Chapter XXII: Part 22

'Once on a time, in those old years,
When lived our grandsires and forbears,
(Writers, by whom the tale we know,
And ancient legends, tell us so),
Love was loyal, and true, and good;
The folk was simple; the fare was rude;
They gathered the berries in forest and mead:
For all their meat and all their bread;
They wandered by valley and plain and mountain,
By river and forest and woodland fountain,
Plucking the chestnuts and sweet wild fruits,
Looking for acorns and rustic roots.
They rubbed together the ears of wheat;
They gathered the clustering grape to eat;
Rich fare they made when the forest bees
Filled with honey the hollow trees:
Water their drink; and the strong red wine
Was not yet pressed from the autumn vine.

* * * * *

'When sleep came with the shades of night,
They spread no beds of down so light,
But stretched in their cabins on piles of hay,
Fresh gathered grass and leaves they lay.
Or slept without--when the air was mild--
And summer winds were hushed and stilled;
When birds in the early morning grey
Awoke to welcome, each in his way,
The dawn that makes all hearts so gay.
In that glad time when the royal pair,
Flora--Queen of the flowers fair--
And Zephyr, her mate, give timely birth
To flowers of spring, through all the earth.

* * * * *

... 'such splendour give
That you might think the world would strive
With Heaven itself for glory--so bright,
So fair, so proud, with its flowers bedight.
Then in the woods they lay at ease,
Over their heads the branching trees--
Lovers kissed, who lovers were,
And kissed again, and had no fear--
Then they chaunted rounds and lays,
Joyously led their sports and plays:
A simple folk; they had no prayer--
No fond ambition--nor other care
Then just to live a life of joy--
And loyal love without annoy.
No king or prince was with them yet
To plunder and wrong, to ravish and fret;
There were no rich, there were no poor,
For no man yet kept his own store:
And well the saying old they knew--
(Wise it is, and is proven true)
_Love and Lordship are two--not one_:
_They cannot abide together, nor mate_:
_Who wishes to join them is undone_,
_And who would unite will separate_.'

Or, as Dryden, who certainly never read the 'Romance of the Rose,' unless perhaps in Marot's edition, says:--

'Love either finds equality, or makes it.'

The end of the Golden Age--a thing not generally known--was accelerated by Jason's voyage, the hero bringing home with him treasures from _Outremer_: people begin to get ideas of property: they amass wealth: they rob and fight for plunder: they go so far as _to divide the land_. 'La propriété,' says Proudhon, 'c'est le vol.'

'Even the ground they parcelled out,
And placed the landmarks all about;
And over these, whene'er they met,
Fierce battle raged. What they could get,
They seized and snatched; and everywhere
The strongest got the biggest share.

* * * * *

So that at length, of plunder tired,
Needs must a guardian should be hired.

* * * * *

A sturdy peasant chose they then,
The mightiest of the sons of men;
Strongest in battle or in ring,
And him they chose to be their king.'

Voltaire has exactly the same idea:

'Le premier roi fut un soldat heureux.'

This is the origin of royalty. The growth of feudalism, of armies, taxation, and division into classes is carefully traced from these small beginnings.

But he deduces the great law of charity and love for our neighbours. Having this, we have everything; and wanting this, we get wars, tyranny, and all the miseries of the world.

What is the nature of true gentility? Lineage, he explains, has nothing to do with it. None are gentle, but those whose virtues make them so. Ancestors may leave their wealth behind them, but not the qualities that made them great. Clerks have an advantage over unlettered persons in knowing what is right. If they are coarse and rude, they sin against greater light, and incur heavier punishment.

'Let him, who gentleman would be,
From sloth and idleness keep free;
In arms and study be employed,
And coarse rusticity avoid.
Let him, with humble, courteous grace,
Meet every class in every place;
Honour all women, wife or maid,
So that not too much trust be laid
In woman's faith. So may he steer,
Of this great danger wholly clear.

* * * * *

Know all that gentle blood may bring
No benefit, or anything,
Except what each man's worth may give.
Know, also, none of all that live
Can ask for honour, praise, or blame
By reason of another's name.'

The idea, of course, is not new. It is found frequently enough in the Greek and Latin literature. It occurs, we believe, for the first time in the fragments of Epicharmus,--

ἀγαθὸς δ' ἄνηρ κἂν Αἰθίοψ καὶ δοῦλος, εὐγενὴς ἔφυ.

and afterwards it is found in Euripides, Horace, Juvenal--'Stemmata quid faciunt?'--and, lastly, in Seneca. Doubtless, Jean de Meung took it from Seneca. Once started anew, the idea, of course, became popular, and poet after poet repeated it, until it became a mere commonplace. But so far as we have been able to discover, Jean de Meung gave it new life.

A few words only, for our limits press, on the natural science taught in the 'Romance of the Rose.' The poet, having got rid of this indignation and wrath that lay at his soul anent the mendicant friars, and the vices of women, wishes now, it seems, to sit down for a quiet and comfortable disquisition on universal knowledge, including alchemy, in which he is a firm believer; indeed, he wants to pass, in a certain ballad of his, for an adept. This part takes the form of a confession of Nature to her chaplain Genius (in which Power afterwards copies him). The confession is long and wearisome, but it is curious as being the earliest and fullest popular account of mediæval science.

