Poetry of the Anti-jacobin

EDITIONS OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN; AND ITS SUCCESSORS.

The Anti-Jacobin, or Weekly Examiner. Sparsosque recolligit ignes. From Nov. 20, 1797, to July 9, 1798. 4to.

Nos. 1 to 36; with a Prospectus (complete).

—— The Same. Second and third editions, in 4to.

—— The Same. Fourth edition, revised and corrected. 2 vols. 8vo.

Every Number contained Poetry, the presumed Names of the Authors of which will be found in the Table of Contents of the present volume.

The Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin. 4to.

This volume includes the whole of the Poetry contained in the original Anti-Jacobin, with a few verbal corrections. Previous to its publication, it was announced that it would be illustrated by 40 plates expressly designed by Gillray; but they never appeared. Numerous editions in 12mo subsequently appeared, but without any additions, till those mentioned below.

The Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin. A New Edition, with Explanatory Notes by Charles Edmonds. 12mo.

—— The Same. Second edition, by Charles Edmonds; with additional Notes, the original Prospectus (by the Rt. Hon. G. Canning), and a complete List of the Authors. Illustrated by six etchings after the designs of Jas. Gillray. 12mo.

The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine; or Monthly Political and Literary Censor. From the commencement in July, 1798, to its close in 1821. (The first few vols. contain engravings by Gillray and others, and much Poetry is scattered through the volumes.) 61 vols. 8vo.

For reasons stated on a previous page, Canning and other political friends of Pitt thought it prudent to withdraw themselves from the original Anti-Jacobin, but by a preconcerted arrangement it was determined that the spirit which had pervaded that work, and which had had so powerful an effect on the popular mind, and thereby, in connection with Gillray’s caricatures, so undoubtedly strengthened the hands of the Ministry, should not die, if it could be kept alive by other and congenial writers. In the words of Mr. Fox Bourne (in his valuable work on English Newspapers, 1887): “Though The Anti-Jacobin made its last appearance on July 9, 1798, there was started a few days before a monthly Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine of the same politics, but much less brilliant, and more ponderous. Strange to say, it also was edited by a Gifford, or one who so called himself. John Richards Green was a bold and versatile adventurer, who, having to fly from his creditors in 1782, returned from France in 1788, as John Gifford, and was connected with several newspapers [including the establishment of The British Critic], besides editing The Anti-Jacobin Review. [He also wrote a History of France, and other works.] Befriended in xviiimany ways by Pitt, he wrote a four-volume pamphlet [3 vols. 4to, and also 6 vols. 8vo, both dated 1809], styled the Life of William Pitt, after his patron’s death. James Mill, the friend and associate of Jeremy Bentham, was glad to earn money in his struggling days by writing non-political articles for The Anti-Jacobin Review. William Gifford, it is hardly necessary to state, besides editing Ben Jonson’s Works, and other useful occupations, was the first editor of The Quarterly Review in 1809.”

In the British Museum are two copies of The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine. In one of them the first six vols. contain the Names of the Authors of most of the articles, among whom are the Rev. John Whitaker, author of The History of Manchester, the Rev. Sam. Henshall, author of works on Domesday Book, the Rev. C. E. Stewart, a copious poetaster, etc., and many other clergymen.

The New Anti-Jacobin Review. Delenda est Carthago.

Nos. 1 to 3 seem to be all that were published, and appeared May 6, June 9, and June 23, 1827; price two shillings each.

No. 2 includes what is called a Patriot Portrait Exhibition, which is continued in No. 3. In the latter No. is also an article entitled Canningiana. Published by Saunders and Otley.

The New Anti-Jacobin; a Monthly Magazine of Politics, Commerce, Science, Literature, Art, Music, and the Drama.

Consists of only Nos. 1 and 2. Published by Smith, Elder, & Co., and Carpenter & Son; dated respectively April and May, 1833.

No. 2 contains Horace in Parliament; an Ode to William Cobbett; being a Parody on Horace—In Barinen, Ode 4, Lib. 2. It is accompanied by a full-length portrait of Cobbett.

The above two works, in accordance with their titles, advocate high Tory principles; but though written with great spirit they had but a very short existence. Copies of both will be found in the British Museum.

English Actors in the French Revolution, and Eye-witnesses of the same.

The most complete details hitherto furnished on these interesting subjects will be found in the Nos. for October, 1887, and July, 1888, of The Edinburgh Review, the work of Mr. John G. Alger, the Paris correspondent of The Times. They have since been published in a volume. (Englishmen in the French Revolution: Low & Co., 1889.)

CONTENTS OF THE POETRY OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN, WITH THE NAMES OF THE AUTHORS.

The following notices of the writers of the Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin are derived from the copies mentioned below, and each name is authenticated by the initials of the authority upon which each piece is ascribed to particular persons:—

[Although many of the pieces in the following list are attributed to wrong authors, it has been thought more convenient to reprint them as they stood in the previous edition, in order to insert any corrections, as far as Frere is concerned. These are derived from the information of Frere himself given to his nephews, who afterwards edited his works in 1872. They are therefore placed beneath the Title of the piece—between brackets.

The pieces, printed in Italics—between brackets—appear for the first time in an edition of The Poetry.—Ed.]

“Wright, the publisher of the Anti-Jacobin, lived at 169, Piccadilly, and his shop was the general morning resort of the friends of the ministry, as Debrett’s was of the oppositionists. About the time when the Anti-Jacobin was contemplated, Owen, who had been the publisher of Burke’s pamphlets, failed. The editors of the Anti-Jacobin took his house, paying the rent, taxes, &c., and gave it up to Wright, reserving to themselves the first floor, to which a communication was opened through Wright’s house. Being thus enabled to pass to their own rooms through Wright’s shop, where their frequent visits did not excite any remarks, they contrived to escape particular observation.”

“Their meetings were most regular on Sundays, but they not unfrequently met on other days of the week, and in their rooms were chiefly written the poetical portions of the work. What was written was generally left open upon the table, and as others of the party dropped in, hints or suggestions were made; sometimes whole passages were contributed by some of the parties present, and afterwards altered by others, so that it is almost impossible to ascertain the names of the authors. Where, in the above notes, a piece is ascribed to different authors, the conflicting statements may arise from incorrect information, but sometimes they arise from the whole authorship being assigned to one person, when, in fact, both may have contributed. If we look at the references, 167, 185, we shall see Canning naming several authors, whereas Lord Burghersh assigns all to one author. Canning’s authority is here more to be relied upon. New Morality Canning assigns generally to the four contributors. Wright has given some interesting particulars by appropriating to each his peculiar portion.”

“Gifford was the working editor, and wrote most of the refutations and corrections of the Lies, Mistakes, and Misrepresentations.”

“The papers on finance were chiefly by Pitt: the first column was frequently kept for what he might send; but his contributions were uncertain, and generally very late, so that the space reserved for him was sometimes filled up by other matter. He only once met the editors at Wright’s.”

