--whom he treated with considerable hauteur. My landlord, his assistant, and myself, all three took our evening meal together; but the youth was not permitted to sit down. Standing near his master, like Corporal Trim, with one foot before the other in an attitude, his head very upright, and his chest projected, he grasped in one hand a hunch of bread and a modicum of sausage, while the other flourished a pocket-knife. His master abruptly handed him a tumbler of wine, without asking him when he would have it; and he forthwith tossed it off, and set down the glass, as if so much and no more was his allowance.

I was amused with my landlord's oration, when I entered his shop and presented my billet. He first read it, then looked at me. "Ah," said he, "in _your_ face, now, I see something, Monsieur, which tells me we shall find you an agreeable inmate. The last Englishman I had conducted himself so badly, I was forced to pitch him out of the window." My landlord had a great penchant, like other Frenchmen of that day, for conversing on the subject of duelling. Asked me if the English did not decide their duels with pistols--were they good shots? I told him the famous wager that had come off not long before, when a crack shot betted to hit with a pistol nineteen oranges out of twenty thrown up in the air--missed the first on purpose to increase the odds--hit the other nineteen. This brought out the Gascon. I had told something extraordinary, he must cap it. "But, Monsieur," said he, "we have, in this place, persons who can hit a butterfly on the wing." (_Qui tuent un papillon volant!_) He gave me some account of a partisan, who had been active against the English. "Monsieur, he's as brave as a lion; in one word, he's as brave as I am myself," (_à tout dire, il est brave comme moi_.) One difference between a Gascon and the rest of the world I conceive to be this--that, when other people utter an extravagant or bombastic speech, they generally utter it in a joke; but when a Gascon exaggerates or romances, he speaks with perfect seriousness, and so expects to be taken.

This evening, though, I made a most agreeable discovery. Jones had found stable-room for Sancho in the yard of an inn near my billet. After dinner I stepped out, feeling it necessary, from previous observation, to see that Sancho had his. On reaching the inn-yard, the first thing I saw was just what one often sees at home about suburban public-houses, a party holding an open-air compotation, standing. It was a party of three--an English soldier, an English groom, and a Portuguese youth of twenty, dressed as much like the groom as possible. They stood in a triangle, noses all pointing to the common centre of gravity. Each held a glass, and the English servant a bottle. He, I concluded, "stood it." The soldier was Jones. He was rhetorically holding forth; the other two were earnest listeners--his theme, the battle of Vittoria. My approach broke up the party. I walked direct into Sancho's stable; found his crib empty--no appearance of corn. This might have been accounted for, by supposing the corn already consumed; but Jones couldn't keep his own counsel. He soon put the matter beyond all doubt by rushing in with a sieve-full, which he shot out under the pony's nose, and sedulously dispersed with his hand. The other two went into their own stable: the English groom, I observed, touching his hat. I had seen him somewhere before, but didn't remember, at the moment, time or place.

"Please, sir," said Jones, "both on 'em is sarvant to a jeddleham, sir; a Hinglishman, what's a-going up along with us, sir, 'cause we've got a hescort, sir; 'cause he considers it's more safer than going by his-self, sir. One on 'em's his groom, sir, and the other's his help, sir." The corn stuck in my gizzard, and I made no reply.

"Please, sir, they've got two sitch be-youtiful horses, as nivver you see'd, sir."

"Please, sir, they've got a text-cart, with a kivver to it, sir; whot carries the jeddleham's baggage, sir."

I took my station at the stable-door, to be sure that Sancho not only had his corn, but ate it. The groom, in the adjoining stable, was addressing the help in a kind of perpetual blowing up, a mixture of Portuguese and English; voice deep and hollow. "You Joe King, (Joaquim,) onde está the tobacco-box?"

To this deep-toned bass responded a piping treble--"Ah, I tink you is got it in you brisch-pockit."

"You Joe King, dá cevada to the cavallos, chega the teapot, and don't bother me nada."

Having thus issued his mandate, the groom came forth from the stable. Catching sight of me, he stepped up, and I recognised him at once. Why, it was Coosey, Gingham's Cockney servant, whom I had seen at Lisbon, in the Castle. Glad was I to meet with the man for the sake of his master. Coosey again touched his hat, and respectfully inquired whether I wasn't the gentleman as vos goin hup with a hescort. A conversation ensued, in the course of which I learned, in reply to my eager inquiries, that Gingham was not aware who it was that had charge of the treasure. Gingham merely knew that a convoy was going up; and intended to go in company, for the sake of the guard.

Learning from Coosey that Gingham's quarters were in the suburbs, and not deeming it advisable to go any distance from my charge, I contented myself, for that evening, with sending Gingham a hearty salutation, with a confident hope that I should have the pleasure of his company in the morning. Before bed-time, Coosey brought me a note from Gingham, that he would join me next day just outside the town, and travel in company.

Before quitting the yard, though, I fell in with another acquaintance. The _garçon_ popped out upon me from a side-door; begged to say there was a gentleman in the _cuisine_, who would be happy to speak to me.

"Who? What is he?"

"A courier, monsieur, employed on an important mission."

"Haven't the pleasure of knowing any gentleman in that line. Describe him."

