Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

Watching the grander guest. It seem’d to rise
Bulky and slow upon the southern brink
Of the horizon--fann’d by sultry sighs--
So black and threatening, I cannot think
Of any simile, except the skies
Miss Wiggins sometime _shades_ in Indian ink--
_Miss_-shapen blotches of such heavy vapour,
They seem a deal more solid than her paper.

As for the sea, it did not fret, and rave,
And tear its waves to tatters, and so dash on
The stony-hearted beach;--some bards would have
It always rampant, in that idle fashion,--
Whereas the waves roll’d in, subdued and grave,
Like schoolboys, when the master’s in a passion,
Who meekly settle in and take their places,
With a very quiet awe on all their faces.

Some love to draw the ocean with a head,
Like troubled table-beer,--and make it bounce,
And froth and roar, and fling--but this, I’ve said,
Surged in scarce rougher than a lady’s flounce:--
But then, a grander contrast thus it bred
With the wild welkin, seeming to pronounce
Something more awful in the serious ear,
As one would whisper that a lion’s near--

Who just begins to roar; so the hoarse thunder
Growl’d long--but low--a prelude note of death,
As if the stifling clouds yet kept it under,
But still it mutter’d to the sea beneath
Such a continued peal, as made us wonder
It did not pause more oft to take its breath,
Whilst we were panting with the sultry weather,
And hardly cared to wed two words together,

But watch’d the surly advent of the storm,
Much as the brown-cheek’d planters of Barbadoes
Must watch a rising of the Negro swarm:--
Meantime it steer’d, like Odin’s old Armadas,
Right on our coast;--a dismal, coal-black form;--
Many proud gaits were quell’d--and all bravadoes
Of folly ceased--and sundry idle jokers
Went home to cover up their tongs and pokers.

So fierce the lightning flashed. In all their days
The oldest smugglers had not seen such flashing,
And they are used to many a pretty blaze,
To keep their Hollands from an awkward clashing
With hostile cutters in our creeks and bays:--
And truly one could think without much lashing
The fancy, that those coasting clouds so awful
And black, were fraught with spirits as unlawful.

The gay Parade grew thin--all the fair crowd
Vanish’d--as if they knew their own attractions,--
For now the lightning through a near hand cloud
Began to make some very crooked fractions--
Only some few remain’d that were not cow’d,
A few rough sailors, who had been in actions,
And sundry boatmen, that with quick yeo’s,
Lest it should _blow_,--were pulling up the _Rose_:

(No flower, but a boat)--some more hauling
The _Regent_ by the head:--another crew
With that same cry peculiar to their _calling_--
Were heaving up the _Hope_:--and as they knew
The very gods themselves oft get a mauling
In their own realms, the seamen wisely drew
The _Neptune_ rather higher on the beach,
That he might lie beyond his billows’ reach.

And now the storm, with its despotic power
Had all usurp’d the azure of the skies,
Making our daylight darker by an hour,
And some few drops--of an unusual size--
Few and distinct--scarce twenty to the shower,
Fell like huge tear-drops from a Giant’s eyes--
But then this sprinkle thicken’d in a trice
And rain’d much _harder_--in good solid ice.

Oh! for a very storm of words to show
How this fierce crash of hail came rushing o’er us!
Handel would make the gusty organs blow
Grandly, and a rich storm in music score us!--
But ev’n his music seem’d composed and low,
When we were _handled_ by this Hailstone Chorus;
Whilst thunder rumbled, with its awful sound,
And frozen comfits roll’d along the ground--

As big as bullets:--Lord! how they did batter
Our crazy tiles:--And now the lightning flash’d
Alternate with the dark, until the latter
Was rarest of the two:--the gust too dash’d
So terribly, I thought the hail must shatter
Some panes,--and so it did--and first it smash’d
The very square where I had chose my station
To watch the general illumination.

Another, and another, still came in,
And fell in jingling ruin at my feet,
Making transparent holes that let me win
Some samples of the storm:--Oh! it was sweet
To think I had a shelter for my skin,
Culling them through these “loopholes of retreat”--
Which in a little we began to glaze--
Chiefly with a jacktowel and some baize!

By which, the cloud had pass’d o’erhead, but play’d
Its crooked fires in constant flashes still,
Just in our rear, as though it had array’d
Its heavy batteries at Fairlight Mill,
So that it lit the town, and grandly made
The rugged features of the Castle Hill
Leap, like a birth, from chaos, into light,
And then relapse into the gloomy night--

As parcel of the cloud:--the clouds themselves,
Like monstrous crags and summits everlasting,
Piled each on each in most gigantic shelves,
That Milton’s devils were engaged in blasting.--
We could e’en fancy Satan and his elves
Busy upon those crags, and ever casting
Huge fragments loose--and that we _felt_ the sound
They made in falling to the startled ground.

And so the tempest scowl’d away,--and soon,
Timidly shining through its skirts of jet,
We saw the rim of the pacific moon,
Like a bright fish entangled in a net,
Flashing its silver sides,--how sweet a boon,
Seem’d her sweet light, as though it would beget,
With that fair smile, a calm upon the seas--
Peace in the sky--and coolness in the breeze!

Meantime the hail had ceased:--and all the brood
Of glaziers stole abroad to count their gains;--
At every window, there were maids who stood
Lamenting o’er the glass’s small remains,--
Or with coarse linens made the fractious good,
Stanching the wind in all the wounded panes,--
Or, holding candles to the panes, in doubt:
The wind resolved--blowing the candles out.