“W. Upcott, who was at the time assistant in Wright’s shop, was employed as amanuensis, to copy out for the printer the various contributions, that the author’s handwriting might not be detected.”—E. Hawkins.

“THE RIGHT HON. GEORGE CANNING AS A MAN OF LETTERS.”

[The following is part of a review, under the above title, of the present editor’s previous edition of The Poetry of the Anti-Jacobin, and appeared in The Edinburgh Review of July, 1858. It is reprinted in the Biographical and Critical Essays of A. Hayward, Esq., Q.C., 2 vols., 8vo., 1873. It is introduced here as throwing some additional light on the Writers of the various pieces.]

“... We can hardly say of Canning’s satire what was said of Sheridan’s, that—

But its severity was redeemed by its buoyancy and geniality, whilst the subjects against which it was principally aimed gave it a healthy tone and a sound foundation. Its happiest effusions will be found in The Anti-Jacobin, set on foot to refute or ridicule the democratic rulers of revolutionary France and their admirers or apologists in England, who, it must be owned, were occasionally hurried into a culpable degree of extravagance and laxity by their enthusiasm....”

“We learn from Mr. Edmonds that almost all his authorities practically resolve themselves into one, the late Mr. W. Upcott, and that he never saw either of the alleged copies on which his informant relied. As regards the principal one, Canning’s own, after the fullest inquiries amongst his surviving relatives and friends, we cannot discover a trace of its existence at any period. Lord Burghersh (the late Earl of Westmoreland) was under fourteen years of age during the publication of The Anti-Jacobin; and we very much doubt whether either the publisher or the amanuensis (be he who he may) was admitted to the complete confidence of the contributors, or whether either the prose or poetry was composed as stated. In a letter to the late Madame de Girardin, à propos of her play, L’École des Journalistes, Jules Janin happily exposes the assumption that good leading articles ever were, or ever could be, produced over punch and broiled bones, amidst intoxication and revelry. Equally untenable is the belief that poetical pieces, like the best of The Anti-Jacobin, were written in the common rooms of the confraternity, open to constant intrusion, and left upon the table to be corrected or completed by the first comer. The unity of design discernible in each, the glowing harmony of the thoughts and images, and the exquisite finish of the versification, tell of silent and solitary hours spent in brooding over, maturing, and polishing a cherished conception; and young authors, still unknown to fame, are least of all likely to sink their individuality in this fashion. We suspect that their main object in going to Wright’s was to correct their proofs and see one another’s articles in the more finished state. Their meetings, if for these purposes, would be most regular on Sundays, because the paper appeared every Monday morning. The extent to which they aided one another may be collected from a well-authenticated anecdote. When Frere had completed the first part of The Loves of the Triangles, he exultingly read over the following lines to Canning, and defied him to improve upon them:—

“Canning took the pen and added—

“These two lines are now blended with the original text, and constitute, we are informed on the best authority, the only flaw in Frere’s title to the sole authorship of the First Part. The Second and Third Parts were by Canning.

“By the kindness of [the late] Lord Hatherton, we have now before us a bound volume containing all the numbers of The Anti-Jacobin as they originally appeared, eight pages quarto, with double columns, price sixpence. On the fly-leaf is inscribed: ‘This copy belonged to the Marquess Wellesley, and was purchased at the sale of his library after his death, January, 1842. H.’ On the cover is pasted an engraved label of the arms and name of a former proprietor, Charles William Flint, with the pencilled addition of ‘Confidential Amanuensis’. In this copy Canning’s name is subscribed to (amongst others) the following pieces, which are also assigned to him (along with a large share in the most popular of the rest) by the most trustworthy rumours and traditions:—Inscription for the Door of the Cell in Newgate where Mrs. Brownrigg, the Prenticide, was confined previous to her execution; The Friend of Humanity and the Knife-Grinder; the lines addressed To the Author of the Epistle to the Editors of The Anti-Jacobin; The Progress of Man (all three parts); and New Morality.^[1]

“With the single exception of The Friend of Humanity and the Knife-Grinder, no piece in the collection is more freshly remembered than the Inscription for the Cell of Mrs. Brownrigg, who

“The Answer to The Author of the Epistle to the Editors of The Anti-Jacobin is less known, and it derives a fresh interest from the fact, recently [c. 1854] made public, that The Epistle (which appeared in The Morning Chronicle of January 17, 1798) was the composition of William Lord Melbourne. The beginning shows that the veil of incognito had been already penetrated.

“After referring to ‘the poetic sage, who sung of Gallia in a headlong rage,’ The Epistle proceeds:—

“Happily the eminent and accomplished sons of these fathers will smile, rather than blush, at this allusion to their sires, and smile the more when they remember from which side the attack proceeded. It is clear from the Answer, that, whilst the band were not a little ruffled, they had not the remotest suspicion that their assailant was a youth in his nineteenth year. Amongst other prefatory remarks they say:—

“‘We assure the author of the epistle, that the answer which we have here the honour to address to him, contains our genuine and undisguised sentiments upon the merits of the poem.

“‘Our conjectures respecting the authors and abettors of this performance may possibly be as vague and unfounded as theirs are with regard to the Editors of The Anti-Jacobin. We are sorry that we cannot satisfy their curiosity upon this subject—but we have little anxiety for the gratification of our own.

“‘It is only necessary to add, what is most conscientiously the truth, that this production, such as it is, is by far the best of all the attacks that the combined wits of the cause have been able to muster against The Anti-Jacobin.’

“The Answer opens thus:—

“The ‘one good line’ was ‘By Leveson Gower’s crop-imitating wig,’ but the Epistle contains many equally good and some better. The speculations as to its authorship afforded no slight amusement to the writer and his friends....

“New Morality is commonly regarded as the master-piece of The Anti-Jacobin; and, with the exception of a few lines, the whole of it is by Canning. It appeared in the last number, and he is said to have concentrated all his energies for a parting blow. The reader who comes fresh from Dryden or Pope, or even Churchill, will be disappointed on finding far less variety of images, sparkling antithesis, or condensed brilliancy of expression. The author exhibits abundant humour and eloquence, but comparatively little wit; i.e., if there be any truth in Sydney Smith’s doctrine ‘that the feeling of wit is occasioned by those relations of ideas which excite surprise, and surprise alone’. We are commonly prepared for what is coming, and our admiration is excited rather by the justness of the observations, the elevation of the thoughts, and the vigour of the style, than by a startling succession of flashes of fancy. If, as we believe, the same might be said of Juvenal, and the best of his English imitators, Johnson, we leave ample scope for praise; and New Morality contains passages which have been preserved to our time and bid fair to reach posterity. How often are the lines on Candour quoted in entire ignorance or forgetfulness of their author....