The _garçon_ laughed; held up one hand, with the forefinger crooked. "_Monsieur, voici son nez._"

I entered. Ah, it was my friend Hookey. Hookey, you will remember, obtained a passage by the Falmouth packet, as bearer of despatches from Oporto to Lisbon. Probably he was not aware, that doubts were then entertained of his real character; for, on the present occasion, he again announced himself as a courier.

"I am now, monsieur, on my way to the British headquarters, with important despatches from Madrid. You are going there, too." (Who told you that, friend Hookey?) "I, as I travel post, shall arrive there first. Don't you see what an excellent opportunity, if you wish to announce yourself? I shall take charge of your letter, and deliver it with supreme felicity."

"Much obliged. They probably know all about me."

"But, monsieur," said Hookey, "headquarters are now advanced from St Sever to Aire, or soon will be." (Pray, Mr Hookey, how do you know, if you come post from Madrid?) "Why not cut right across, then, and go to Aire by the nearest road? Why go round by St Sever? Your route is by St Sever, I understand?"

Wondering how Hookey understood anything of the matter, and not choosing to convert his understanding into certainty, I merely replied, that wherever a man is going, of course he would wish to take the best road.

"Yes, monsieur," said Hookey, "that is incontestable. But the best road is, evidently, the most direct. Why march on the arc, when you can march on the chord? _Ecoutez, monsieur_--your road is by Hagetmau, direct to Aire."

Seeing he was so urgent, I began to suspect he had a motive, so resolved to humour him. "Really, what you say appears very just. But the road--I am totally ignorant of it. It may be good; it may be bad."

"I answer for the road; know every inch of it."

"By the bye, monsieur, an idea strikes me. Give me your opinion. What if I perform the remaining distance by water?"

"By water!" exclaimed Hookey; "a great thought! What a saving of time and labour!"

"Good. I impress all the boats on the river; embark my whole convoy and escort; and so, by the Adour, or by one of its tributaries, arrive within a day's march of headquarters. What a surprise for Milord Vilinton, and all his staff!"

"Excellent! Write that, monsieur. Commit your letter to me, and trust me for delivering it. You will excite a sensation. The whole army will be electrified."

Greatly doubting whether a letter intrusted to Hookey would ever come to hand, I asked for writing materials, and just wrote that I hoped to reach my destination by the day appointed. Then, closing the document, I addressed it in due form, and handed it to Hookey. Had I really departed from my written route, as Hookey exhorted, I should not only have incurred responsibility, but have disobeyed orders, gone off the line of English posts, and entered a district which just at that time, as I have since discovered, was the seat of a serious disturbance. I now took leave of friend Hookey. That he was no courier, we had good reason for knowing ere long. He probably urged me to write, because doubtful whether my route was round by St Sever--hoping that something in my letter might help him to decide. This was evidently the point that he wished to ascertain; and on this subject I left him as wise as I found him.

Waiting a while at the door, ere I departed to my billet for the night, I heard a confab under the gateway, between Jones and Joaquim. Joaquim (Englished by Coosey "Joe King") was displaying to Jones his proficiency in the English language. Joaquim, I discovered, was ambitious to be English in everything--an English groom, like Coosey; took Coosey as his model. Coosey, by way of teaching him the language, had begun with the London cries. Joaquim was exhibiting his attainments; "Old clo'--old clo'."

"Quite naytral," said Jones; "better than the Jews does it themselves."

"Hinny yonnimints f'yer fire ... stooves?"

"Muinto buyng, muinto buyng," said Jones, whose Portuguese was second only to Joaquim's English. Jones, with an eye to Gingham, of whose well-stored cart he had already formed most magnificent conceptions, was assiduously striving to establish himself both with Joaquim and Coosey. Coosey at that moment came up.

"Hony you 'ear him do the donkey, though," said Coosey. "You Joe King, come, tip us the burro."

Joaquim brayed. Tommy Duncombe couldn't have done it better.

"There," said Coosey. "Now you listen." A donkey, somewhere within hearing, responded with a distant bray.

"That's vot I goes by," said Coosey. "I knows many young jeddlemen in Hingland, vot does it wherry like. But I never see not nobody, hony this 'ear Joe King, vot could make 'em 'oller."

Next morning, Jones again attempted to defraud Sancho of his corn. Jones, it was too evident, was a rogue in grain--detection did not reform him. As we issued from the town, proceeding on our day's march, I looked out for Gingham, right and left. At length, passing a cross-road, I heard a smart slap on Jones's musket; and, looking down the turning, I caught sight of Coosey returning the salute, hand to forehead, in military style, which Joaquim ditto'd. What Coosey did, Joaquim did; that was Joaquim's moral code. A little further down the lane, hurra! my eyes had now the pleasure of beholding Gingham; and not Gingham only, but Mr Staff-surgeon Pledget. Heartily should I have hailed the sight of either. What then was now my joy, in falling in both with Pledget, the solemn and the facetious, and with Gingham, the best of friends! Most cordial was the greeting on my side, nor less so on theirs. Gingham came forth in a new aspect. He turned out in a substantial great-coat, which covered everything from his spurs to his nose. This coat he wore upon the march in all weathers, rain or shine; but peeled at the end of the journey, and peeled white--came out clean as a nut--in _propriâ personâ--ipsissimus_--Gingham. The junction of these friends was a real accession to our party. Pledget was mounted on a good sensible mule. Gingham rode a handsome horse--Spanish--a really splendid fellow--all mettle and muscle--with fiery nostrils, flashing eye, delicate little ears, zebra legs, elastic motion--in short, a horse worthy of such a rider--a perfect gentleman. Coosey, also, was mounted on a showy Spanish stallion, whose advance was sideways, a perpetual zigzag. All in a quiver, he champed the bit, and came sidling up the road with arched neck, and foam churning from his jaws. The cart, drawn by a strong, large-boned French horse, was intrusted to the care of Joaquim, with the option of walking or riding. After our first greetings, the cart, being a novelty, became the subject of our conversation as we rode along. Gingham had built it at Passages. Had out the wheels from England; a pair, with a swivel wheel in front. The cart had for its covering a tarpaulin supported by hoops, closed at the back, and also closing, when requisite, in front--might be used, on an occasion, to sleep in--was so built that Gingham's boxes exactly fitted into it, making a level surface with their lids. In short the concern was well arranged, unpretending, and complete--altogether worthy of Gingham. Jones conned it with an admiring, but at the same time a critical eye; now walking in front and alongside, now dropping behind, to take a view in every direction; and, Coosey being Gingham's right-hand man, and Joaquim his help, would have tumbled head over heels to secure the favour of either.