No house was whole that had a southern front,--
No green-house but the same mishap befell:--
_Bow_-windows and _bell_-glasses bore the brunt,--
No sex in glass was spared!--For those who dwell
On each hill side, you might have swam a punt
In any of their parlours;--Mrs. Snell
Was slopp’d out of her seat,--and Mr. Hitchin
Had a _flow’r_-garden wash’d into a _Kitchen_.

But still the sea was mild, and quite disclaim’d
The recent violence.--Each after each
The gentle waves a gentle murmur framed,
Tapping, like Woodpeckers, the hollow beach.
Howbeit his _weather eye_ the seaman aim’d
Across the calm, and hinted by his speech
A gale next morning--and when morning broke
There was a gale--“quite equal to bespoke.”

Before high water--(it were better far
To christen it not _water_ then, but _waiter_,
For then the tide is _serving at the bar_)
Rose such a swell--I never saw one greater!
Black, jagged billows rearing up in war
Like ragged roaring bears against the baiter,
With lots of froth upon the shingle shed,
Like stout pour’d out with a fine _beachy head_.

No open boat was open to a fare,
Or launch’d that morn on seven-shilling trips;
No bathing woman waded--none would dare
A dipping in the wave--but waived their dips;
No seagull ventured on the stormy air,
And all the dreary coast was clear of ships;
For two _lea shores_ upon the river Lea
Are not so perilous as one at sea.

Awe-struck we sat, and gazed upon the scene
Before us in such horrid hurly-burly,--
A boiling ocean of mix’d black and green,
A sky of copper colour, grim and surly,--
When lo, in that vast hollow scoop’d between
Two rolling Alps of water,--white and curly!
We saw a pair of little arms a-skimming,
Much like a first or last attempt at swimming!

Sometimes a hand--sometimes a little shoe--
Sometimes a skirt--sometimes a hank of hair,
Just like a dabbled seaweed, rose to view,
Sometimes a knee, sometimes a back was bare--
At last a frightful summerset he threw
Right on the shingles. Any one could swear
The lad was dead--without a chance of perjury,
And batter’d by the surge beyond all surgery!

However, we snatch’d up the corse thus thrown,
Intending, Christian-like, to sod and turf it,
And after venting Pity’s sigh and groan,
Then Curiosity began with _her_ fit;
And lo! the features of the Small Unknown!
’Twas he that of the surf had had this surfeit!--
And in his fob, the cause of late monopolies!
We found a contract signed Mephistopheles!

A bond of blood, whereby the sinner gave
His forfeit soul to Satan in reversion,
Providing in this world he was to have
A lordship over luck, by whose exertion
He might control the course of cards, and brave
All throws of dice,--but on a sea excursion
The juggling Demon, in his usual vein,
Seized the last cast--and _Nick’d_ him in the _main_!

LINES

TO A LADY ON HER DEPARTURE FOR INDIA.

Go where the waves run rather Holborn-hilly,
And tempests make a soda-water sea,
Almost as rough as our rough Piccadilly,
And think of me!

Go where the mild Madeira ripens _her_ juice,--
A wine more praised that it deserves to be:
Go pass the Cape, just capable of ver-juice,
And think of me!

Go where the Tiger in the darkness prowleth
Making a midnight meal of he and she;
Go where the Lion in his hunger howleth,
And think of me!

Go where the serpent dangerously coileth,
Or lies along at full length like a tree,
Go where the Suttee in her own soot broileth,
And think of me!

Go where with human notes the Parrot dealeth
In mono-_polly_-logue with tongue as free,
And like a woman, all she can revealeth,
And think of me!

Go to the land of muslin and nankeening,
And parasols of straw where hats should be,
Go to the land of slaves and palankeening,
And think of me!

Go to the land of Jungles and of vast hills,
And tall bamboos--may none _bamboozle_ thee!
Go gaze upon their Elephants and Castles,
And think of me!

Go where a cook must always be a currier,
And parch the pepper’d palate like a pea,
Go where the fierce musquito is a worrier,
And think of me!

Go where the maiden on a marriage plan goes,
Consign’d for wedlock to Calcutta’s quay,
Where woman goes for mart, the same as mangoes,
And think of me!

Go where the sun is very hot and fervent,
Go to the land of pagod and rupee,
Where every black will be your slave and servant,
And think of me!

THE NELSON.

This here, your honour, upon wheels, is the true genuine real
_Nelson’s Car_.

GUIDE TO GREENWICH HOSPITAL.

“THE Nelson,” I repeated to myself, as I read that illustrious name on the dicky of the vehicle--“the Nelson.” My fancy instantly converted the coach into a first-rate, the leaders and wheelers into sea-horses, the driver into Neptunus, brandishing a trident, and the guard into a Triton blowing his wreathed shell. There was room for one on the box, so I climbed up, and took my seat beside the coachman. “Now, clap on all sail,” said I, audibly, “I am proud to be one of the crew of the great Nelson, the hero of Aboukir.”

“Begging your pardon, Sir,” said the coachman, “the Hero ain’t a booker at Mrs. Nelson’s: it goes from some other yard.” Gracious powers! what a tumble down stairs for an idea! As for mine, it pitched on its head, as stunned and stupefied as if it had rolled down the whole flight at the Monument. “I have made a Bull, indeed,” I exclaimed, as the noted inn at Aldgate occurred to my memory; “but we are the slaves of association,” I continued, addressing the coachman, “and the name of Nelson identified itself with the Union Jack.”