“The drama of The Rovers, or Double Arrangement, was written to ridicule the German Drama, then hardly known in this country, except through the medium of bad translations of some of the least meritorious of Schiller’s, Goethe’s, and Kotzebue’s productions. The parody is now principally remembered by Rogero’s song, of which, Mr. Edmonds states, the first five stanzas were by Canning. “Having been accidentally seen, previously to its publication, by Pitt, he was so amused with it that he took a pen and composed the last stanza on the spot....”

xxvii“Canning’s reputed share in The Rovers excited the unreasoning indignation, and provoked the exaggerated censure, of a man who has obtained a world-wide reputation by his historical researches, most especially by his skill in separating the true from the fabulous, and in filling up chasms in national annals by a process near akin to that by which Cuvier inferred the entire form and structure of an extinct species from a bone. The following passage is taken from Niebuhr’s History of the Period of the Revolution (published from his Lectures, in two volumes, in 1845):—

“‘Canning was at that time (1807) at the head of foreign affairs in England. History will not form the same judgment of him as that formed by contemporaries. He had great talents, but was not a great Statesman; he was one of those persons who distinguish themselves as the squires of political heroes. He was highly accomplished in the two classical languages, but without being a learned scholar. He was especially conversant with Greek writers. He had likewise poetical talent, but only for Satire. At first he had joined the leaders of opposition against Pitt’s ministry: Lord Grey, who perceived his ambition, advised him, half in joke, to join the ministers, as he would make his fortune. He did so, and was employed to write articles for the newspapers and satirical verses, which were often directed against his former benefactors.

“‘Through the influence of the ministers he came into Parliament. So long as the great eloquence of former times lasted, and the great men were alive, his talent was admired; but older persons had no great pleasure in his petulant, epigrammatic eloquence and his jokes, which were often in bad taste. He joined the Society of the Anti-Jacobins, which defended everything connected with existing institutions. This society published a journal, in which the most honoured names of foreign countries were attacked in the most scandalous manner. German literature was at that time little known in England, and it was associated there with the ideas of Jacobinism and revolution. Canning then published in The Anti-Jacobin the most shameful pasquinade which was ever written against Germany, under the title of Matilda Pottingen. Göttingen is described in it as the sink of all infamy; professors and students as a gang of miscreants; licentiousness, incest, and atheism as the character of the German people. Such was Canning’s beginning: he was at all events useful, a sort of political Cossack’ (Geschichte des Zeitalters der Revolution, vol. ii., p. 242).

“‘Here am I,’ exclaimed Raleigh, after vainly trying to get at the rights of a squabble in the courtyard of the Tower, ‘employed in writing a true history of the world, when I cannot ascertain the truth of what happens under my own window.’ Here is the great restorer of Roman history—who, by the way, prided himself on his knowledge of England—hurried into the strangest misconception of contemporary events and personages, and giving vent to a series of depreciatory misstatements, without pausing to verify the assumed groundwork of his patriotic wrath. His description of ‘the most shameful pasquinade,’ and his ignorance of the very title, prove that he had never seen it. If he had, he would also have known that the scene is laid at Weimar, not at Göttingen, and that the satire is almost exclusively directed against a portion of the dramatic literature of his country, which all rational admirers must admit to be indefensible. The scene in The Rovers, in which the rival heroines, meeting for the first time at an inn, swear eternal friendship and embrace, is positively a feeble reflection of a scene in Goethe’s Stella; and no anachronism can exceed that in Schiller’s Cabal und Liebe, when Lady Milford, after declaring herself the daughter of the Duke of Norfolk who rebelled against Queen Elizabeth, is horrified on finding that the jewels sent her by the Grand Duke have been purchased by the sale of 7000 of his subjects to be employed in the American war.^[3]

xxviii“Amongst the prose contributions to The Anti-Jacobin, there is one in which, independently of direct evidence, the peculiar humour of Canning is discernible,—the pretended report of the meeting of the Friends of Freedom at the Crown and Anchor Tavern.^[4] The plan was evidently suggested by Tickell’s Anticipation, in which the debate on the Address at the opening of the Session was reported beforehand with such surprising foresight, that some of the speakers, who were thus forestalled, declined to deliver their meditated orations.

“At the meeting of the Friends of Freedom, Erskine, whose habitual egotism could hardly be caricatured, is made to perorate as follows, &c.... A long speech is given to Mackintosh, who, under the name of Macfungus, after a fervid sketch of the Temple of Freedom which he proposes to construct on the ruins of ancient establishments, proceeds with kindling animation, &c....^[5]

“The wit and fun of these imitations are undeniable, and their injustice is equally so. Erskine, with all his egotism, was, and remains, the greatest of English advocates. He stemmed and turned the tide which threatened to sweep away the most valued of our free institutions in 1794; and (we say with Lord Brougham) ‘Before such a precious service as this, well may the lustre of statesmen and orators grow pale’. Mackintosh was pre-eminently distinguished by the comprehensiveness and moderation of his views; nor could any man be less disposed by temper, habits, or pursuits towards revolutionary courses. His lectures on The Law of Nature and Nations were especially directed against the new morality in general, and Godwin’s Political Justice in particular.

“At a long subsequent period (1807) Canning, when attacked in Parliament for his share in The Anti-Jacobin, declared that ‘he felt no shame for its character or principles, nor any other sorrow for the share he had had in it than that which the imperfection of his pieces was calculated to inspire’. Still, it is one of the inevitable inconveniences of a connection with the Press that the best known writers should be made answerable for the errors of their associates; and the license of The Anti-Jacobin gave serious and well-founded offence to many who shared its opinions and wished well to its professed object. In Wilberforce’s Diary for May 18, 1799, we find ‘Pitt, Canning, and Pepper Arden came in late to dinner. I attacked Canning on indecency of Anti-Jacobin.’ Coleridge, in his Biographia Literaria, complains bitterly of the calumnious accounts given by The Anti-Jacobin of his early life, and asks with reason, ‘Is it surprising that many good men remained longer than perhaps they otherwise would have done adverse to a party which encouraged and openly rewarded the authors of such atrocious calumnies?’

“Mr. Edmonds says that Pitt got frightened, and that the publication was discontinued at the suggestion of the Prime Minister. It is not unlikely that Canning, now a member of the House of Commons and Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, found his connection with it embarrassing, as his hopes rose and his political prospects expanded. Indeed, it may be questioned whether a Parliamentary career can ever be united with that of the daily or weekly journalist without compromising one or both. At all events, the original Anti-Jacobin closed with the number containing New Morality, and Canning had nothing to do with the monthly review started under the same name.”

THE ANTI-JACOBIN AS AN AID TO GOVERNMENT.

[Considering The Anti-Jacobin from a national as well as a literary point of view, we cannot do better than use a portion of an Essay on English Political Satires by the late Jas. Hannay, in the Quarterly Review, April, 1857.]