I must here describe a little affair in which we were involved on this day's march; not as important in itself, but as standing connected with our subsequent adventures. While Gingham and I were still discussing the subject of the cart, we reached the river which we had passed the day before, and had now to pass again. A large and commodious ferryboat, which was to take us over, was lying on the other side; where we also saw assembled a concourse of people, apparently country-folks, who had come there with the intention of crossing. Expecting that a boat-load of them would soon pass to us, our party, as they came up, halted on the bank, waiting their arrival.

There seemed to be some delay. The people on the other side didn't get in, and the boat didn't come. We shouted across. They took no notice. Shouted louder. They answered with derisive jeers. Corporal Fraser stood by my side. "Some of the individuals have firearms," said he. I made a closer examination--saw it was so--and saw Hookey. Addressed him personally: "Have the kindness to get them to bring over the ferryboat." "This is not your road," sung out Hookey, with much gesticulation; "go by Hagetmau. Press all the boats on the Adour, and go by water." The case was clear. They did not intend to let us pass; and, as they had got the boat on their side, we could not compel them. Mr Chesterfield and I held a council of war.

"We can easily disperse that rabble by a few shots," said he; "and then the ferrymen will no doubt come forward, and bring the boat over."

I, on the contrary, was for avoiding collision, if possible. A war with the peasantry, once commenced, might soon become serious; and, should they return our fire, one or two wounded men, even supposing nothing worse, would prove a serious incumbrance to our subsequent progress. "Well, then," said Mr Chesterfield; "what are we to do? We can't wait here all day; that's evident."

The river was low. Could we find no other crossing? Was there no ford? I looked up the stream, Gingham looked down. "See here," said he, with his usual sagacity; "the river bends below, and spreads in the bend. Beyond, I see it again. No doubt there is a considerable sweep; and, probably, in that sweep a shallow."

"Suppose we go and examine," said I. Gingham looked earnestly in the direction.

"Don't see any way of getting there," said he. "There must be some communication, though, between that farmhouse and the road. No doubt it is the lane we passed just now. Suppose we go and see."

Gingham and I rode off up the road, to find the lane. Pledget followed on his mule. The multitude on the other side, thinking, no doubt, we were of to the town for assistance, again raised a shout of derision. We found the lane; and arrived at the farmhouse, and the bend in the river, without being noticed by the enemy.

The character of the ground was here peculiar. The river swept round in a horse-shoe curve, as the Thames sweeps round the Isle of Dogs; but so that the convexity was towards us, and the peninsula on the other side. Just at the vortex of this curve, or at what may be called the toe of the horse-shoe, the stream widened out, and to all appearance shoaled. "Here's the ford," said Gingham, and rode in. Pledget and I followed. We crossed the river and re-crossed it--most part of the way not knee-deep. The ford, though, was not right across; a ledge of rock traversed the river obliquely. Down to that ridge there was a ripple, and the stream gradually shoaled. Below it, all was deep water, smooth, dark, and silent.

"The worst of it is, though," said Gingham, awaking from a fit of musing, "the moment we withdraw our party from the ferry to pass them over here, the fellows on the other side will discover our design. We shall then have the whole peninsula covered with them.

"No fear of that," said I. "Don't you see? The peninsula is our ground, though on the other side of the river. We can command the whole of it from this bank, and the approaches too."

"Of course we can," said Pledget. "Occupy the house with half-a-dozen muskets, and that knoll with as many more, and not a man of them can come on the peninsula."

In fact, a few words are necessary to explain the full amount of our advantages. The whole extent of the peninsula, round which the river swept, was not above two or three acres. At one extremity of the curve, or, if you like to call it so, at one heel of the horse-shoe, stood the farmhouse, at the other stood the knoll; so that, though both knoll and house were on our side of the stream, a line drawn from one to the other would cut right across the isthmus; and, these two points once occupied, no one on the opposite side could come on the peninsula, and approach the ford, without passing under our guns, and exposing himself to a cross fire.