He fancies Nature to be perpetually at work, fashioning creatures whom Death continually tries to destroy.

'Nature, who fashions all that holds
The sky beneath its ample folds,
Within her forge meanwhile was found,
And at her work's eternal round,--
Struck out new forms of every race,
Lest life should fail, and types should cease;
She made so many, that Death, who toiled
With heavy mace to kill, was foiled.

* * * * *

They fly to save themselves, where'er
Their fate may lead, or feet may bear;
Some to the Church and convent rule,
Some to the dance, some to the school;
Some to their merchandize are turned,
Some to the arts which they have learned.

* * * * *

Another, sworn by Holy Writ,
Puts on the cloak of hypocrite;
And, flying, would his thoughts conceal,
Did not his life the truth reveal.
So, shunning Death, do all men shape
Their diverse ways, his blows to 'scape.'

The scientific discourse follows: observe the _good sense_ of many of his remarks:--

'God, having made the world out of nothing, having put all
things into their proper places, measured spaces, and
allotted courses, handed all over to Nature as his
_chambrière_. Whatever man can do--and his power is very
great--he cannot equal Nature, the inexhaustible and
untiring. By alchemy he can interchange metals; can restore
its pristine purity to everything; can turn quicksilver
into gold by subtle medicines; but he cannot change or
create species. This Nature alone is able to effect,
changing the complexions of things, so that they assume new
forms and become new substances; as when in thunderstorms,
stones fall from the clouds, where no stones ever were.

'The heavens turn every day, bearing with them the stars.
They go round from east to west, rejoicing the world. A
complete revolution is made every 26,000 years.

'The moon is different from the planets in being obscure in
some places and clear in others. The reason of this is,
that the sun can penetrate through one part of it, as
through glass; the dark part, on which is figured a serpent
having a tree on his back, reflecting the rays.

'In the centre is the sun, like a king. He it is who makes
the stars so bright that they serve as lamps of the night;
were we nearer to the sun we should be scorched; were we
farther away we should be frozen.

'The comets are not attached to the heavens, but fly about
in the air. They do not last long, and it is a mistake to
suppose that they portend disaster. For there is no man of
worth or power sufficient for the heavens to take notice of
him.

Nor any prince of so great worth,
That signs from heaven should give to earth,
Notice of death for him alone:
Nor is his body--life once gone--
Worth one jot more than simple squire,
Or clerk, or one who works for hire.

'Foolish people imagine, too, that stars fall like flying
dragons from the skies; and that eclipses are to be taken
as portents. Now, no one would be astonished at these
things who understood the causes of things.

'Every student ought to acquire a knowledge of optics,
which can be learned by the aid of geometry, from the books
of Aristotle, Albacen, and Hucayen. Here can be learned the
properties of mirrors; how they produce things which appear
miracles; make small things seem great--a grain of sand
like a mountain; and great things small--a mountain like a
grain of sand; how glasses can be used to burn things; how
straight lines can be made to look crooked, round things
oblong, upright things reversed; the phantoms which do not
exist appear to be moving about.'

The book from beginning to end is as full of quotations as Burton. The author quotes from Aristotle, Justinian, Horace, Seneca, St. Augustine, Ovid, Cicero, Boethius, Lucan, Claudian, Suetonius, and he has, probably through Cicero, some knowledge of Plato, but all this in the wildest jumble, with no discrimination and no critical power whatever. His range of reading was not by any means contemptible, and though we know of no writer of his time who can compare with him in this respect, it is evident that since one man had command of so many books, other men must have enjoyed the same advantages. There is reason to believe from Jean de Meung alone that acquaintance with Latin literature was much more extended than is generally thought, and that the scholarship of the time was by no means wholly confined to scholastic disputation.

Such, roughly sketched, is the work of Jean de Meung, from which we have plucked some of the fruits that come readiest to our hand. If not altogether an original or a profound thinker, he has at least the merit of fearlessness. He taught the folk, in the most popular way possible, great and valuable lessons. He told them that religion is a thing apart from, and independent of, religious profession; that "la robe ne faict pas le moyne;" he says that most of the saints, men and women, were decent married people, that marriage is a laudable and holy custom, that the wealth of monks is a mockery of their profession and a perjury of their vows, that learned persons ought to set an example, and what is sheer ignorance and brutality in others is rank sin with them; he attacks superstition, showing that all phenomena have natural causes, and have nothing to do with earthly events and the fortunes of men, because men are equal in the sight of God; and he teaches in terms as clear as any used by Carlyle, that labor is noble, and in accordance with the conditions of our being--that man's welfare is the end and aim of all earthly provision.

All this is what used to be called the Dark Ages. After six hundred years, the same questions exercise us which exercised Jean de Meung. We are still disputing as to whether true nobility is inherited or not; we have not all made up our minds about the holiness of marriage; we still think the clergyman, because he wears a surplice, holier than other men; work has been quite recently and with much solemnity pronounced noble by a prophet who forgot, while he was about it, to call it also respectable; men yet live who look upon scientific men with horror, and quote with fine infelicity, a text of St. Paul's about 'science falsely so called;' while the lesson of personal holiness has to be preached again and again, and is generally forgotten in the war over vestments and creeds.