“... In the case of The Anti-Jacobin, what are we to say? A hundred opinions may be adopted respecting the French Revolution. Some hate it with unmitigated hatred. Some regret it, but accept its consequences as beneficial to mankind on the whole. Some cherish its memory as a new political revelation of which they hope to see still further results. But a candid man of any of these persuasions must remember that the aim of The Anti-Jacobin was to keep Britain from revolution during 1797–8. It was therefore necessary to fight as our soldiers afterwards did in Spain—to wage such a literary war as suited the agitated spirit of Europe. While we blame Canning, therefore, for speaking as he did of Madame Roland, we must not forget the indecorum of her Memoirs, or that it was from persons of her party that vile aspersions were cast upon the character of Marie Antoinette. There were men quite ready to begin the same work over here that had been done in France, and that in a spirit of vulgar imitation, and under quite different circumstances. They had to be shot down like mad dogs; for a cur, though contemptible in ordinary cases, becomes tragic when he has hydrophobia.

“For The Anti-Jacobin must be claimed an honour which can be claimed for scarce one of the works we have passed under review. Let us waive the question how much we may have owed it for helping to inspire that unity and stout insular self-confidence which carried us through the great war,—whole within and impervious without. Let us consider it only in a literary point of view, and we shall find it enjoying the rare distinction that its best Satires live in real popular remembrance. The Knife-Grinder, with his

is almost as widely known as our nursery rhymes.

“But if The Anti-Jacobin excels all similar works in popularity, and in the eminence of its contributors, it also excels them in another important particular. It contains on the whole a greater number of really good things than any one of them. The Loves of the Triangles, in which,

is an irresistible parody, and likely to keep the original of Darwin [Loves of the Plants] in remembrance. Gray’s Odes have survived the burlesques of Colman; and the Country and City Mouse of Prior and Montague is neglected by nine-tenths of those who read with admiration the Hind and the Panther. But Darwin’s case is peculiar. Other poems live in spite of ridicule; and his Loves of the Plants in consequence of it. The Attic salt of his enemies has preserved his reputation.

“There is always a purpose in The Anti-Jacobin’s view something more important than the mere persiflage that teases individuals. Like the blade of Damascus, which has a verse of the Koran engraved on it, its fine wit glitters terribly in the cause of sacred tradition.”

DESCRIPTION OF THE PLATES.

PROSPECTUS OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN; OR, WEEKLY EXAMINER, — No. I. — INTRODUCTION. — INSCRIPTION [8] For the Apartment in Chepstow Castle, where Henry Marten, the Regicide, was imprisoned thirty years. — IMITATION. INSCRIPTION For the Door of the Cell in Newgate, where Mrs. Brownrigg, the ’Prentice-cide, was confined previous to her Execution.

At a moment, when whatever may be the habits of inquiry and the anxiety for information upon subjects of public concern diffused among all ranks of people, the vehicles of intelligence are already multiplied in a proportion nearly equal to this encreased demand, and to the encreased importance and variety of matter, some apology may perhaps be necessary for the obtrusion of a new Paper upon the World; and some account may reasonably be expected of the views and principles on which it founds its pretensions to notice, before it can hope to make its way through the crowd of competitors which have gotten the start of it in the race for public favour.

[As this Prospectus was written by Mr. Canning, and it has been prefixed only to the former edition of the Poetry by the present Editor, it is again considered an interesting addition to the present one.]

2The grounds upon which such pretensions have usually been rested by those who have engaged in undertakings of this kind, are accuracy, variety, and priority of Intelligence, connections at home, correspondence abroad, and, above all, a profession of impartial and unprejudiced attention to all opinions, and to all parties and descriptions of men.

On none of these Topicks is it Our intention to enlarge.

Of Our means of information, and of the use which We make of them, our readers will, after a very short trial, be enabled to form their own opinion. And to that trial We confidently commit ourselves: professing, however, at the same time, that if the only advantage which We were desirous of holding out to our Readers, were that of having it in our power to apprize them an hour or a day sooner than those Journals, which are already in their hands, of any event however important—We should bring to the undertaking much less anxiety for success, and should state our claims on public attention with much less boldness, than We are disposed to do in the consciousness of higher purposes, and more beneficial views.

Novelty indeed We have to announce. For what so new in the present state of the daily and weekly Press (We speak generally, though there are undoubtedly exceptions which we may have occasion to point out hereafter) as the Truth? To this object alone it is that Our labours are dedicated. It is the constant violation, the disguise, the perversion of the Truth, whether in narrative or in argument, that will form the principal subject of our Weekly Examination: and it is by a diligent and faithful discharge of this duty—by detecting 3falsehood, and rectifying error, by correcting misrepresentation, and exposing and chastising malignity—that We hope to deserve the reception which We solicit, and to obtain not only the approbation of the Country to our attempt, but its thanks for the motives which have given birth to it.

These are strong words. But We are conscious of intending in earnest what they profess. How far the execution of our purpose may correspond with the design, it is for others to determine. It is ours to state that design fairly, and in the spirit in which we conceive it.

Of the utility of such a purpose, if even tolerably executed, there can be little doubt, among those persons (a very large part of the community) who must have found themselves, during the course of the last few years, perplexed by the multiplicity of contradictory accounts of almost every material event that has occurred in that eventful and tremendous period; and who must anxiously have wished for some public channel of information on which they could confidently rely for forming their opinion.

But before We can expect sufficient credit from persons of this description, to enable us to supply such a defect, and to assume an office so important, it is natural that they should require some profession of our principles as well as of our purposes; in order that they may judge not only of our ability to communicate the information which We promise, but of our intention to inform them aright.

To that freedom from partiality and prejudice, of which We have spoken above, by the profession of which so many of our Contemporaries recommend themselves, We 4make little pretension—at least in the sense in which those terms appear now too often to be used.

We have not arrived (to our shame perhaps we avow it) at that wild and unshackled freedom of thought, which rejects all habit, all wisdom of former times, all restraints of ancient usage, and of local attachment; and which judges upon each subject, whether of politicks or morals, as it arises, by lights entirely its own, without reference to recognized principle, or established practice.

We confess, whatever disgrace may attend such a confession, that We have not so far gotten the better of the influence of long habits and early education, not so far imbibed that spirit of liberal indifference, of diffused and comprehensive philanthropy, which distinguishes the candid character of the present age, but that We have our feelings, our preferences, and our affections, attaching on particular places, manners, and institutions, and even on particular portions of the human race.

It may be thought a narrow and illiberal distinction—but We avow ourselves to be partial to the Country in which we live, notwithstanding the daily panegyricks which we read and hear on the superior virtues and endowments of its rival and hostile neighbours. We are prejudiced in favour of her Establishments, civil and religious; though without claiming for either that ideal perfection, which modern philosophy professes to discover in the other more luminous systems which are arising on all sides of us.

The safety and prosperity of these kingdoms, however unimportant they may seem in abstract contemplation when compared with the more extensive, more beautiful, and more productive parts of the world, do yet excite in 5our minds a peculiar interest and anxiety; and will probably continue to occupy a share of our attention by no means justified by the proportional consequence which speculative reasoners may think proper to assign to them in the scale of the universe.