We returned forthwith, and made our report to Mr Chesterfield, who at once saw the expediency of promptly occupying the house and knoll. Accordingly, our whole party withdrew up the road. The enemy, thinking they had defeated our project, and compelled us to return to our last night's quarters, now shouted with redoubled energy, "The other road! The other road!--To Hagetmau! To Hagetmau!" One little squeaking voice I distinguished above the yells--not Hookey's: "So sal you here ober komm, so sal I gib you someting." This was not the last time I heard that voice.

Mr Chesterfield now pushed forward with a party by the lane towards the ford, the convoy and the rest of the escort following. He occupied both the farm-house and the knoll, the former with infantry, the latter with dragoons. The rest of the escort then forded the river with the convoy. Twenty or thirty of the rabble now discovered us, and ran down towards the spot; but they were too late. A few carbine and musket shots, from the knoll and house, soon brought them to a halt, and sent them to the right-about. Meanwhile the multitude at the ferry made demonstrations of crossing in the boat, with shouts and menaces. But in the midst of the uproar, looking down the river towards the ford, they caught sight of our cavalry moving up the bank towards them on their own side, in order of battle. It was quite sufficient. Not wishing for a closer acquaintance, the yokels immediately dispersed and cut; we did not pursue them; and thus was effected the passage of the river without collision, and without loss too, save and except the loss of time. Nor did we meet with any further obstruction during that day's march, which brought us to the next halting-place indicated in our route.

Still the state of affairs was far from satisfactory. It was sufficiently clear, from the events of the morning, that a spirit of hostility was alive; and that the rural population were disposed to obstruct our progress; nay perhaps, if they saw a prospect of success, to attack us. Hookey, it seemed probable, was the prime mover; and I felt satisfied we should see him again. I was far from thinking he had the concurrence of the French authorities; nor do I think so now. He would doubtless have been delighted to ease us of part of our cash; and probably, like other distinguished agitators, he was agitating on his own account. However that might be, it was clearly incumbent on us to have our eyes open, and to be prepared, if needful, to take our own part.

Nor could we feel wholly satisfied in other respects. In our intercourse with the inhabitants generally, we did not, it is true, detect tokens of hostility, or even experience rudeness. Still there was unquestionably a great alteration of manner, since we had advanced beyond the immediate vicinity of the Allied forces before Bayonne. This I noticed in the morning. But at the close of the day's journey it was still more observable. Whatever we applied for, indeed, we obtained--billets, accommodations, in short everything usually required by troops on a march. But nothing was given with alacrity; we seemed to have got into a cooler climate. I suppose most of my readers know the difference between a Frenchman who wishes to please, and one who has no such amiable ambition. By the demeanour and looks of the younger branches, too, we may sometimes discover how the heads of a family really stand affected towards us; and here, in the houses which I entered, nothing struck me more than the deportment of the children. Their distant and suspicious glances seemed to perform the part of tell-tales; one could almost guess what kind of a conversation respecting _les Anglais_, had previously passed in the family. One plucky little fellow appeared dressed out as a soldier. I tapped his sword, and asked him what that was for. He gravely replied, "To kill you."

The occurrences of the day seemed to remind us, that we were not to regard our remaining journey to headquarters as a mere party of pleasure; and those of the morrow were quite in accordance with this impression.

THE DWARF AND THE OAK TREE.

A VISION OF 1850.

I.

Within the greenwood as I walked,
Upon a summer's day,
I saw a vision wonderful,
That filled me with dismay.
Beneath the spreading shadow
Of a tall and stately tree,
Was a band of porkers gathered,
Grunting fierce as fierce could be.
They were rough and bristly monsters,
With an aspect most obscene;
And they trampled to a dunghill
All the fair and comely green.
Hideous tusks, and sharply whetted,
Did the savage creatures bear;
And their flanks were thick incrusted
With the droppings of their lair.

II.

Above, the mighty branches spread
From out the parent stem;
And lo! I saw a Mannikin
High perched on one of them.
His face was pale, his cheeks were white;
He sate in utter woe;
It seemed he durst not venture down,
For fear of those below.
But anon he shook the branches,
And down the acorns fell,
And then the beasts rushed forward,
Each with a horrid yell.
Right sharp and savage was the grunt,
Though plentiful the food:
So sate the lonely Mannikin
Within the lonely wood.

III.

But as I tarried, wondering much
To see the little man,
A gleam of light came o'er his face;
It seemed some cunning plan
Rose up within him, for he grinned
And nodded to himself,
Then grinned again and chuckled,
Like a sly and naughty elf.
And then I marked him, stealthily
From out his belt withdraw
A weapon in the morning light,
That glittered like a saw;
And straight astride a heavy branch
Right nimbly clambered he,
And sawed away most busily,
Between him and the tree!

IV.

Then longer from accosting him
I could not well forbear--
"What, ho, thou foolish Mannikin!
What art thou doing there?
A little deeper, and 'tis plain
The branch must downward go,
And down with it the carpenter
Unto the beasts below!"
Then answered back the Mannikin--
"Aha! I'm light and strong:
You'll see me scramble higher up,
And higher yet ere long.
But first this branch I sever, just
To please the hungry swine;
And then I'll lop another off--
For that's a scheme of mine!"

V.