“I really can’t say,” replied the coachman, very civilly, “whether the name of Mrs. Nelson is down to the Slave Associations or not: but as for Jack, if you mean Jack Bunce, he’s been off the Union these six months. Too fond of the _Bar_, Sir” (here he tipped me the most significant of winks), “to keep his seat on the _Bench_.”

“I alluded, my good fellow, to Nelson, the wonder of the maritime world--the dauntless leader when yard was opposed to yard, and seas teemed with blood.”

“We’re all right--as right as a trivet,” said the coachman, after a pause of perplexity; “I thought our notions were getting rather wide apart, and that one of us wanted putting straight; but I see what you mean, and quite go along with your opinion, step for step. To be sure, Mrs. Nelson has done the world and all for coaching; and the Wonder _is_ the crack of all the drags in London, and so is the Dauntless, let yard turn out agin yard, as you say, any day you like. And as for leaders, and teams full of blood, there’s as pretty a sprinkling of blood in the tits I’m now tooling of--”

“The vehicles of the proprietress, and the appearance of the animals, with their corresponding caparisons,” said I, “have often gratified my visual organs and elicited my mental plaudits.”

“That’s exactly what _I_ says,” replied the coachman, very briskly, “there’s no humbug nor no nonsense about Mrs. Nelson. You never see her a standing a-foaming and fretting in front o’ the Bank, with a regular mob round her, and looking as if she’d bolt with the Quicksilver. And you never see her painted all over her body, wherever there’s room for ’em, with Saracen Heads, and Blue Boars, and Brown Bears, from her roller bolts to her dicky and hind boot. She’s plain and neat, and nothin’ else--and is fondest of having her body of a claret colour, pick’d out with white, and won’t suffer the Bull, no where, except on the back-gammon board.”

I know not how much further the whimsical description might have gone, if a strapping, capless, curly-headed lass, running with all her might and main, had not addressed a screaming retainer to the coachman. With some difficulty he pulled up, for he had been tacitly giving me a proof that the craft of _his_ Nelson was a first-rate, with regard to its rate of travelling.

“If you please, Mr. Stevens,” said the panting damsel, holding up something towards the box--“if you please, Mr. Stevens, mother’s gone to Lonnon--in the light cart--and will you be so kind as to give her--her linchpin.”

Mr. Stevens took the article with a smile, and I fancied with a sly squeeze of the hand that delivered it.

“If such a go had been anyone’s but your mother’s, Fanny,” he slyly remarked, “I should have said it was somebody in love.” The Dispatch was too strictly timed to allow of further parley; the horses broke, or were rather broken, into a gallop, in pursuit of the mother of Fanny, the Flower of Waltham; and the pin secretly acting as a spur, we did the next five mile in something like twenty minutes.

In spite, however, of this unusual speed, we never overtook Mrs. Merryweather and her cart till we arrived at the Basing-House, where we found her chirping over a cup of ale; as safe and sound as if linchpins had never been invented; in fact, she made as light of the article, when it was handed to her, as if it had been only a pin out of her gown!

“Well, I must say one thing for Mrs. Nelson,” said our coachman, as he resumed his seat on the box, “and that’s this. There’s no pinning at the Bull. She sets her face against everything but the patent boxes. She may come to a runaway with a bolter--or drop the ribbons--or make a mistake in clearing a gate, by being a little lushy--but you’ll never see Mrs. Nelson lying flat on her side in the middle of the road, with her insides gone to smash, and her outsides well distributed, because she’s been let go out of the yard without one of her pins.”

SONNET

TO A SCOTCH GIRL, WASHING LINEN AFTER HER COUNTRY FASHION.

WELL done and wetly, thou Fair Maid of Perth,
Thou mak’st a washing picture well deserving
The pen and pencilling of Washington Irving:
Like dripping Naiad, pearly from her birth,
Dashing about the water of the Firth,
To cleanse the calico of Mrs. Skirving,
And never from thy dance of duty swerving
As there were nothing else than dirt on earth!
Yet what is thy reward? Nay, do not start!
I do not mean to give thee a new damper,
But while thou fillest this industrious part
Of washer, wearer, mangler, presser, stamper,
Deserving better character--thou art
What Bodkin would but call--“a common tramper.”

MY APOLOGY.

GENTLE READERS,

For the present month, there must be what Dr. Johnson called a solution of continuity in my “Literary Reminiscences.” Confined to my chamber by what ought to be termed _room_atism--then attacked by my old livery complaint--and finally, by a minor, but troublesome malady, the Present has too much prevailed over the Past, to let me indulge in any retrospective reviews. In such cases, on the stage, when a Performer is unable to support his character, a substitute is usually found to read the part; but, unfortunately, in the present case there is no part written, and consequently it cannot be read. But apropos of theatricals--there is an anecdote on point.

In the Olympic days of the great Elliston, there was one evening a tremendous tumult at his Theatre, in consequence of the absence of a favourite performer. One man in the pit--a Butcher--was especially vociferous in his cry for “Carl! Carl! Carl!” Others called for the Manager, who duly made his appearance, and black as the weather looked, he was the very sort of pilot to weather the storm. With one of his princely bows he proceeded to address the House. “Ladies and Gentlemen--but by your leave I will address myself to a single individual. I will ask that gentleman (pointing to the vociferous Butcher) what right he has to demand the appearance of Mr. Carl?”