We should be averse to hazarding the smallest part of the practical happiness of this Country; though the sacrifice should be recommended as necessary for accomplishing throughout the world an uniform and beautiful system of theoretical liberty: and We should at all times exert our best endeavours for upholding its constitution, even with all the human imperfections which may belong to it, though We were assured that on its ruins might be erected the only pillar that is yet wanting to complete the “most glorious fabrick which the Integrity and Wisdom of man have raised since the Creation”.

If, as Philosopher Monge^[6] avers, in his eloquent and instructive address to the Directory, “The Government of England and the French Republick cannot exist together,” We do not hesitate in our choice; though well aware that in that choice we may be much liable, in the opinion of many critics of the present day, to the imputation of a want of candour or of discernment.

6Admirers of military heroism, and dazzled by military success in common with other men, We are yet even here conscious of some qualification and distinction in our feelings: We acknowledge ourselves apt to look with more complacency on bravery and skill, when displayed in the service of our Country, than when We see them directed against its interests or its safety; and, however equal the claims to admiration in either case may be, We feel our hearts grow warmer at the recital of what has been atchieved by Howe, by Jervis, or by Duncan, than at the “glorious victory of Jemappe,” or “the immortal battle of the bridge of Lodi”.

In Morals We are equally old-fashioned. We have not yet learned the modern refinement of referring in all considerations upon human conduct, not to any settled and preconceived principles of right and wrong, not to any general and fundamental rules which experience, and wisdom, and justice, and the common consent of mankind have established, but to the internal admonitions of every man’s judgment or conscience in his own particular instance.

We do not dissemble,—that We reverence Law,—We acknowledge Usage,—We look even upon Prescription without hatred or horror. And we do not think these, or any of them, less safe guides for the moral actions of men, than that new and liberal system of Ethics, whose operation is not to bind but to loosen the bands of social order; whose doctrine is formed not on a system of reciprocal duties, but on the supposition of individual, independent, and unconnected rights; which teaches that all men are pretty equally honest, but that some have different notions of honesty from others, and that the 7most received notions are for the greater part the most faulty.

We do not subscribe to the opinion, that a sincere conviction of the truth of no matter what principle, is a sufficient defence for no matter what action; and that the only business of moral enquiry with human conduct is to ascertain that in each case the principle and the action agree. We have not yet persuaded ourselves to think it a sound, or a safe doctrine, that every man who can divest himself of a moral sense in theory, has a right to be with impunity and without disguise a scoundrel in practice. It is not in our creed, that Atheism is as good a faith as Christianity, provided it be professed with equal sincerity; nor could We admit it as an excuse for Murder, that the murderer was in his own mind conscientiously persuaded that the murdered might for many good reasons be better out of the way.

Of all these and the like principles, in one word, of JACOBINISM in all its shapes, and in all its degrees, political and moral, public and private, whether as it openly threatens the subversion of States, or gradually saps the foundations of domestic happiness, We are the avowed, determined, and irreconcileable enemies. We have no desire to divest ourselves of these inveterate prejudices; but shall remain stubborn and incorrigible in resisting every attempt which may be made either by argument or (what is more in the charitable spirit of modern reformers) by force, to convert us to a different opinion.

It remains only to speak of the details of our Plan.

8It is our intention to publish Weekly, during the Session of Parliament, a Paper, containing,

First, An Abstract of the important events of the week, both at home and abroad.

Secondly, Such Reflections as may naturally arise out of them: and,

Thirdly, A contradiction and confutation of the falsehoods and misrepresentations concerning these events, their causes, and their consequences, which may be found in the Papers devoted to the cause of Sedition and Irreligion, to the pay or principles of France.

This last, as it is by far the most important, will in all probability be the most copious of the three heads; and is that to which, above all others, We wish to direct the attention of our Readers.

We propose diligently to collect, as far as the range of our own daily reading will enable us, and We promise willingly to receive, from whatever quarter they may come, the several articles of this kind which require to be thus contradicted or confuted; which will naturally divide themselves into different classes, according to their different degrees of stupidity or malignity.

There are, for instance (to begin with those of the highest order), the Lies of the Week; the downright, direct, unblushing falsehoods, which have no colour or foundation whatever, and which must at the very moment of their being written, have been known to the writer to be wholly destitute of truth.

Next in rank come Misrepresentations which, taking for their groundwork facts in substance true, do so colour and distort them in description, as to take away all semblance of their real nature and character.

9Lastly, The most venial, though by no means the least mischievous class, are Mistakes; under which description are included all those Hints, Conjectures, and Apprehensions, those Anticipations of Sorrow and Deprecations of Calamity, in which Writers who labour under too great an anxiety for the Public Welfare are apt to indulge; and which, when falsified by the event, they are generally too much occupied to find leisure to retract or disavow:—A trouble which We shall have great pleasure in taking off these Gentlemen’s hands.

To each of these several articles We shall carefully affix the name and date of the Publication from which We may take the liberty of borrowing it.

With regard to the Proceedings in Parliament, We shall not fail to mark to Our Readers the progress of the public business; though it does not enter into our Plan to give a regular detail of the Debates: nor would the limits of our Paper allow of it.

We have a further reason for not occupying this province, which will equally account for our determination, not to receive Advertisements—our earnest desire not to lessen the circulation of any existing Public Print.

It is obvious upon every ground of fairness and of policy, that We must entertain this desire very strongly with regard to the respectable Papers which are directed by principles and attachments like our own: an attachment (We have no wish to disguise it) to the cause of a Government, with whose support, whose popularity and consequent means of exertion, the circumstances of the present times have essentially connected the existence of this Country as an independent Nation.

10As little should we wish to circumscribe the sale of those Journals, upon whose errors or perverseness, upon whose false statements and pernicious doctrines We reckon for the main support, as they have been the principal cause of our undertaking. These We would entreat to proceed with fresh vigour and increased activity. It is our wish to be seen together, and to be compared with them. Every week of misrepresentation will be followed by its weekly comment; and with this corrective faithfully administered, the longest course of Morning Chronicles or Morning Posts, of Stars or Couriers, may become not only innocent but beneficial.

With these views then We commence our undertaking. Whatever may be the success or the merit of its execution in our hands, the want of something like it has so long been felt and deplored by all thinking and honest men, that We cannot doubt of the approbation and encouragement with which the attempt will be received.

We claim the support, and We invite the assistance, of ALL, who think with US that the circumstances and character of the age in which We live require every exertion of every man, who loves his COUNTRY in the old way, in which till of late years the LOVE of one’s COUNTRY was professed by most men, and by none disclaimed or reviled; of ALL who think that the Press has been long enough employed principally as an engine of destruction, and who wish to see the experiment fairly tried whether that engine, by which many of the States which surround us have been overthrown, and others shaken to their foundations, may not be turned into an instrument of defence for the one remaining Country which has Establishments to protect, and a Government with the spirit, 11and the power, and the wisdom to protect them; of ALL who look with respect to public honour, and with attachment to the decencies of private life; of ALL who have so little deference for the arrogant intolerance of Jacobinism as still to contemplate the OFFICE and the PERSON of a King with veneration, and to speak reverently of Religion, without apologizing for the singularity of their opinions; of ALL who think the blessings which we enjoy valuable, and who think them in danger; and who, while they detest and despise the principles and the professors of that NEW FAITH by which the foundations of all those blessings are threatened to be undermined, lament the lukewarmness with which its propagation has hitherto been resisted, and are anxious, while there is yet time, to make every effort in the cause of their COUNTRY.