Jean de Meung wished, as it seems to us, to write a book for the people, to answer their questions, to warn them of dangers before them, to instruct their ignorance. On the sapless trunk of a dying and passionless allegory he grafts a living branch which shall bear fruit in the years to come. His poem breathes indeed. Its pulses beat with a warm human life. Its sympathies are with all mankind. The poet has a tear for the poor naked beggars dying on dung-heaps and in the Hôtel-Dieu, and a lash of scorpions for the Levite who goes by on the other side; he teaches the loveliness of friendship; he catches the wordless complaint of the poor, and gives it utterance: he speaks with a scorn which Voltaire only has equalled, and a revolutionary fearlessness surpassing that of D'Alembert or Diderot.

And much more than this. It seems to us that his book--absolutely the only cheerful book of the time--afforded hope that things were not permanent: evil times may change; times have not been always evil: there was once a Golden Age: the troubles of the present are due, not to the innate badness of Nature and the universal unfitness of things, but to certain definite and ascertainable causes. Now to discover the cause is to go some way towards curing the disease.

In that uneasy time, strange questions and doubts perplexed men's minds--questions of religion and politics, affecting the very foundations of society. They asked themselves _why_ things were so; and looking about in the dim twilight of dawning knowledge they could find as yet no answer. There was no rest in the Church or in the State, and the mind of France--which was the mind of Europe--was gravitating to a social and religious democracy. An hour before the dawn, you may hear the birds of the forest twitter in their sleep: they dream of the day. Europe at the close of the thirteenth century was dreaming of the glorious Renaissance, the dawn of the second great day of civilization. Jean de Meung answered the questions of the times with a clearness and accuracy which satisfied if it did not entirely explain. Five generations passed away before the full burst of light, and he taught them all, with that geniality that is his greatest charm. His book lasted because, confused and without art as it is, it is full of life and cheerfulness and hope. Not one of the poets of his own time had his lightness of heart: despondency and dejection weigh down every one: they alternate between a monotonous song to a mistress or a complaint for France; and to Jean de Meung they are as the wood-pigeon to the nightingale. They all borrowed from him, or studied him. Charles of Orleans, Villon, Clement Marot, Rabelais, La Fontaine, Regnier, Molière, Béranger, all come down from him in direct line, his literary children and grandchildren. And in Jean de Meung, to make an end, is the first manifestation of the true spirit of French literature--the _esprit Gaulois_--the legacy, they tell us, of the ancient Gaul.

FOOTNOTES:

[51] Milman's Hist. of Latin Christianity, vol. iv. p. 407

[52] He died about 1308, at the age of one hundred. A selection from his satires is to be found in Raynouard's collection of Provençal literature.

[53] Among these, the most formidable, at one time, was the great order of Knights Templars--_Ecclesia super Ecclesiam_.

[54] See _Révue des Deux Mondes_, 1866, vol. 64.

[55] Cf. also Richard of Hampole--

'Ther is lyf withoute ony deth,

* * * * *

Ae yatte the most sovereign joye of alle
Is the sight of Goddes bright face,
In whom resteth all manere grace.'

[56] It may be objected that 'La Bible Guyot' was a satire on the times. But this curious book is, so far as it deals with the Church, a querulous complaint of certain indignities and privations suffered by the author, chiefly in the way of eating and drinking. 'The Abbot,' he says, 'gets the meat and the clear wine; the monks get beans and muddy wine. And they are obliged to be "roaring and bellowing" all night long, so that they can get no sleep.' A monk, whose chief complaint is the frequency of church services and the rigorous mortification of the flesh, can hardly be called a satirist.

[57] It was, among others, the cause of that most singular movement, the Crusade of Children. Friar Nicholas preached that by reason of the rapacity and lust of the soldiers, the Holy Land would never be conquered, but that, were the children to invade it, the arms of the infidels would drop powerless from their hands. Acting on this belief, hundreds of children started from Germany and France, in the belief that the Mediterranean would be dried up for them to pass. Seven shiploads were kidnapped and sold for slaves in Alexandria, several thousands perished; only a few found their way back. The story is told by M. Capefigue in a note to Michault's 'Histoire des Crusades.'

ART. V.--_Letters and Letter Writing._

_Gossip about Letters and Letter Writers._ By GEORGE SETON, Advocate. Edinburgh. 1870.

We all of us know well, and to our cost, that we can make no improvement in the management of our affairs, no change for the better in the arrangements, economical and ethical, of our modes of life and action without some attendant trial, trouble, or loss coming ever like a shadow in its train. It is, therefore, not a cause for wonder that some spirit of evil has cast its shadow in the wake of the introduction of the penny post, and the still later changes in the direction of cheapness in the newspaper press. A feeling of regret arises in our minds that with their introduction the good old-fashioned long and newsy letter of bygone days has been almost crushed out of existence. Letter writing is becoming a lost art, and no correspondence is now carried on as in the olden time; for no one now lives 'a life of letter writing' as Walpole said he did. The reason of this is not far to seek, for the hurry and bustle of life has become too great to allow of anything but the passing thought being committed to paper, and each writer finds it to be useless to tell news to a correspondent who has already learned what has happened from the same source as himself. It is now frequently a shorter operation to call upon your friend and talk with him than to write him a long letter; but it is a happy thing for us of this day that this was not always the case, for the letters of the past which we possess form one of the most charming branches of our lighter literature.