“’Cos,” said the Butcher, “’cos he’s down in the Bill.” Such an undeniable answer would have staggered any other Manager than Elliston, but he was not easily to be disconcerted. “Because he is down in the bill!” he echoed, in a tone of the loftiest indignation: “Ladies and Gentlemen, the Mr. Carl, so unseasonably, so vociferously and so unfeelingly called for, is at this very moment labouring under severe illness--he is in bed. And let me ask, is a man, a fellow-creature, a human being, to be torn from his couch, from his home, on a cold night, from the affectionate attentions of his wife and family, at the risk of his valuable life perhaps, to go through a fatiguing part because he happens to be DOWN IN THE BILL?” [Cries of “Shame, shame!” from all parts of the house.] “And yet, ladies and gentlemen, there stands a man--if I may call him so--a Butcher, that for his own selfish gratification--the amusement of a few short hours--would risk the very existence of a deserving member of society, a good husband, father, friend, and one of your favourite actors, and all, forsooth, because he is DOWN IN THE BILL!” [Universal hooting, with cries of “Turn him out.”] “By all means,” acquiesced the Manager, with one of his best bows--and the indignant pittites actually hooted and kicked their own champion out of the theatre, as something more than a Butcher, and less than a Christian.

Now I am myself, gentle readers, in the same predicament with Mr. Carl. Like him I am an invalid--and like him I am unfortunately down in the Bill. It would not become me to set forth my own domestic or social virtues, or to hint what sort of gap my loss would make in society--still less would it consist with modesty to compare myself with a favourite actor--but as a mere human being I throw myself on your mercy, and ask, in common charity, would you have had me leave my warm bed, to shiver in a printer’s damp sheets, at the risk of my reputation perhaps, and for the mere amusement of some half hour, or more probably for no amusement at all--simply because I was “_down in the Bill_?”

But there is no such Butcher, or Butcheress, or little Butcherling, amongst you; and by your good leave and patience, the instalment of my Reminiscences that is over due, shall be paid with interest in the NEXT NUMBER.

SONNET TO A DECAYED SEAMAN.

HAIL! seventy-four cut down! Hail, Top and Lop!
Unless I’m much mistaken in my notion,
Thou wast a stirring Tar, before that hop
Became so fatal to thy locomotion;--
Now, thrown on shore, like a mere weed of ocean,
Thou readest still to men a lesson good,
To King and Country showing thy devotion,
By kneeling thus upon a stump of wood!
Still is thy spirit strong as alcohol;
Spite of that limb, begot of acorn-egg,--
Methinks,--thou Naval History in one Vol.--
A virtue shines, e’en in that timber leg,
For unlike others that desert their Poll,
Thou walkest ever with thy “Constant Peg!”

THE GREAT CONFLAGRATION.

_Dreadful Fire--Destruction of both Houses of Parliament--The Speaker’s House gutted--Reports of Incendiarism._

IT is our unexpected lot to announce that the Houses of Lords and Commons, so often threatened with combustion, are in a state of actual ignition. At this moment, both fabrics are furiously burning. We are writing this paragraph without the aid of lamp or candles; by the mere reflection of the flames. Nothing is known of the origin of the fire, although it is throwing a light upon everything else.--_Evening Star._

The devouring element which destroyed Covent Garden and Drury Lane, the Royalty and the Pantheon, has made its appearance on a new stage, equally devoted to declamatory elocution. St. Stephen’s Chapel is in flames! The floor which was trodden by the eloquent legs of a Fox, a Burke, a Pitt, and a Sheridan, is reduced to a heap of ashes; and the benches which sustained the Demosthenic weight of a Wyndham, a Whitbread, and a Wilberforce, are a mere mass of charcoal. The very roof that re-echoed the classicalities of Canning is nodding to its fall. In Parliamentary language, Fire is in possession of the House: the Destructive spirit is on its legs, and the Conservative principle can offer but a feeble opposition.--_Daily Post._

The blow is struck. What we have long foreseen has come to pass. Incendiarism triumphs! The whole British Empire, as represented by the three estates, is in a blaze! The Throne, the Lords, and the Commons, are now burning. The cycle is complete. The spirit of Guy Fawkes revives in 1834!

England seems to have changed places with Italy; London with Naples. We stand hourly on the brink of a crater; every step we take is on a solfaterra--not a land of Sol Fa, as some musical people would translate it; but a frail crust, with a treacherous subsoil of ardent brimstone! At length the eyes of our rulers are opened; but we must ask, could nothing short of such an eruption awaken them to a sense of the perilous state of the country? For weeks, nay, months past, at the risk of being considered alarmists, we have called the attention of the legislature and magistracy to a variety of suspicious symptoms and signs of the times, and in particular to the multiplied chemical inventions, for the purpose of obtaining instantaneous lights. Well are certain matches or fire-boxes called Lucifers, for they may be applied to the most diabolical purposes! The origin of the fire cannot raise the shadow of a doubt in any reasonable mind. Accident is out of the question. Tell us not of tallies. We have just tried our milk-woman’s, and it contained so much water, that nothing could make it ignite.--_Britannic Guardian_.