Published by J. Wright, No. 169, opposite Old Bond Street, Piccadilly: by whom Orders for the Papers, and all Communications of Correspondents, addressed to the Editor of the Anti-Jacobin, or Weekly Examiner, will be received. Sold also by all the Booksellers and Newsmen in Town and Country.

In our anxiety to provide for the amusement as well as information of our readers, we have not omitted to make all the inquiries in our power for ascertaining the means of procuring poetical assistance. And it would give us no small satisfaction to be able to report that we had succeeded in this point precisely in the manner which would best have suited our own taste and feelings, as well as those which we wish to cultivate in our readers.

But whether it be that good Morals, and what we should call good Politics, are inconsistent with the spirit of true Poetry—whether “the Muses still with freedom found” have an aversion to regular governments, and require a frame and system of protection less complicated than king, lords, and commons:—

and there only—or for whatever other reason it may be, whether physical, or moral, or philosophical (which last 13is understood to mean something more than the other two, though exactly what, it is difficult to say), we have not been able to find one good and true Poet, of sound principles and sober practice, upon whom we could rely for furnishing us with a handsome quantity of sufficient and approved verse—such verse as our readers might be expected to get by heart, and to sing; as the worthy philosopher Monge describes the little children of Sparta and Athens singing the songs of Freedom, in expectation of the coming of the Great Nation.

In this difficulty we have had no choice but either to provide no poetry at all—a shabby expedient—or to go to the only market where it is to be had good and ready made, that of the Jacobins—an expedient full of danger, and not to be used but with the utmost caution and delicacy.

To this latter expedient, however, after mature deliberation, we have determined to have recourse; qualifying it at the same time with such precautions as may conduce at once to the safety of our readers’ principles, and to the improvement of our own poetry.

For this double purpose, we shall select from time to time from among those effusions of the Jacobin Muse which happen to fall in our way, such pieces as may serve to illustrate some one of the principles on which the poetical as well as the political doctrine of the New School is established—prefacing each of them, for our readers’ sake, with a short disquisition on the particular tenet intended to be enforced or insinuated in the production before them—and accompanying it with an humble effort of our own, in imitation of the poem itself, and in further illustration of its principle.

14By these means, though we cannot hope to catch “the wood-notes wild” of the Bards of Freedom, we may yet acquire, by dint of repeating after them, a more complete knowledge of the secret in which their greatness lies than we could by mere prosaic admiration; and if we cannot become poets ourselves, we at least shall have collected the elements of a Jacobin Art of Poetry for the use of those whose genius may be more capable of turning them to advantage.

It might not be unamusing to trace the springs and principles of this species of poetry, which are to be found, some in the exaggeration, and others in the direct inversion of the sentiments and passions which have in all ages animated the breast of the favourite of the Muses, and distinguished him from the “vulgar throng”.

The poet in all ages has despised riches and grandeur.

The Jacobin poet improves this sentiment into a hatred of the rich and the great.

The poet of other times has been an enthusiast in the love of his native soil.

The Jacobin poet rejects all restriction in his feelings. His love is enlarged and expanded so as to comprehend all human kind. The love of all human kind is without doubt a noble passion: it can hardly be necessary to mention that its operation extends to freemen, and them only, all over the world.

The old poet was a warrior, at least in imagination; and sung the actions of the heroes of his country in strains which “made Ambition Virtue,” and which overwhelmed the horrors of war in its glory.

The Jacobin poet would have no objection to sing battles too—but he would take a distinction. The 15prowess of Buonaparte, indeed, he might chant in his loftiest strain of exultation. There we should find nothing but trophies and triumphs and branches of laurel and olive, phalanxes of Republicans shouting victory, satellites of despotism biting the ground, and geniuses of Liberty planting standards on mountain-tops.

But let his own country triumph, or her allies obtain an advantage: straightway the “beauteous face of war” is changed; the “pride, pomp, and circumstance” of victory are kept carefully out of sight, and we are presented with nothing but contusions and amputations, plundered peasants, and deserted looms. Our poet points the thunder of his blank verse at the head of the recruiting serjeant, or roars in dithyrambics against the lieutenants of pressgangs.

But it would be endless to chase the coy Muse of Jacobinism through all her characters. Mille habet ornatus. The Mille decenter habet is perhaps more questionable. For in whatever disguise she appears, whether of mirth or of melancholy, of piety or of tenderness; under all disguises, like Sir John Brute in woman’s clothes, she is betrayed by her drunken swagger and ruffian tone.

In the poem which we have selected for the edification of our readers and our own imitation this day, the principles which are meant to be inculcated speak so plainly for themselves, that they need no previous introduction.

[Henry Marten was one of the most interesting and remarkable of the Regicides, not only from his abilities and consistent honesty, but from the elegance of his manners, his wit, and the fascinating gaiety of his conversation; and, moreover, from his humane disposition and generosity to fallen foes. His private life, however, was disgraced by the most reckless debauchery, which might seem more appropriate in such libertines as Rochester and Sedley than in a coadjutor of the strict Puritan party. But from a note in Grey’s edition of Hudibras, pt. ii., ch. i., p. 313, it would appear that the general opinion at that time was that profligacy of a pronounced character was indulged in privately by more than a few of that sanctimonious sect.

He was the son of Sir Henry Marten, LL.D., a loyal Judge of the Admiralty. After receiving a learned education at Oxford, he entered one of the Inns of Court, and travelled in France. Having a stake in Berkshire—for he inherited a property of £3000 a year, besides several thousand pounds in money—he was elected, 1640, one of the members for the county in the last two Parliaments of King Charles I. His chief seat was at Becket, in the parish of Shrivenham. He afterwards obtained a grant of £1000 a year to him and his heirs out of the forfeited estates of the Duke of Buckingham. His early marriage with a rich widow, selected by his father, but not affected by himself, also benefited his finances.

From the commencement of the Civil Wars he was a violent Republican; and as early as 1643 openly expressed his opinion of the desirability of the destruction of the King and his children, for which rather premature advice he was expelled from the House of Commons, and underwent a short imprisonment in the Tower. He was appointed by the House of Commons a Colonel of Horse and Governor of Reading, but made less mark as a soldier than as a rapacious spoiler of the adherents of the King, which earned him the opprobrious nickname of “Plunder-master General”.