The value of communication between persons in distant places was appreciated in very early times; and we find Job exclaiming, 'Now my days are swifter than a post.' In the days of Hezekiah 'the posts went with the letters from the king and his princes throughout all Israel and Judah,' and Ahasuerus sent letters into every province of his empire by 'the posts that rode upon mules and camels,' and were 'hastened and pressed on by the king's commandment,' to inform his subjects that it was his imperial will that every man should bear rule in his own house. Various modes of communication other than writing have at different times been in use, such as numerically marked or notched pieces of wood, and the many-coloured cords, regularly knotted, which were called _quipus_ by the Peruvians. Herodotus tells us of a cruel practice resorted to, in order to convey secret intelligence with safety. The head of a trusty messenger was shaved, and certain writings were impressed upon his skull. After his hair had grown sufficiently long for the purposes of concealment he was sent on his mission, and on arriving at his destination was again shaved, in order that the writing might be revealed. When the Spaniards visited America they found the postal communication in Mexico and Peru to be carried out on a most perfect system; and we learn that the couriers of the Aztecs wore a differently coloured dress, according as they brought good or bad tidings.

The establishment of a postal system in England is chiefly due to the sagacity of Richard III., who commanded the expedition against the Scots, in his brother Edward's reign. During this time, as it was necessary for the king and his government to know how the war was carried on, stages of about twenty miles each were established upon the North road. When Richard came to the throne he did not allow this system to fall into abeyance. Henry VIII. instituted the office of 'Master of the Postes,' and from his time to the present the Post Office has increased in importance year by year. Henry Bishop was appointed Postmaster-General at the Restoration, on his entering into a contract to pay to Government the annual sum of £21,500. In Queen Anne's reign the revenue of the Post Office had risen to £60,000; in 1761 it reached £142,000; in 1800 £745,000; in 1813 £1,414,224, and is now between four and five millions sterling.

Much of this great increase in the revenue is owing to the various improvements that have been introduced; and most of these have come from without, and have been opposed by the officials. John Palmer had great difficulty in obtaining the adoption of his scheme of mail coaches, and Sir Rowland Hill battled for many years for his penny postage. Thomas Waghorn, the hero of the Overland Route, was originally a pilot in the service of the Hon. East India Company, and came to England with a letter of introduction from the Governor-General to the chairman of the Company. The chairman cared nothing for his scheme, and told him to return to his duties in India, saying that the East India Company were quite satisfied with the postal communication as conducted _viâ_ the Cape of Good Hope. Waghorn left the room, disgusted with his reception, and wrote the following laconic note in the hall:--

'To John Harvey Astell, Esq., M.P., Chairman of the Hon.
East India Company.

'SIR,--I this day resign my employment as a pilot in the
Hon. East India Company's Bengal Marine Service, and have
the honour to remain, your obedient servant,

'THOMAS WAGHORN.'

With the ink scarcely dry he rushed into the august presence, and delivering his letter, said, 'There, sir, is my resignation of my position in the Company's service, and I tell you, John Harvey Astell, Esq., member of Parliament, and chairman of the Hon. East India Company, that I will stuff the Overland Route down your throat before you are two years older.'[58]

It was very long before the present enlightened views of cheap postage took root in the official mind, and in a tract, entitled 'England's Wants,' reprinted in 'Somers's Tracts' (vol. ix. p. 219), letters are among the objects proposed for taxation. When the cost of postage was high the receiver expected to get his money's worth in a long letter, but various tricks were often resorted to in order to save this cost, and blank letters, with a cipher on the outside, were sometimes sent, and refused by the persons to whom they were directed, because they had learnt from the exterior all that they wanted to know. Another trick discovers an ingenious mode of getting letters free. A shrewd countryman, learning that there was a letter for him at the post office, called for it, but confessing that he could not read, requested the postmaster to open it, and let him know the contents. When he had obtained all the information he required, he politely thanked the official for his kindness, and drily observed, 'When I have some change I will come and take it.' The doctrine of the inviolability of letters is held by all persons of honour, and Cicero asks 'who at all influenced by good habits and feelings has ever allowed himself to resent an affront or injury by exposing to others any letters received from the offending person during their intercourse of friendship?' Nevertheless, all Governments have reserved to themselves the right of opening, in time of emergency, the letters that pass through their hands. The great Falkland would not countenance any such dishonourable doctrine, and Lord Clarendon says of him, 'One thing Lord Falkland could never bring himself to, while Secretary of State, and that was the liberty of opening letters upon suspicion that they might contain matter of dangerous consequence, which he thought such a violation of the law of nature that no qualification of office could justify him in the trespass.' In late years Sir James Graham incurred much public odium, for allowing the letters of Mazzini to be opened as they passed through the English post.

The history of literature presents us with many specimens of beautiful letters, and of continued correspondence of a high order. The French, more especially, excel in this charming department of the _belles lettres_, and can claim a De Sevigné and a Du Deffand; while we too can boast of the possession of Walpole, Gray, and Cowper among the men, and of Lady Russell and Lady Mary Montagu among the ladies. Good letters should be like good conversation, easy and unrestrained, for fine writing is as out of place in the one as fine talk is in the other. Pope did not understand this, and his early letters are showy and unnatural, full of rhetorical flourishes on trivialities. He was in the habit of keeping rough copies of his own letters, and sometimes repeated the same letter to different persons, as in the case of the two lovers killed by lightning, an account of which he sent to the two sisters Martha and Theresa Blount. His letters, therefore, are of little more interest than those of Katherine Phillips, the matchless Orinda, to her grave Poliarchus (Sir Charles Cottrel). Dr. Sprat, in his life of Cowley, makes some judicious remarks upon this subject, but draws the conclusion that familiar letters should not be published to the world.