The Houses of Parliament are in flames. We shall stop the press to give full particulars. Our reporters are at the spot, and Mons. C----, the celebrated Salamander, is engaged to give a description of the blazing _interiors_, exclusively for this journal.--_Daily Times._

_From a Correspondent._

On Thursday evening, towards seven o’clock, I was struck by the singular appearance of the moon silvering the opposite chimneys with a blood-red light, a lunar phenomenon, which I conceived belonged only to our theatres. It speedily occurred to me that there must be a conflagration in my vicinity, and after a little hunting by scent as well as sight, I found myself in front of the Houses of Lords and Commons, which were burning with a rapidity and brilliancy that I make bold to say did not always characterise their proceedings. By favour of my natural assurance, which seemed to identify me with the firemen, I was allowed to pass through the lines of guards and policemen, who surrounded the blazing pile, and was thus enabled to select a favourable position for overlooking the whole scene. It was an imposing sight. The flames rose from the Peers’ in a volume, as red as the Extraordinary Red Book, and the House of Commons was not at all behind-hand in voting supplies of timber and other combustibles. Westminster Hall reminded me vividly of a London cry, “Hall hot, Hall hot,” that was familiar in our childhood--and the Gothic architecture of the Abbey seemed unusually _florid_. Instead of dingy stone, the venerable pile appeared to be built of the well-baked brick of the Elizabethan age. Indeed, so red-hot was its aspect, that it led to a ludicrous misapprehension on the part of the populace. A procession, bearing several male and female figures in a state of insensibility, naturally gave rise to the most painful conjectures, inferring loss of human life by the devouring element, but I have reason to believe it was only the Dean and Chapter saving the Wax-Work. As far as my own observation went, the first object carried out certainly bore a strong resemblance to General Monk.

In the meantime a select party had effected an entrance into the Hall, but not without some serious delay, occasioned, I believe, by somebody within bringing the wrong key, that belonged to a tea-caddy. However, at last they entered, and I followed their example. The first person I beheld was the veteran Higginbottom, so unfairly, but facetiously, put to death by the authors of the Rejected Addresses; for no man is more alive to his duty. But he was sadly hampered. First came one Hon. Gent. said to be Mr. Morrison, and insisted on directing the _Hose_ department; and next arrived a noble Lord from Crockford’s, who wouldn’t sit out, but persisted in taking a hand, and playing, though every body agreed that he played too high. I mention this, because some of the journals have imputed mismanagement to the engines, and have insinuated that the pipes wanted organising; indeed, I myself overheard a noble director of the Academy of Music lamenting that the firemen did not “play in concert.”

The same remark applies with greater force to the House of Commons. Here all was confusion worse confounded, and Higginbottom’s station was enviable, compared with that of some of the poor fellows in St. Stephen’s Chapel. A considerable number of members had arrived, and without any attention to their usual parliamentary rules, were all making motions at once, which nobody seconded. The most prominent, I was informed, were Mr. Hume, Mr. O’Connell, Mr. Attwood, Mr. Buckingham, Mr. Pease, Sir Andrew, and Mr. Buxton--the latter almost covered with blacks. The clamour was terrific, and I really expected that the poor foremen who held the pipes would be torn in pieces. Every body wanted to command the Coldstream. Nothing but shouts of “Here! here! here!” answered like an Irish echo by cries of “There! there! there!” “Oh, save my savings!”--“My poor, Poor Bill!” “More water--more water for my Drunkenness!” “Work awa, lads, work awa--it’s no the Sabbath, and ye may just play at what ye like!”

In pleasing contrast to this tumult, was the unusual and cordial unanimity of the members of both Houses, in rescuing whatever was portable from the flames. It was a delightful novelty to see the Lords helping the Commons in whatever they moved or carried. No party spirit--no Whig, pulling at one leg of the table, whilst a Tory tugged at another in the opposite direction. They seemed to belong to the Hand-in-Hand. Peers and Commoners were alike seen burthened with loads of papers or furniture. Mr. Calvert, in particular, worked like any porter. Of course, in rescuing the papers and parchments, there was no time for inspecting their contents, and some curious results were the consequence. Every body remembers the pathetic story in the Tatler, of the lover who saved a strange lady from a burning theatre, under the idea that he was preserving the mistress of his affections, and some similar mistakes are currently reported to have occurred at the late conflagration--and equally to the chagrin of the parties. I go by hearsay, and cannot vouch for the facts, but it is said that the unpopular Six Acts, including what I believe is called the Gagging Act, were actually preserved by Mr. Cobbett. Mr. O’Connell saved the Irish Coercion Bill, whilst the Reform Bill was snatched like “a brand out of the fire,” by a certain noble Duke, who resolutely set his face against it in all its stages! Amongst others, Mr. Ricardo saved an old tattered flag, which he thought was “the standard of value.”

However deficient in general combination, and concentration of energies, individual efforts were beyond all praise. The instances of personal exertion and daring were numerous. Mr. Rice worked amidst the flames till he was nearly baked; and everybody expected that Mr. Pease would be parched. The greatest danger was from the melted metal pouring down from the windows and roof. The heads of some of the Hon. Gentlemen were literally nothing but lead. Great apprehensions were entertained of the falling in of one of the walls, which eventually gave way, but fortunately everybody had retreated on the timely warning of a gentleman, Mr. O’Connell, I believe, who declared that he saw a Rent in it.

I did not enter the House of Lords, which was now one mass of glowing fire, but directed my attention towards the Speaker’s mansion, which was partially burning. The garden behind was nearly filled with miscellaneous property--and numbers of well-dressed gentlemen were every moment rushing into the house, from which they issued again, laden with spits, sauce-pans, and other culinary implements. I, myself, saw one zealous individual thus encumbered--with a stew-pan on his head, the meat-screen under one arm, the dripping-pan under the other, the frying-pan in his right hand, the grid-iron in his left, and the rolling-pin in his mouth. Indeed, it is said that every article in the kitchen was saved down to the salt-box; and the cook declares that such was the anxiety to save her she was “cotched up in twelve gentlemen’s arms, and never felt her feet till the corner of Abingdon Street.”