"Forbear, thou naughty Mannikin!"
'Twas thus again I spoke--
"Who was't gave thee the liberty
To lop that stately oak?
In strength and glory it hath stood
A thousand years and more,
Still spreading forth its mighty arms,
As proudly as of yore.
What tree hath ever matched it yet
For majesty of form?
Or yielded such a sure defence
From heat, or rain, or storm?
Though tempests often round it swept,
It still hath bravely stood,
Nor ever stooped its shapely crest--
That monarch of the wood!

VI.

"And _thou_, an ape-like atomy,
Perched up within the tree!
Shall its fair limbs be lopped away
By such a dwarf as thee?"
Yet chattered still the Mannikin--
"Down, down, the branch must go!
The pigs demand the sacrifice--
They're watching me below.
See--see! they're grunting upwards! ah,
They bare their tusks at me!
For rather than offend my swine
I would uproot the tree.
Hush--hush, my darlings! Hush, my dears!
Here's plenty food for you--
A moment's patience, and 'tis done;
The branch is nearly through!"

VII.

"Have done, thou wicked Mannikin,
And hold that hand of thine;
I marvel what Ulysses 'twas
Set thee to keep the swine!
If from that noble forest-tree
Thou loppest every shoot,
Where, when another autumn comes,
Will be the needful fruit?
'Tis well to feed thy bristly herd,
Ay, feed them to the fill;
But leave the oak-tree unprofaned
With all its branches still:
Lest, when the swine have eaten all
The food that thou canst send,
They take a horrid fancy next
To dine on thee, my friend!"

VIII.

'Twas thus I spoke in warning. Still
The Mannikin said, "Nay!"
But ever chattered busily,
And ever sawed away.
I marked the branch declining fast,
Its fibres creaking sore:
I heard the grunting of the beasts
Still fiercer than before.
High up into the air was thrown
Each grim uncleanly snout,
With wriggling tails and cloven hoofs
They galloped all about.
They flung the mire and pebbles up,
In their unholy glee,
And held a Satan's carnival
Beneath the fated tree!

IX.

But as I gazed in wonderment,
The sky grew dark above;
A whirlwind sharp and fitfully
Among the branches drove;
There was swaying, shrieking, groaning,
Throughout the forest wide,
And the hurricane came downward
With an angry angel's stride.
Then, right across the welkin, shot
The red and dazzling levin,
And the thunder brattled growlingly
Within the dome of heaven.
'Twere better in an hour like that
Far off at home to be,
Than watching silly Mannikins
Upon the greenwood tree!

X.

The first flash scared the porkers;
Their nasal snort grew still--
The second sent them cowering;
As low-bred monsters will--
The third with triple fervency,
And answering peal broke out;
Then helter-skelter from the tree
Rushed forth the filthy rout.
I looked up for my Mannikin--
I saw him clinging there
To branch and twig, to bark and bough,
The image of despair.
And ever as the gust blew strong,
He clutched with desperate paw,
And wildly chattered in affright--
"The foul fiend take the saw!"

XI.

By Tamworth town a hermit dwells,
Who riddles strange can read;
A wizard once of dreaded power,
And versed in many a creed.
Of Michael Scott no wilder tales
Have ever yet been told:
Men say he knew the wond'rous art
Of multiplying gold.
But now his magic wand is broke,
His tricksy spirits gone,
And on a backward bench he sits,
Forsaken and alone.
To him I went, and told him straight
The things that I had seen!
"O holy man, I pray thee say,
What may this vision mean?"

XII.

The hermit smiled--he stroked his chin--
Then quaintly answered he,
"There's something very singular
Connected with that tree!
Once on a time, when bark was dear,
The boughs I thought to peel,
But that same hurricane arose
And tossed me head o'er heel.
I think the oak will last my time--
But hark! I hear the bell!"
With his left hand he crossed himself,
Then slid into his cell.
But what the herd of porkers were,
He never told to me;
Nor who might be the MANNIKIN
Was sawing at the TREE.

FESTUS.[5]

[5] _Festus, a Poem._ By PHILIP JAMES BAILEY. Third Edition: with Additions.

Those who are acquainted with the Faust of Goethe (and who is not?) cannot fail to have observed the influence which it has exercised over several of our contemporary poets. We do not infer that those poets have exhibited any signs of slavish imitation, or that any other than an honourable influence has been exerted over their minds. Before them also nature and thought lay open; they too have had their philosophy--their own mode of solving, or stating, the problems of human life; and of the great German himself, as perhaps of all men of genius, it can only be said that he felt more strongly, and reflected more vividly than others, the common spirit of his age--the spirit of bold inquiry, of discontent, of aspiration, and of doubt. We would merely infer that, in their writings, there is much, either in the tone and temper, or the structure of the composition, which irresistibly reminds us of the master-piece of Goethe.