'There was (he says), one kind of prose wherein Mr. Cowley
was excellent; and that is his letters to his private
friends. In those he always expressed the native tenderness
and innocent gaiety of his mind. I think, sir, you and I
have the greatest collection of this sort. But I know you
agree with me that nothing of this sort should be
published; and herein you have always consented to approve
of the modest judgment of our countrymen above the practice
of some of our neighbours, and chiefly of the French. I
make no manner of question but the English at this time are
infinitely improved in this way above the skill of former
ages. Yet they have been always judiciously sparing in
printing such composures, while some other witty nations
have tried all their presses and readers with them. The
truth is, the letters that pass between particular friends,
if they are written as they ought to be, can scarce ever be
fit to see the light. They should not consist of fulsome
compliments, or tedious politics, or elaborate elegancies,
or general fancies, but they should have a native clearness
and shortness, a domestical plainness, and a peculiar kind
of familiarity which can only affect the humour of those
for whom they were intended. The very same passages which
make writings of this nature delightful among friends will
lose all manner of taste when they come to be read by those
that are indifferent. In such letters the souls of men
should appear undressed; and in that negligent habit they
may be fit to be seen by one or two in a chamber, but not
to go abroad in the street.'

The letters of Scott, Byron, Southey, and Burns--all thoroughly different in style--keep up the character of the moderns, and show that they understood the secret of the art.

Letter-writing has a special charm for shy, retiring men, because they are able to exhibit upon paper the feelings and emotions about which they could not speak. Some men seem able to think only when a pen is in their hands; though others, in the same situation, seem to lose all their ideas. Johnson said of the industrious Dr. Birch, 'Tom Birch is as brisk as a bee in conversation, but no sooner does he take a pen in his hand than it becomes a torpedo to him and benumbs all his faculties.' Dr. French Lawrence was an instance of the exact reverse, for Fox made him put on paper what he wanted to relate, saying, 'I love to read your writing, but I hate to hear you talk.'

Sir James Mackintosh was a great admirer of Madame de Sevigné, and we find in his works the following admirable remarks on the proper tone for polite conversation and familiar letters. We doubt whether it would be possible to find juster or finer thoughts on this subject, expressed in more elegant language:--

'When a woman of feeling, fancy, and accomplishment has
learned to converse with ease and grace, from long
intercourse with the most polished society, and when she
writes as she speaks, she must write letters as they ought
to be written, if she has acquired just as much habitual
correctness as is reconcilable with the air of negligence.
A moment of enthusiasm, a burst of feeling, a flash of
eloquence may be allowed, but the intercourse of society,
either in conversation or in letters, allows no more.
Though interdicted from the long continued use of elevated
language, they are not without a resource. There is a part
of language which is disdained by the pedant or the
declaimer, and which both if they knew its difficulty would
dread; it is formed of the most familiar phrases and turns
in daily use by the generality of men, and is full of
energy and vivacity, bearing upon it the mark of those keen
feelings and strong passions from which it springs. It is
the employment of such phrases which produces what may be
called colloquial eloquence. Conversation and letters may
be thus raised to any degree of animation without departing
from their character. Anything may be said, if it be spoken
in the tone of society; the highest guests are welcome, if
they come in the easy undress of the club; the strongest
metaphor appears without violence, if it is familiarly
expressed; and we the more easily catch the warmest
feeling, if we perceive that it is intentionally lowered in
expression out of condescension to our calmer temper. It
is thus that harangues and declamations, the last proof of
bad taste and bad manners in conversation, are avoided,
while the fancy and the heart find the means of pouring
forth all their stores. To meet this despised part of
language in a polished dress, and producing all the effects
of wit and eloquence, is a constant source of agreeable
surprise. This is increased when a few bolder and higher
words are happily wrought into the texture of this familiar
eloquence. To find what seems so unlike author-craft in a
book, raises the pleasing astonishment to the highest
degree. I once thought of illustrating my notions by
numerous examples from "La Sevigné." I must some day or
other do so, though I think it the resource of a bungler,
who is not enough master of language to convey his
conceptions into the minds of others. The style of Madame
de Sevigné is evidently copied, not only by her worshipper,
Walpole, but even by Gray, who, notwithstanding the
extraordinary merits of his matter, has the double
stiffness of an imitator and of a college recluse. Letters
must not be on a subject. Lady Mary Wortley's letters on
her journey to Constantinople are an admirable book of
travels, but they are not letters. A meeting to discuss a
question of science is not conversation; nor are papers
written to another, to inform or discuss, letters.
Conversation is relaxation not business, and must never
appear to be occupation, nor must letters. Judging from my
own mind, I am satisfied of the falsehood of the common
notion that these letters owe their principal interest to
the anecdotes of the court of Louis XIV. A very small part
of the letters consist of such anecdotes. Those who read
them with this idea must complain of too much Grignan. I
may now own that I was a little tired during the two first
volumes. I was not quite charmed and bewitched till the
middle of the collection, where there are fewer anecdotes
of the great and famous. I felt that the fascination grew
as I became a member of the Sevigné family; it arose from
the history of the immortal mother and the adored daughter,
and it increased as I knew them in more detail; just as my
tears in the dying chamber of Clarissa depend on my having
so often drank tea with her in those early volumes, which
are so audaciously called dull by the profane vulgar. I do
not pretend to say that they do not owe some secondary
interest to the illustrious age in which they were written;
but this depends merely on its tendency to heighten the
dignity of the heroine, and to make us take a warmer
concern in persons who were the friends of those celebrated
men and women, who are familiar to us from our childhood.'