The whole of the Foot Guards were in attendance, as well as a great number of the police, but the thieves had mustered in great force, and there was a good deal of plundering, which was however checked temporarily by a gentleman said to be one of the members and magistrates for Essex, who jumped up on a railing and addressed the populace to the following effect, “How do you hall dare!”

The origin of the fire is involved in much mystery; nor is it correctly ascertained by whom it was first discovered. Some say that one of the serjeants, in taking up the insignia, was astonished to find the mace as hot as ginger. Others relate that a Mr. Spell, or Shell, or Snell, whilst viewing the House, although no dancer, began suddenly, and in his boots, to the utter amazement of his companions and Mrs. Wright, the housekeeper, to jump and caper like a bear upon a hotted floor. This story certainly seems to countenance a report that the mischief originated in the warming apparatus, an opinion that is very current, but, for my own part, I cannot conceive that the Collective Wisdom, which knows how to lay down laws for us all, should not know how to lay down flues. Rumours of Incendiarism are also very generally prevalent, and stories are in circulation of the finding of half-burnt matches and other combustibles. But these facts rest on very frail foundations. The links said to have been found in the Speaker’s garden have turned out to be nothing but German sausages; and another cock-and-a-bull that has got abroad will probably come to no better end. A Mr. Dudley affirms that he smelt the fire before it broke out, at Cooper’s Hill; but such olfactories are too much like manufactories to be believed.

I am, Sir, your most obedient Servant,
X. Y. Z.

_Another Account._

The writer of these lines, who resides in Lambeth, was first awakened to a sense of conflagration by a cry of “Fire” from a number of persons who were running in the direction of Westminster Bridge. Owning myself a warm enthusiast on the subject of ignition, and indeed not having missed a fire for the last fifty years, except one, and that was only a chimney, it may be supposed the exclamation in question had an electric effect. We are all the slaves of some physical bias, strange as it may appear to others with opposite tendencies. It is recorded of some great marshal that he disliked music, but testified the liveliest pleasure at a salvo of artillery or a roll of thunder, and the rumble of an engine has the same effect on the author of these lines. To say I am a guebre, or fire-worshipper, is only to confess the truth. I have a sort of observatory erected on the roof of my house, from which, if there be a break-out within the circuit of the metropolis, it may be discovered, and before going to bed I invariably visit this look-out.

Every man has his hobby-horse, and, figuratively speaking, mine was always kept harnessed and ready to run to a fire with the first engine. Many a time I have arrived before the turncocks, though I perhaps had to traverse half London, and I scarcely remember an instance that I did not appear long before the water. Habit is second nature--I verily believe I could sniff a conflagration by instinct; and if I was not, I ought to have been, the trainer of the firemen’s dog, which at present attracts so much of the public attention, by his eager running along with the Sun, the Globe, the British, and the Hand-in-Hand.

Of course I have seen a great many fires in my time--Rotherhithe, the theatres, the Custom-house, &c. &c. I remember in the days of Thistlewood and Co., when the metropolis was expected to be set on fire, I slept for three weeks in my clothes in order to be ready for the first alarm; for I had the good fortune to witness the great riots of 1780, when no less than eight fires were blazing at once, and a lamentable sight it was. I say lamentable, because it was impossible to be present at them all at the same time; but my good genius directed me to Langdale’s the Distiller, which made (excuse the vulgar popular phrase) a very satisfactory flare-up.

The Rotherhithe fire, not the recent little job, but some fifteen or twenty years ago, was also on a grand scale, and very lasting. The engine-pipes were wilfully cut; and I remember some of my friends rallying me on my well-known propensity, jocularly accusing me of lending my knife and my assistance. The Custom-house was a disappointment; it certainly cleared itself effectually, but it was done by day-light, and consequently the long-room fell short of my anticipations. Drury-lane and Covent-garden were better: but I have observed generally that theatres burn with more attention to stage effect. They avoid the noon; a dark night to a fire is like the black letters in a benefit-bill, setting off the red ones.

The destruction of the Kent Indiaman I should like to have witnessed, but contrary to the opinion of many experienced amateurs I conceive the Dartford Mills must have been a failure. Powder magazines make very indifferent conflagrations; they are no sooner on fire than they are off,--all is over before you know where you are, and there is no getting under, which quite puts you out. But fires, generally, are not what they used to be. What with gas, and new police, steam, and one cause or other, they have become what one might call slow explosions. A body of flame bursts from all the windows at once, and before B 25 can call fi-er in two syllables, the roof falls in, and all is over. It was not so in _my_ time. First a little smoke would issue from a window-shutter, like the puff of a cigar, and after a long spring of his rattle, the rheumatic watchman had time to knock double and treble knocks, from No. 9 to No. 35, before a spark made its appearance out of the chimney-pot. The Volunteers had time to assemble under arms, and muffle their drums, and the bell-ringers to collect in the belfry, and pull an alarm peal backwards. The parish engines even, although pulled along by the pursy churchwardens, and the paralytic paupers, contrived to arrive before the fire fairly broke out in the shape of a little squib-like eruption from the garret-window. The affrighted family, fourteen in number, all elaborately drest in their best Sunday clothes, saved themselves by the street-door, according to seniority, the furniture was carefully removed, and after an hour’s pumping, the fire was extinguished without extending beyond the room where it originated, namely a bed-room on the second floor. Such was the progress _in my time_ of a fire, but it is the fashion now to sacrifice everything to _pace_. Look at our race-horses, and look at our fox-hounds,--and I will add look at our conflagrations. All that is cared for is a burst--no matter how short, if it be but rapid. The devouring element never sits down now to a regular meal--it pitches on a house and _bolts_ it.