Being empowered to dispose of the Regalia and royal trappings, he once invested George Wither—who had been made one of Cromwell’s Major-Generals—with them, and so accoutred induced the old Poet to strut up and down Westminster Abbey to the scandal of right-thinking people.

18To him also were referred the alterations in the public arms, the Great Seal, and the legends upon the money. Upon the latter was a shield bearing the cross of St. George, encircled by a palm and olive branch, and inscribed The Commonwealth of England, and on the reverse, God with us, 1648; which occasioned the remark “that God and the Commonwealth were not on the same side”.

Nothing apparently could damp the ill-timed jocosity too often prevalent in those troublous times, for at Marten’s trial, 16th October, 1660, Ewer, who had been his servant, swore that “at the signing of the warrant for the King’s execution he did see a pen in Mr. Cromwell’s hand, and he marked Mr. Marten in the face with it, and Mr. Marten did the like to him”. But many of his excesses were condoned in the eyes of both his friends and enemies by his generous and humane spirit.

D’Israeli, in his Commentaries on the life and Reign of Charles I., describes the ingenious way in which Marten saved the life of David Jenkins, a loyal and obstinate Welsh judge, who, when brought to the bar of the House of Commons to answer for imprisoning several persons for bearing arms against the King, peremptorily disowned their jurisdiction, and defied them in the following bold terms: “‘But, Mr. Speaker, since you and this House have renounced your allegiance to your Sovereign, and are become a den of thieves, should I bow myself in this House of Rimmon the Lord would not pardon me’. The whole House were electrified.... He was voted guilty of high treason without any trial. The day of execution was then debated. Harry Marten, who had not yet spoken, rose, not to dissent from the vote of the House, he observed, but he had something to say about the time of the execution. ‘Mr. Speaker,’ said he, ‘everyone must believe that this old gentleman here is fully possessed in his head resolved to die a martyr in his cause, for otherwise he would never have provoked the House by such biting expressions. If you execute him, you do precisely that which he hopes for, and his execution will have a great influence over the people, since he is condemned without a jury. I therefore move that we should suspend the day of execution, and in meantime force him to live in spite of his teeth.’ The drollery of the motion put the House into better humour, and he was reprieved. After being kept in various prisons for eleven years, he was released by Cromwell, and died in 1663, aged eighty-one.”

Another instance may be given of Marten’s felicitous humour and humane temper. When the Commons had rid themselves of the Sovereign, they voted the Lords to be dangerous and useless. But Marten proposed an amendment in their favour; namely, that they were useless, but not dangerous.

His speeches in the House were represented to have been not long, “but wondrous poynant, pertinent, and witty. He was exceedingly apt in apt instances; he alone hath sometimes turned the whole House.”

He wrote several tracts on parliamentary subjects, and Verses on the Death of his Nephew, Charles Edmonds, 7th July, 1661, æt. 30. But the most amusing of the publications bearing his name is one entitled Familiar Letters to his Lady of Delight; also her kinde Returnes: with his Rivall R. Pettingall’s Heroicall Epistles. Printed by Edmundus de Speciosâ Villâ [i.e., Edmund Gayton]. Bellositi Dobunorum [Oxford], 1662 and 1663, 4to. Another edition, with additions, appeared in 1685. “These epistles,” says D’Israeli, “paint to the life the loose habits and espiègleries of this witty profligate; and I think they have been referred to by some inconsiderate writers as a genuine correspondence.” They were probably altogether concocted by Gayton. He was severely attacked in various scurrilous lampoons, some of which are printed among the Rump Songs, 1662.

On his trial he was found guilty and sentenced to death; but the good feeling created among many who had in his prosperous days enjoyed his society and hospitality, and even among many of his former opponents by his generous treatment of them when in danger, stood him in good stead, and it was by a well-timed and humorous appeal to the Judges—such as he himself might have used—that his life was saved. Henry, fourth Viscount Falkland, whose virtuous and heroic father fell at the first Battle of Newbury while fighting for the King, said to the Judges: “Gentlemen, ye talk here of making a sacrifice: it was old law that all sacrifices were to be without spot or blemish; 19and now you are going to make an old rotten rascal a sacrifice”. This piece of wit pleased his Judges, and his sentence was commuted to imprisonment for life. He was confined in Chepstow Castle, Monmouthshire, for twenty years, and died in September, 1680, aged seventy-eight.

He must have felt some contrition for his vicious life, for some time before his death he made this epitaph, by way of acrostic, on himself:

“In Cromwell’s time Chepstow Castle served as a place of imprisonment for Jeremy Taylor; and, after the Restoration, it received a less illustrious occupant in the person of Harry Marten, the Regicide, whose imprisonment here has attracted more than its share of notice in consequence of the foolish lines written by Southey in his days of republicanism and pantisocracy, but which are as untrue in fact as they are mischievous in sentiment. As to the fact, it is notorious that Marten—at all events after the first few years of his imprisonment—was little more than a prisoner on parole; allowed to visit the neighbouring gentry, and occupying at Chepstow Castle, with his family and servants, spacious and comfortable apartments in the tower which still bears his name. As to the sentiment, the lines received their best antidote in the clever parody of Canning and Frere in The Anti-Jacobin.”—Annals of Chepstow Castle, by J. F. Marsh, 1883; 4to.]

[Mrs. Elizabeth Brownrigg was executed at Tyburn on Monday, 14th Sept., 1767, for murdering one of her apprentices, Mary Clifford.—Ed.]

No. II. — SAPPHICS. THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE KNIFE-GRINDER.

In the specimen of Jacobin Poetry which we gave in our last number was developed a principle, perhaps one of the most universally recognised in the Jacobin creed; namely, “that the animadversion of human law upon human actions is for the most part nothing but gross oppression; and that, in all cases of the administration of criminal justice, the truly benevolent mind will consider only the severity of the punishment, without any reference to the malignity of the crime”. This principle has of late years been laboured with extraordinary industry, and brought forward in a variety of shapes, for the edification of the public. It has been inculcated in bulky quartos, and illustrated in popular novels. It remained only to fit it with a poetical dress, which had been attempted in the Inscription for Chepstow Castle, and which (we flatter ourselves) was accomplished in that for Mrs. Brownrigg’s Cell.

Another principle, no less devoutly entertained, and no less sedulously disseminated, is the natural and eternal warfare of the POOR and the RICH. In those orders and gradations of society, which are the natural result of the original difference of talents and of industry among mankind, the Jacobin sees nothing but a graduated scale of violence and cruelty. He considers every rich man as an oppressor, and every person in a lower situation as the victim of avarice, and the slave of aristocratical insolence and contempt. These truths he declares 21loudly, not to excite compassion, or to soften the consciousness of superiority in the higher, but for the purpose of aggravating discontent in the inferior orders.

A human being, in the lowest state of penury and distress, is a treasure to the reasoner of this cast. He contemplates, he examines, he turns him in every possible light, with a view of extracting from the variety of his wretchedness new topics of invective against the pride of property. He, indeed (if he is a true Jacobin), refrains from relieving the object of his compassionate contemplation; as well knowing that every diminution from the general mass of human misery must proportionably diminish the force of his argument.