A French writer has said, 'les marins ecrivent mal;' but the gallant admiral, Lord Collingwood, whose correspondence was published in 1828, was a brilliant exception to this rash assertion. The following letter, addressed to the Honourable Miss Collingwood, is dated July 1809, and shows that its writer, in the midst of his manifold duties as a sailor, found time to direct the education of his children.

'I received your letter, my dearest child, and it made me
very happy to find that you and dear Mary are well, and
taking pains with your education. The greatest pleasure I
have amidst my toils and troubles is in the expectation
which I entertain of finding you improved in knowledge, and
that the understanding which it has pleased God to give you
both has been cultivated with care and assiduity. Your
future happiness and respectability in the world depend on
the diligence with which you apply to the attainment of
knowledge at this period of your life, and I hope that no
negligence of our own will be a bar to your progress. When
I write to you, my beloved child, so much interested am I
that you should be amiable and worthy the esteem of good
and wise people, that I cannot forbear to second and
enforce the instruction which you receive by admonition of
my own, pointing out to you the great advantages that will
result from a temperate conduct and sweetness of manner to
all people, on all occasions. It does not follow that you
are to coincide and agree in opinion with every ill-judging
person; but after showing them your reason for dissenting
from their opinion, your argument and opposition to it
should not be tinctured by anything offensive. Never forget
for one moment that you are a gentlewoman, and all your
words and all your actions should mark you gentle. I never
knew your mother--your dear, your good mother--say a harsh
or hasty thing to any person in my life. Endeavour to
imitate her. I am quick and hasty in my temper, my
sensibility is touched sometimes with a trifle, and my
expression of it sudden as gunpowder; but, my darling, it
is a misfortune which, not having been sufficiently
restrained in my youth, has caused me much pain. It has,
indeed, given me more trouble to subdue this natural
impetuosity than anything I ever undertook. I believe that
you are both mild; but if you ever feel in your little
breasts that you inherit a particle of your father's
infirmity, restrain it, and quit the subject that has
caused it until your serenity be recovered. So much for
mind and manners; next for accomplishments. No sportsman
ever hits a partridge without aiming at it, and skill is
acquired by repeated attempts. It is the same thing in
every art; unless you aim at perfection you will never
attain it, but frequent attempts will make it easy. Never,
therefore, do anything with indifference. Whether it be to
mend a rent in your garment or finish the most delicate
piece of art, endeavour to do it as perfectly as it is
possible. When you write a letter give it to your greatest
care, that it may be as perfect in all its parts as you can
make it. Let the subject be sense, expressed in the most
plain, intelligible, and elegant manner that you are
capable of. If in a familiar epistle you should be playful
and jocular, guard carefully that your wit be not sharp, so
as to give pain to any person; and before you write a
sentence examine it, even the words of which it is
composed, that there be nothing vulgar or inelegant in
them. Remember, my dear, that your letter is the picture of
your brains; and those whose brains are a compound of
folly, nonsense, and impertinence are to blame to exhibit
them to the contempt of the world, or the pity of their
friends. To write a letter with negligence, without proper
stops, with crooked lines and great flourishing dashes, is
inelegant. It argues either great ignorance of what is
proper, or great indifference towards the person to whom it
is addressed, and is consequently disrespectful. It makes
no amends to add an apology for having scrawled a sheet of
paper, for bad pens, for you should mend them; or want of
time, for nothing is more important to you, or to which
your time can be more properly devoted. I think I can know
the character of a lady pretty nearly by her handwriting.
The dashers are all impudent, however they may conceal it
from themselves or others; and the scribblers flatter
themselves with the vain hope that, as their letter cannot
be read, it may be mistaken for sense. I am very anxious to
come to England; for I have lately been unwell. The
greatest happiness which I expect there is to find that my
dear girls have been assiduous in their learning. May God
Almighty bless you, my beloved little Sarah, and sweet Mary
too.'

Having seen from the foregoing extracts the principles that should govern the composition of familiar letters, we shall be better able to judge of the merits or demerits of the specimens that follow; and we will take this opportunity of saying that we have preferred to choose our examples from little known sources, rather than from such well-known volumes as the correspondences of Walpole, Gray, or Cowper. The celebrated Mrs. Elizabeth Carter was much troubled by one of her most intimate and early friends always writing to her in terms of great respect. In order to show her correspondent the absurdity of her conduct, and to obtain an easier kind of intercommunication, she wrote the following letter:--

'Nov. 29, 1742.