But I am wandering from the point. The announcement of both Houses of Parliament being in flames thrilled through every fibre. It seemed to promise what I may call a crowning event to the Conflagrationary Reminiscences of an Octogenarian. I snatched up my hat, and rushed into the street, at eighty years of age, with the alacrity of eighteen, when I ran from Highgate to Horselydown, to be present at the gutting of a ship chandler’s. As the bard says--

“Ev’n in our ashes live their wonted _fires_,”

and I could almost have supposed myself a fireman belonging to the Phœnix. My first step into the street discouraged me, the moonlight was so brilliant, and in such cases the most splendid blaze is somewhat “shorn of its beams.” But a few steps reassured me. Even at the Surrey side of the river the sparks and burning particles were falling like flakes of snow--I mean of course the red snow formerly discovered by Captain Ross, and the light was so great that I could have read the small print of the Police Gazette with the greatest ease, only I don’t take it in. I of course made the best of my way towards the scene, but the crowd was already so dense that I could only attain a situation on the Strand opposite Cotton Gardens, up to my knees in mud. Both Houses of Parliament were at this time in a blaze, and no doubt presented as striking objects of conflagration as the metropolis could offer. I say, “no doubt,”--forgetting jammed against a barge with my back towards the fire, I am unable to state anything on my own authority as an eye-witness, excepting that the buildings on the Surreyside exhibited a glowing reflection for some hours. At last the flowing of the tide caused the multitude to retreat, and releasing me from my retrospective position allowed me to gaze upon the ruins. By what I hear, it was a most imposing sight--but in spite of my Lord Althorpe, I cannot help thinking that Westminster Hall, with its long range, would have made up an admirable fire. Neither can I agree with the many that it was an Incendiary Act, that passed through both houses so rapidly. To enjoy the thing, a later hour and a darker night would certainly have been chosen. Fire-light and moon-light do not _mix well_:--they are best _neat_.

I am, Sir, Yours, &c.,
SENEX.

_Various Accounts._

WE are concerned to state that Sir Jacob Jubb the new member for Shrops was severely burnt, by taking his seat in the House, on a bench that was burning under him. The danger of his situation was several times pointed out to him, but he replied that his seat had cost him ten thousand pounds, and he wouldn’t quit. He was at length removed by force.--_Morning Ledger._

A great many foolish anecdotes of the fire are in circulation. One of our contemporaries gravely asserts that the Marquis of Culpepper was the last person who left the South Turret, a fact we beg leave to question, for the exquisite reason that noble lord alluded to is at present at Constantinople.--_The Real Sun._

We are enabled to state that the individual who displayed so much coolness in the South Turret was Captain Back.--_The Public Journal._

It is said that considerable interest was evinced by the members of the House of Commons who were present at the fire, as to the fate of their respective Bills. One honourable gentleman, in particular, was observed anxiously watching the last scintillations of some burnt paper. “Oh, my Sabbath Observances!” he exclaimed, “There’s an end of religion! There go the Parson and Clerk!”--_Public Diary._

The Earl of M. had a very narrow escape. His lordship was on the point of kicking a bucket when a labourer rushed forward and snatched it out of the way. The individual’s name is M’Farrel. We understand he is a sober, honest, hard-working man, and has two wives, and a numerous family; the eldest not above a year old.--_Daily Chronicle._

The exclamation of a noble lord, high in office, who was very active at the fire, has been very incorrectly given. The words were as follows:--“Blow the Commons! let ’em flare up--but oh,--for a save-all! a save-all.”--_Morning News._

The public attention has been greatly excited by the extraordinary statement of a commercial gentleman, that he smelt the fire at the Cock and Bottle, in Coventry. He asserts that he mentioned the fact in the commercial room to a deaf gentleman, and likewise to a dumb waiter, but neither have any recollection of the circumstance. He has been examined before the Common Council, who have elicited that he actually arrived at Coventry on the night in question, by the Tallyho, and the near leader of that coach has been sent for by express.--_New Monitor._

We were in error in stating that the Atlas was the first engine at the scene of action. So early as five o’clock Mr. Alderman A. arrived with his own garden engine, and began immediately to play upon the Thames.--_British Guardian._

It must have struck everyone who witnessed the operations in the House of Commons, that there was a lamentable want of “order! order! order!” A great many gentlemen succeeded in making pumps of themselves, without producing any check on the flames. The conduct of the military also was far from unexceptionable. On the arrival of the Coldstream at the fire they actually refused to fall in. Many declined to stand at ease on the burning rafters--but what is the public interest to a private?--_Public Advertiser._

_Monsieur C.’s Account. (Exclusive.)_

WHEN I am come first to the fire it was not long burnt up; and I was oblige to walk up and down the floor to keep myself warm. At last, I take my seat on the stove, quite convenient to look about. In the House of Commons there was nobody, and I am all alone. The first thing I observe was a great many rats, ratting about--but they did not known which way to turn. So they were all burnt dead. The flames grew very fast; and I am interested very much with the seats, how they burned, quite different from one another. Some seats made what you call a great splutter, and popped and bounced, and some other seats made no noise at all. Mr. Bulwer’s place burned of a blue colour; Mr. Buckstone’s turned quite black; and there was one made a flame the colour of a drab. I observe one green flame and one orange, side by side, and they hiss and roar at one another very furious. The gallery cleared itself quite quickly, and the seat of Messieurs the reporters, exploded itself like a cannon of forty-eight pounds. The speaking chair burnt without any sound at all.