In one respect, however, our poets have been far from imitating the great German. They share with him, more or less, in the daring spirit of philosophical speculation, and in those views of human life, which are expressed either in the poetic desperation of Faust, or the withering sarcasm of Mephistopheles. They have also adopted his admixture of various styles and metres, suited to a changeful theme discussed by various speakers. But in this apparent freedom and bold diversity of styles, whether ballad, or satiric couplet, or mournful blank verse, the German is always the consummate _artist_. His verse is, on each occasion, all that the verse should be--polished, refined, correct, according to its manner and its order. Native critics assure us, and a foreign ear feels the truth of the criticism, that the Faust is as remarkable for its mastery of language, and perfection of style, as for any other and higher qualities of poetry. But _this_ merit some of our English bards seem to have despised, as utterly superfluous. They seem to contemn the labours of the artist. The control which the poet exercises over his own mind, in order that he may not allow the fervour of imagination to carry him wide beyond the pale of common-sense, or the frenzy of his passion to bear him far away from the sympathy of all other mortals; the survey and revisal in a calmer moment of what had been poured forth in the excited hour of original composition: the blotting out, the compressing together, the shading down, the removal of all stumbling-blocks to clear apprehension--all those labours, in short, by which language is made translucent and harmonious--made to serve its double purpose of use and luxury, of meaning and delight--they throw aside as an antiquated, absurd, unnecessary, and slavish toil. They will retain nothing, own nothing, but the "torrent rapture" of original composition. The consequence is evident and unavoidable. It is a very brief and imperfect rapture they afford their readers. Theirs is a very summer torrent, resembling what one often meets in a bright day, in the real landscape--very little stream, much stone, and a great scar in the earth left dry, glaring, and barren.

What are our "latter-day" poets dreaming of? Is the end of the world reckoned to be so near at hand that they think it folly to build for endurance?--idle to erect their "monument of brass," when it and the earth will so soon be swept away together? Or has the poet's old dream of an immortality of fame died out with the superstitions of a by-gone age, and no one in this philosophic era proposes to himself so visionary an object as a posthumous renown? We cannot think that poetic genius is wanting. Of all explanations, this is the last we should be disposed to admit. We could undertake to furnish from poems sinking rapidly into decay and oblivion, many a passage, and many a page, which would do honour to the highest names in the calendar of our muse-inspired men. We seem to have amongst us good poets still, but they have ceased to produce good poems. We have much genuine poetry diffused through our literature, and not a new work of art added to our possessions.

But if our men of genius are contented to be known in future times (if known at all) by some brilliant extracts only from crude, hasty, and forgotten works, could they not contrive to write extracts--now--for us--and leave the works alone? If they have but a few finished pictures to give us, if this is all their patience or their talent enables them to bring to perfection, must they really build, each one of them, a huge, rambling, misshapen edifice, that they may paint them here and there upon the walls? It is not absolutely necessary to build a new house for every new picture; although, in the infancy of the arts, such an idea was probably entertained. Those never-to-be-forgotten Chinese, immortalised by Charles Lamb, who, in the earliest stage of the culinary art, thought it requisite to burn down a house every time a sucking pig was to be roasted, very likely entertained this kindred idea. No doubt the artists of that period always built a wall before they painted a landscape. Happily all these matters have been simplified, and our poets should remember this. They should remember that, in none of the arts is it necessary to alarm the whole country by a conflagration, in order that some dainty morsels may be gathered out of the ruins.

Of all the poems which have lately come under our notice, there is none to which these remarks are more applicable than to Mr Bailey's _Festus_. It is the most extraordinary instance which our times, or we think any times have produced, of the union of genuine poetic power with utter recklessness of all the demands of art, or indeed of the requisitions of common-sense. It is "chaos come again," but chaos, withal, with such lightning flashes of real genius as compel us to look into it. Were it not for these abrupt and brief, but undoubted displays of genius, we certainly should not be induced to notice a work which so often degenerates into a mere _poetic rant_, a mere farrago of distracted metaphors, and crude metaphysics, and bewildering theology; where reasoning and imagination both run riot together; where the logic is as insane as the maniac fancy that is dancing with its flaring torch about it. Criticism, if it has any office, or duty, or voice left in the world, must protest against a species of literature which would set aside all the claims of good taste and good sense, in favour of a bold, original, reckless and unregulated imagination. Assuredly it ought not, in such a case, as it appears to have done, lavish unqualified encomiums.

Is the book worth reading?--is a summary question often put, and with some impatience, to the critic. Put here, we answer decidedly, Yes. Read it by all means, and with the pencil in your hand; for the probability is, that you will not work your way through it _twice_, and there are many things in it which you will not be content to have caught a glimpse of only once. Read it by all means. But this summary question, and its answer, do not decide the matter. If the author, by longer study and greater labour, could have made it worth preserving as well as reading, worth reading many times--if the state of opinion in the literary world is such that it encourages the publication of hasty and immature performances--there is something wrong here--something which ought, if possible, to be rectified.

In his poetic temperament, Mr Bailey will frequently remind the reader of Keats. He shares the same ardent imagination and uncontrollable fancy--the same, and perhaps stronger passion--the same breathless haste of composition which Keats manifested in his first production;--such haste, as if the writer feared to check himself a moment in his head-long career, lest the pause should be fatal to his inspiration. As Mr Bailey frequents a profounder region of thought than Keats had entered, he attains, in his happier moments, to a higher strain of poetry than his less reflective predecessor. On the other hand, his poetic sins are of a deeper dye, greater in number and in magnitude. That luxuriance of metaphor, that perpetual festival of the imagination, by which Keats is distinguished, are classic purity and abstinence itself, compared to the excesses of this kind in which the author of _Festus_ indulges.

Mr Bailey has the true poetic fervour in him. This, no one capable of enjoying the literature of imagination will hesitate to acknowledge. Mr Bailey is a poet. But this poem of _Festus_? Criticism looks aghast at it--cannot possibly give it welcome--looks at it with dismay and perplexity. Genuine gold in it, you say. Good. But what if a whole hogshead of the precious mud of the Sacramento, fresh from its native bed, unwashed, unsifted, is rolled to your door! Confess that the present is somewhat embarrassing. A single handful of the bullion would have been so much better.