'To MISS ----

'It is with the utmost diffidence, dear Miss ----, that I
venture to do myself the high honour of writing to you,
when I consider my own nothingness and utter incapacity of
doing any one thing upon earth. Indeed, I cannot help
wondering at my own assurance in daring to expose my
unworthy performance to your accurate criticisms, which to
be sure I should never have presumed to do if I had not
thought it necessary to pay my duty to you, which, with the
greatest humility, I beg you to accept. Unless I had as
many tongues in my head as there are grains of dust betwixt
this place and Canterbury, it is impossible for me to
express the millionth part of the obligations I have to
you; but people can do no more than they can, and therefore
I must content myself with assuring you that I am, with
the sublimest veneration, and most profound humility,

'Your most devoted,
'Obsequious,
'Respectful,
'Obedient,
'Obliged,
'And dutiful,
'Humble servant,

'E. CARTER.

'I know you have an extreme good knack at writing
respectful letters; but I shall die with envy if you outdo
this.'

Aaron Hill expresses in elegant words what many have felt when they have received a letter from one who was separated from them by time and space:--

'Letters from absent friends extinguish fear,
Unite division, and draw distance near;
Their magic force each silent wish conveys,
And wafts embodied thought a thousand ways.
Could souls to bodies write, death's power were mean,
For minds could then meet minds with heaven between.'

James Howell, who has left us a most amusing collection of letters, and therefore may be allowed to speak with some authority, says 'familiar letters may be called the 'larum bells of love;' and he puts the same idea into the form of a distich, thus--

'As keys do open chests,
So letters open brests.'

Unfortunately all the letters in the _Epistolæ Ho-elianæ_ are not genuine, but were written when Howell was confined in the Fleet prison, and were made up in order to supply their author with money for his necessities.

To Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus, has been given the credit of the invention of letterwriting, but her claim is easily disposed of, as we have specimens of written communications very long before her time. The earliest letter of which we have any record is that written by David to Joab, directing him to place Uriah in the front of the battle. There are several classical stories, that bear a likeness to this, of persons who carried letters, in which their own execution was desired; thus Homer tells the story of Bellerophon, who himself bore the sealed tablets that demanded his death. In later Jewish History we learn from the Bible that Queen Jezebel wrote letters in Ahab's name, and sealed them with his seal, and sent them to the elders and nobles.

Cicero was one of the earliest to bring the art to perfection, and his letters exhibit most of the graces of which it is capable. Seneca and the younger Pliny were also amongst the masters in the art. When we consider the inconvenient and perishable medium that the Romans had to content themselves with, we cannot but feel surprise at the number of letters that were written, and the large proportion that has come down to us. Thin wooden tablets, coated over with wax, were used and fastened together with a crossed thread. The knotted ends were sealed with wax, and as the letters were usually written by a confidential slave (the _librarius_), the seal was the only guaranty of genuineness. Sometimes ivory or parchment tablets were used, and an elevated border was probably added, in order to prevent rubbing. The want of a system of posts was not felt among the Romans, as most families possessed _tabellarii_, or special slaves, whose duty it was to convey letters to their destination.

It was the practice with the Romans to place the names of both the writer and his correspondent at the commencement of the letter, as 'Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, unto Timothy, my own son in the faith;' and the ending usually consisted of the word _vale_, or _ave_, or _salve_. The dates were scrupulously added, and sometimes the very hours were mentioned. This method of the Romans might well be imitated by us, for we often find an old letter rendered of little value by the omission of a date. A bad habit that some writers indulge in is to use the name of the day of the week, instead of the day of the month and year.

Amongst ourselves, etiquette once placed her stern hands upon correspondence, and laid down rules of how a letter was to be written. Among persons pretending to any fashion it was considered proper to use fine gilt paper, sealed with a coat of arms. Ladies used tinted paper with borders, and sealed their letters with coloured and perfumed wax. In town it was not the fashion to send letters or notes through the post, nor to put the address upon the envelope, for no one could be supposed to be ignorant of the abode of so distinguished a person as Lady Arabella Smith. The circle of fashionable life, however, has been so much enlarged and encroached upon, that most people now are forced to acknowledge their ignorance on such points. If we imagine that we should groan under these restrictions, what should we think of the etiquette enjoined in the East? There correspondence is carried on with many degrees of refinement. Letters are written by some accomplished scribe, on beautiful paper, and the sender's mark is placed in a particular position, according to the recognised status of his correspondent. The letter is folded by rule, and a florid superscription is added, such as, 'Let this come under the consideration of the benefactor of his friends, the distinguished in the State, the renowned, the lion in battle, on whom be peace from the Most High.' The following are two amusing specimens of the untrue complaisance common in Chinese correspondence:--

'To a Friend who has lately left another.

'Ten days have elapsed since I had the privilege of
listening to your able instructions. Ere I was aware, I
found my heart filled and choked with noxious weeds.
Perhaps I shall have to thank you for favouring me with an
epistle, in which I know your words will flow, limpid as
the streams of pure water: then shall I instantly see the
nature of things, and have my heart opened to understand.'

'To a Friend at a distance.

'I am removed from your splendid virtues. I stand looking
towards you with anxious expectation. There is nothing for
me, but toiling along a dusty road. To receive your advice,
as well as pay my respects, are both out of my power. In
sleep my spirit dreams of you; it induces a kind of
intoxication. I consider my virtuous brother a happy man,
eminent and adorned with all rectitude. You are determined
in your good purposes, and rejoice in the path of reason.
You are always and increasingly happy. On this account I am
rejoiced and consoled more than can be expressed.'