When everything is quite done in the Commons I leave them off, and go to the House of Lords, where the fire was all in one sheet, and almost the whole of its inside burnt out. I was able in this room to take off my great coat. I could find nothing to be saved except one great ink-stand, that was red hot, and which I carry away in my two hands. Likewise here, as well as in the Commons, I bottled up several bottles of smoke, to distribute afterwards, at five guineas a-piece, and may be more; for I know the English people admire such things, and are fond after reliques, like a madness almost. I did not make a long stop, for whenever I was visible, the pompiers was so foolish as play water upon me, and I was afraid of a catch-cold. In fact, when I arrive at home, I find myself stuffed in my head, and fast in my chest, and my throat was a little horse. I am going for it into a bath of boiling water, and cannot write any more at full length.

_A Letter to a Labouring Man._

BUSHELL,

When you made a holiday last Whitsuntide to see the Sights of London, in your way to the Waxwork and Westminster Abbey, you probably noticed a vast pile of buildings in Palace Yard, and you stood and scratched that shock head of yours, and wondered whose fine houses they were. Seeing you to be a country clodpole, no doubt some well-dressed vagabond, by way of putting a hoax upon the hawbuck, told you that in those buildings congregated all the talent, all the integrity and public spirit of the country--that beneath those roofs the best and wisest, and the most honest men to be found in three kingdoms, met to deliberate and enact the most wholesome, and just, and judicious laws for the good of the nation. He called them the oracles of our constitution, the guardians of our rights, and the assertors of our liberties. Of course, Bushell, you were told all this; but nobody told you, I dare say, that within those walls your master had lifted up his voice, and delivered the only sound, rational, and wholesome, upright, and able speeches that were ever uttered in St. Stephen’s Chapel. No, nobody told you that. But when I come home, Bushell, I will lend you all my printed speeches, and when you have spelt them, and read them, and studied them, and got them by heart, bumpkin as you are, Bushell, you will know as much of legislation as all our precious members together.

Well, Bushell, the fine houses you stood gaping at are burnt down, gutted, as the vulgar call it, and nothing is left but the bare walls. You saw Farmer Gubbins’ house, or, at least, the shell of it, after the fire there: well, the Parliament Houses are exactly in the same state. There is news for you! and now, Bushell, how do you feel? Why, if the well-dressed vagabond told you the truth, you feel as if you had had a stroke--for all the British Constitution is affected, and you are a fraction of it, that is to say, a British subject. Your bacon grows rusty in your mouth, and your table-beer turns to vinegar on your palate. You cannot sleep at night, or work by day. You have no heart for anything. You can hardly drag one clouted shoe after another. And how do you look? Why, as pale as a parsnip, and as thin as a hurdle, and your carroty locks stand bolt upright as if you had just met old Lawson’s ghost with his head under his arm. I say thus you must feel and look, Bushell, if what the well-dressed vagabond told you is the truth. But is that the case? No. You drink your small-beer with a sigh and smack of delight; and you bolt your bacon with a relish, as if, as the virtuous Americans say, you could “go the whole hog.” Your clouted shoes clatter about as if you were counting hobnails with the Lord Mayor, and you work like a young horse, or an old ass, and at night you snore like an oratorio of jews’ harps. Your face is as bold and ruddy as the Red Lion’s. Your carroty locks lie sleek upon your poll, and as for poor old Lawson’s ghost, you could lend him flesh and blood enough to set him up again in life. But what, say you, does all this tend to? I will tell you, Bushell. There are a great many well-dressed vagabonds, besides the one you met in Palace Yard, who would persuade a poor man that a House of Lords or Commons is as good to him as his bread, beer, beef, bacon, bed, and breeches; and therefore I address this to you, Bushell, to set such notions to rights by an appeal to your own back and belly. And now I will tell you what you shall do. You shall go three nights a week to the Red Lion (when your work is done), and you may score up a pint of beer, at my cost, each time. And when the parson, or the exciseman, or the tax-gatherer, or any such gentry, begin to talk of that deplorable great burning, and the national calamity, and such-like trash, you shall pull out my letter and read to them--I say, Bushell, you shall read this letter to them, twice over, loudly and distinctly, and tell them from me, that the burning of twenty Parliament Houses wouldn’t be such a national calamity as a fire at No. 1, Bolt Court.

PRIVATE CORRESPONDENCE.

_To Mary Price, Fenny Hall, Lincolnshire._

O Mary,--I am writing in such a quiver, with my art in my mouth, and my tung sticking to it. For too hole hours Ive bean Doin nothink but taking on and going off, I mean into fits, or crying and blessing goodness for my miraclus escape. This day week I wear inwallopped in flams, and thinkin of roth to cum, and fire evverlasting. But thenks to Diving Providings, hear I am, althowgh with loss of wan high brew scotched off, a noo cap and my rite shew. But I hav bean terrifid to deth. Wen I was ate, or it mite be nine, I fell on the stow, and hav had a grate dred of fire evver since. Gudge then how low I felt at the idear of burning along with the Lords and Communer’s. It as bean a Warnin, and never, no, never never never agin will I go to Clandestiny parties behind Mississis backs. I now see my errer, but temtashun prevaled, tho the clovin fut of the Wicked Wan had a hand in it all: Oh Mary, down on yure marrybones, and bless yure stars for sitiating you in a loanly stooped poky place, wear you cant be lead into liteness and gayty, if you was evver so inclind. Fore wipping willies and a windmill is a dullish luck out, shure enuff, but its better then moor ambishus prospex, and stairing at a grate fire, like a suckin pig, till yure eyes is reddy to drop out of yure hed!