In dissecting the plot, and analysing the materials of this poem, a critic might find innumerable occasions for satire and for ridicule. We shall not avail ourselves of any such opportunities. Perhaps we have no calling for this part, and are resisting no temptation in refusing to be satirical. But, indeed, the critic is not properly the satirist. The satirist is already there--in the outer world; he exists in every man of keen sense in whom judgment preponderates over those feelings to which the poet applies himself. The critic steps in between this satirist and the poet--steps in to mediate. He tells the shrewd and intelligent man of the world, prompt to detect the ridiculous aspect of things, that if he really has no sympathy with a class of feelings based much upon imagination--if he has no admiration, approaching to enthusiasm, for the beautiful in the visible, and for the tender and heroic in the moral world--the page of the poet is not for him: instead of sneering and condemning, he has but to shut up the book and depart. On the other side, he tells the poet that he does not write for his own solitary heart, or for the ears of two or three of peculiar and kindred temperament, who will forgive everything, so that some favourite chord be touched. He tells him that he will mould his verse to little purpose, if he fail to secure the attention of judicious, as well as gentle and imaginative readers; and that it is unwise in him wantonly to incur the ridicule of men whom a little more sobriety of thought would have added to his listening and admiring audience. He tells him that imagination ought not to be divorced from sense, and that distracted metaphors ought not to be seen wandering about, with nothing to illustrate; that it is not well to write with wilful obscurity; nor to torture the ear with discord; nor perplex, and weary, and unfit for the enjoyment of what is really excellent, by a perpetual exaggeration which borders, if it is not quite within, the region of hyperbole.

One must be pardoned for repeating the very rudiments of criticism to some of the headstrong writers of our day. A lucid, correct, harmonious, style--they have forgotten what it means--what virtue there is in it. They speak, or think, of it as of some matter of antiquated prejudice--of stale, conventional observance. It is no matter of convention; it is the living source of a calm perpetual gratification. It is the music of the printed book. It is that which makes reading a delight, as well as a necessary task. It is that which makes another's thought, to the mind, what the visible object is to the eye--seen without effort, and seen clad with beauty, as well as distinguished by form and position. Whether the subject of the poet be of a calm and gentle, or of a grand and sublime description, this charm of beautiful composition ought always to accompany it. The theory is false which separates beauty from sublimity. The wing of the eagle is not less graceful than that of the smallest bird which flutters from bough to bough, or from flower to flower; nor is his flight less smooth, in his stormy altitudes, than the slow sailing of unruffled swans in their peaceful element. And as the pleasure attendant upon distinct and melodious language is of itself of the calm and graceful order, so also some degree of calmness and self-possession should pervade the mind of the poet who is to produce it for us. Not always must the thought flow torrent-like. Let it gush with what precipitation it will from the smitten rock, but let the waters subside and tranquillise a little before the prophet invites us to dip our thirsty lips into the stream. Let the hour of reflection follow at due interval. Not always is the poet to be in the full tempest of original composition;--as, however, Mr Bailey seems to think, both by his practice and the advice he gives in his drama to the Student--

"Once
Begun, work thou all things into thy work,
And set thyself about it as the sea
About the earth, _lashing at it day and night_."

Poets who give and follow such advice as this, grow to have a horror of _distinctness_ of thought. They shrink from examining their own ideas, lest these should turn out to be no ideas at all; or perhaps very good and sensible ideas, but shockingly true and commonplace. They leave them, therefore, with the bloom of obscurity upon them, and lapse into the conviction that a certain degree of indistinctness is inseparable from subtlety and refinement of thought. A great mistake. Your subtle and refined thinking, if it be worth anything, if it be really _thinking_, must be distinct to those who have the ability to perceive what is subtle and refined. The thinnest gossamer that floats upon the air, _if it is to be seen_, must have an outline as well defined as if it were part of a ship's cable. But it is in vain to preach this doctrine to such writers--vain to argue that the imagination, in its most ethereal exercise, should still have an alliance with sense--we do not say with _common_ sense, but with some intelligible thought: they have a direct interest in believing the contrary. What! sacrifice this image!--silence all this thunder!--throw away this new word we have just coined to express our else unutterable conceptions!--impossible!

If these remarks of ours appear to be of a very elementary character, the fault lies with those who render their repetition necessary. Mr Bailey, in his composition, has contrived to commit all the oldest sins in the newest kind of way. He has not only, by the aid of German metaphysics, become transcendently obscure, but he also emulates Messrs Sternhold and Hopkins, in the baldness and ruggedness of his verse.

"It is time that something should be done for the poor."

Who would imagine that this was a line of poetry? It is, however; and forms the commencement of a speech of Lucifer's. The whole speech follows in the same style of composition:--

"_Lucifer._--It is time that something should be done for the poor.
The sole equality on earth is death;
Now, rich and poor are both dissatisfied.
I am for judgment: that will settle both.
Nothing is to be done without destruction.
Death is the universal salt of states;
Blood is the base of all things, law and war.
I could tame this lion age to follow me.
I should like to macadamize the world;
The road to Hell wants mending."