We are not now so distant as formerly in the commencement of our letters, and use more friendly openings (such as 'Dear Sir,' 'My dear Sir') than our fathers did. 'Sir,' alone, was once nearly universal, but is now usually considered cold. Even Howell, who was most inventive in his endings, usually commences with _Sir_, although once he breaks forth with 'Hail! half of my soul.' Such beginnings as 'Right worshipful Father,' 'Good Sir,' 'Honoured Sir,' 'Respected Sir,' are quite out of date, but many writers adopt a variety in their commencements, and do not always follow the beaten track; thus the great Chatham wrote to his wife, 'Be of cheer, noble love.' In modern letters we miss the use of some of the quaint and loving expressions of former days, such a one, for instance, as the good old word 'heart,' for is there not always a charm about an old letter beginning with the words 'Dear Heart?'

The ending of a letter requires some taste, and many find it as difficult to close one gracefully as to finish conversation and leave a room with ease. The 'I remain' requires to be led up to, and not to be added to the letter without connection. There is a large gamut of choice for endings, from the official 'Your obedient servant,' and high and mighty 'Your humble servant,' to the friendly 'Yours truly,' 'Yours sincerely,' and 'Yours affectionately.' Some persons vary the form, and slightly intensify the expression by placing the word 'yours' last, as 'Faithfully yours.' James Howell used a great variety of endings, such as 'Yours inviolably,' 'Yours intirely,' 'Your intire friend,' 'Yours verily and invariably,' 'Yours really,' 'Yours in no vulgar way of friendship,' 'Yours to dispose of,' 'Yours while J. H.,' 'Yours! Yours! Yours!' Walpole writes--'Yours very much,''Yours most cordially,' and to Hannah More, in 1789, 'Yours more and more.' Mr. Bright some years ago ended a controversial letter in the following biting terms, 'I am, sir, with whatever respect is due to you.' The old Board of Commissioners of the Navy used a form of subscription very different from the ordinary official one. It was their habit to subscribe their letters (even letters of reproof) to such officers as were not of noble families or bore titles, 'Your affectionate friends.' It is said that this practice was discontinued in consequence of a distinguished captain adding to his letter to the Board, 'Your affectionate friend.' He was thereupon desired to discontinue the expression, when he replied, 'I am, gentlemen, no longer your affectionate friend.' The expression was supposed to have been adopted from James Duke of York, who, when Lord High Admiral, always so subscribed his official letters; but we have found a letter from the Navy Office to the Officers of the Ordnance, dated '9th May, 1653,' which is subscribed 'Your very loveing ffrends.' The position of the writer's name was once a matter of consequence in Europe, as it is now in the East, and this appears from the following curious directions in Angel Day's 'English Secretary' (1599).

'And now to the subscriptions, the diversities whereof are
(as best they may be allotted in sense) to either of these
to bee placed, forwarned alwaies unto the unskilfull
herein, that, writing to anie person of account, by howe
much the more excellent hee is in calling from him in whose
behalfe the Letter is framed, by so much the lower shall
the subscription thereunto belonging in any wise be placed.

'And if the state of honour of him to whome the Letter
shall be directed doe require so much, the verie lowest
margent of paper shall do no more but beare it, so bee it
the space bee seemelie for the name, and the room faire
inough to comprehend it.'

We now come to the consideration of directions, and here a certain etiquette still lingers, as many who have no claim to any title are dignified by the addition of the meaningless &c., &c., &c. A friend of the once celebrated agriculturist, Sir John Sinclair, amusingly ridiculed the fancy that some men have for seeing a number of letters of the alphabet after their names, by directing his letter to 'Sir John Sinclair, A.M., F.R.S., T.U.V.W.X.Y.Z.' Besides the name of the person to whom the letter was sent, it was formerly the custom to write on the outside of a letter various directions to its bearer: thus a letter of the Earl of Hertford afterwards the Protector Somerset, to Sir William Paget, upon the death of Henry VIII., was addressed 'Haste, Post Haste, Haste with all diligence, For thy life! For thy life!'

As long as letters have been written, the inadvertent misdirecting of them must have been a constant source of trouble and annoyance. In James I.'s reign a lover sent a letter intended for his mistress to an obdurate father, and his letter renouncing her to the lady. When he found out the dreadful mistake he had committed life became insupportable to him, and he threw himself upon his sword. Swift sent a love-letter to a bishop, and the letter intended for the bishop to the lady.

The celebrated civilian, Dr. Dale, was fortunate in the success of his expedient of purposely misdirecting his letters. When he was employed on a diplomatic mission to Flanders he was much pressed for money, and in a packet to the Secretary of State he sent two letters, one for Queen Elizabeth and the other for his wife, which he misdirected, so that the letter for his wife was addressed _to her most excellent Majesty_, and that for the Queen _to his dear wife_. The Queen was surprised to find her letter beginning 'Sweetheart,' and concluding with a request to her to be very economical, as the writer could send her nothing because he was very short of money, and could not think of trespassing on the bounty of Her Majesty any further. Dale was successful in his stratagem, as an immediate supply of money was sent to him and to his family.