We give another specimen. It is a lyrical effusion delivered by the _Angel of the Earth_. We must give a lengthy and continuous sample, lest it should be said that it is we who, by omitting some portions, have made nonsense of the rest.

"_Angel of Earth._--Stars, stars!
Stop your bright cars!
Stint your breath--
Repent ere worse--
Think of the death
Of the universe.
Fear doom, and fear
The fate of your kin-sphere.
As a corse in the tomb,
Earth! thou art laid in doom.
The worm is at thy heart.
I see all things part:--
The bright air thicken,
Thunder-stricken:
Birds from the sky
Shower like leaves:
Streamlets stop,
Like ice on eaves:
The sun go blind:
Swoon the wind
On the high hill-top--
Swoon and die:
Earth rear off her cities
As a horse his rider;
And still, with each death-strain,
Her heart-wound tear wider:
The lion roar and die,
With his eyeball on the sky:
The eagle scream,
And drop like a beam:
Men crowd and cry,
'Out on this deathful dream!'
A low dull sound--
'Tis the march of many bones
Under ground:
Up! and they fling,
Like a fly's wing,
Off them the gray grave-stones;
They sit in their biers--
Father and mother,
Man and wife,
Sister and brother,
As in life;
Lady and lover--
Love all over.
Their flesh re-appears--
Their hearts beat--
Their eyes have tears:
Woe--woe!
Do they speak?
Stir? No.
Tongues were too weak,
Save to repeat
'Woe!'
But they smile
In a while," &c.--(P. 84.)

In these days, when it is said that verse has hard matter to keep its ground, and is thought to be going altogether into disrepute, is it wise to give us such verse as this? Or was it well to conjure up angelical or supernatural persons to repeat it? Or, again, is it wise of one, who really has poetic power, to abuse it in such rant and hyperbole as the following? We quote from a part of the poem where the author is dealing with the most popular and favourable subject a reflective poet could select. Festus, under pretence of giving an account of another, describes his own early emotions at his first intercourse with nature and with life--those emotions which made a poet of him. Our extract leads off with a noble line, as happy as it is bold--"All things talked thoughts to him;" and we would wish to rescue from apparent censure the fine expression for the sky--"The blue eye of God." For the rest, it is what we have attempted to characterise as _poetical rant_--imagination grown raving and delirious.

"All things talked thoughts to him!--The sea went mad,
And the wind whined as 'twere in pain, to show
Each one his meaning; and _the awful sun_
_Thundered his thoughts into him_; and at night
The stars would whisper theirs, the moon sigh hers.
The spirit speaks all tongues and understands;
Both God's and angels', man's, and all dumb things,
Down to an insect's inarticulate hum,
And an inaudible organ. And it was
The spirit spake to him of everything;
And with the moony eyes, like those we see,
Thousands on thousands, crowding air in dreams,
Looked into him its mighty meanings, till
He felt the power fulfil him, as a _cloud_
In every _fibre_ feels the forming wind.
He spake the world's one tongue: in earth and heaven
There is but one; it is the word of truth.
To him the eye let out its hidden meaning;
And young and old made their hearts over to him;
And thoughts were told to him as unto none,
Save one, who heareth, said and unsaid, all.
And his heart held these as a grate its gleeds,
Where others warm them.
_Student._ I would I had known him.
_Festus._--All things were inspiration unto him:
Wood, wold, hill, field, sea, city, solitude,
And crowds and streets, and man where'er he was;
And the blue eye of God which is above us;
Brook-bounded pine spinnies, where spirits flit;
And haunted pits the rustic hurries by,
_Where cold wet ghosts sit ringing jingling bells_;
Old orchards' leaf-roofed aisles and red-cheeked load;
And the blood-coloured tears where yew-trees weep
O'er churchyard graves, like murderers remorseful."

The same most favourite subject--of the early feelings of a poet--he encounters in another scene of the drama, where he meets the very Muse herself. We prefer to select from these parts, because, though more extraordinary passages might be found elsewhere, yet on those occasions the extraordinary or unsuitable nature of his theme may be thought to have betrayed him into the _violent_ style of writing we have to condemn. Festus meets the Muse in some one of the happy planets that he visits. She speaks in rhyme. We give a part of her address, and part of the answer of Festus. But first we must premise, that the Muse had that morning watched a particular ray of light, as it travelled from the sun to the earth--had "listened" to this ray, and reports what it said upon its unwilling journey downwards. She then sees this ray enter a cottage where a young poet is sitting, and in this original manner introduces her description:--

"_Muse._ A boyish bard
Sate suing night and stars for his reward.
The sunbeam swerved and grew, a breathing, dim,
For the first time, as it lit and looked on him:
His forehead faded--pale his lip, and dry--
Hollow his cheek--and fever-fed his eye.
Clouds lay about his brain, as on a hill,
Quick with the thunder thought and lightning will.
His clenched hand shook from its more than midnight clasp,
Till his pen fluttered like a wingèd asp;
Save that no deadly poison blacked its lips:
'Twas his to life-enlighten, not eclipse;
Nor would he shade one atom of another,
To have a sun his slave, a god his brother.
The young moon laid her down as one who dies,
Knowing that death can be no sacrifice,
For that the sun, her god, through nature's night,
Shall make her bosom to grow great with light.
Still he sat, though his lamp sunk; and he strained
His eyes, to work the nightness that remained.

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