This principle is treated at large by many authors. It is versified in sonnets and elegies without end. We trace it particularly in a poem by the same author [Southey] from whom we borrowed our former illustration of the Jacobin doctrine of crimes and punishments. In this poem, the pathos of the matter is not a little relieved by the absurdity of the metre. We shall not think it necessary to transcribe the whole of it, as our imitation does not pretend to be so literal as in the last instance, but merely aspires to convey some idea of the manner and sentiment of the original. One stanza, however, we must give, lest we should be suspected of painting from fancy, and not from life.

The learned reader will perceive that the metre is Sapphic, and affords a fine opportunity for his scanning and proving, if he has not forgotten them.

23This is enough; unless the reader should wish to be informed how

Or how, not long after,

We proceed to give our Imitation, which is of the Amœbæan or Collocutory kind.

No. III. — THE INVASION; [11] OR, THE BRITISH WAR SONG.

We have received the following from a loyal correspondent, and we shall be very happy at any time to be relieved, by communications of a similar tendency, from the drudgery of Jacobinical imitations.

[The following Song which furnished the hints for the one above was written by Miles Peter Andrews, M.P. for Bewdley, and a dealer in gunpowder; but his Plays, Prologues, Verses, &c., by no means resemble so active a composition. He, with other members of the “Della Crusca,” was savagely attacked and extinguished by W. Gifford in “The Baviad”. His song was set to music by Sir Henry Bishop. He died in 1814.

No. IV. — LA SAINTE GUILLOTINE. A New Song. ATTEMPTED FROM THE FRENCH. — LINES. — MEETING OF THE FRIENDS OF FREEDOM.

We have been favoured with the following specimen of Jacobin Poetry, which we give to the world without any comment or imitation. We are informed (we know not how truly) that it will be sung at the meeting of the Friends of Freedom; an account of which is anticipated in our present paper.^[12]

31[The following Lines were written by an ardent reformer, W. Roscoe, the accomplished author of the “Life of Leo X.,” and other works, to commemorate the taking of the Bastille (14th July, 1789), and the publication by the National Assembly (on 20th August following) of the famous “Declaration of Rights”—a manifesto which became the creed of the Revolution, and which promulgated, as the basis of social government, the specious but impracticable doctrines of liberty, equality, and the sovereignty of the people exercised by universal suffrage. How the hopes and anticipations of moderate reformers, as embodied in these lines, were falsified by the spoliations and massacres which rapidly followed are but too well known.

When, therefore, the Anti-Jacobin was established to combat the principles of the Revolution, these Lines were, for party purposes, maliciously referred to, and significantly recommended to be “recited on the anniversary of the 14th August”. To make this allusion more clear, it must be remembered that on the 10th August, 1792, after frightful massacres, the Hotel de Ville was seized and the Tuileries stormed. On the 13th the king and family were imprisoned in the Temple. His deposition, the dismissal of the Ministers, and the formation of a National Convention, on more popular principles than the Legislative Assembly, were decreed by the victors. On the 14th Le Brun became Minister for Foreign Affairs, Danton for Justice, and Monge for Marine; while the Girondist Ministers, Roland, Servan, and Clavière, resumed their former functions as Ministers of the Interior, War, and Finance respectively.

The Song, La Sainte Guillotine, was evidently written as a Contrast, and not as a Parody—a few lines at the beginning only excepted, which serve as an introduction to verses on another promised phase of the Revolution, the invasion of England.—Ed.]

[The Account of what was “anticipated to take place at the Meeting of the Friends of Freedom”—alluded to on page 29—duly appeared in The Anti-Jacobin, but has never hitherto formed a part of the collection of its Poetry. As it is marked by much ability, and has been often quoted, it appears to the editor desirable to introduce some portion of it into the present edition of the Poetry.

The House of Russell being given, Lord John and Lord William both rose at once.

Lord John made a very neat, and Lord William a very appropriate speech.

Alderman Coombe made a very impressive speech.

Mr. Tierney made a very pointed speech.

Mr. Grey made a very fine speech. He described the ministers as “bold bad men”—their measures he repeatedly declared to be not only “weak, but wicked”.

Mr. Byng said a few words.

General Tarleton and the Electors of Liverpool being given, the General, after an eulogium on Mr. Fox, begged to anticipate their favourite concluding toast, and to give “The Cause of Freedom all over the World”. This toast unfortunately gave rise to an altercation which threatened to disturb the harmony of the evening. Olaudah Equiano, the African, and Henry Yorke, the mulatto, insisted upon being heard; but as it appeared that they were entering upon a subject which would have entirely altered the complexion of the Meeting, they were, though not without some difficulty, withheld from proceeding further.

33Mr. Erskine rose, in consequence of some allusions which had been made to Trial by Jury. He professed himself to be highly flattered by the encomiums which had been lavished upon him; at the same time he was conscious that he could not, without some degree of reserve, consent to arrogate to himself those qualities which the partiality of his friends had attributed to him. He had, on former occasions, declared himself to be clothed with the infirmities of man’s nature; and he now begged leave in all humility to reiterate that confession; he should never cease to consider himself as a feeble, and with respect to the extent of his faculties in many respects, a finite being—he had ever borne in mind, and he hoped he should ever continue to bear in mind, those words of the inspired Penman, “Thou hast made him less than the angels, to crown him with glory and honour”. These lines were indeed applicable to the state of man in general, but of no man more than himself; they appeared to him pointed and personal, and little less than prophetic; they were always present to his mind; he could wish to wear them in his breast as a sort of amulet against the enchantment of public applause, and the witcheries of vanity and self-delusion; yet if he were indeed possessed of those superhuman powers—all pretensions to which he again begged leave most earnestly to disclaim—if he were endowed with the eloquence of an angel, and with all those other faculties which we attribute to angelic natures, it would be impossible for him to do justice to the eloquence with which the Honourable Gentleman who opened the meeting had defended the Cause of Freedom, identified as he conceived it to be with the persons and government of the Directory. In his present terrestrial state he could only address it as a prayer to God and as counsel to Man that the words which they had heard from that Honourable Gentleman might work inwardly in their hearts, and in due time, produce the fruit of Liberty and Revolution.

He had not the advantage of being personally acquainted with any of the Gentlemen of the Directory; he understood, however, that one of them (Mr. Merlin) previous to the last change, had stood in a situation similar to his own—he was, in fact, nothing less than a leading Advocate and Barrister in the midst of a free, powerful and enlightened people.

The conduct of the Directory with regard to the exiled Deputies had been objected to by some persons on the score of a pretended rigour. For his part he should only say that having been, as he had been, both a Soldier and a Sailor, if it had been his fortune to have stood in either of those two relations to the Directory—as a Man and as a Major-General he should not have scrupled to direct his artillery against the National Representation:—as a Naval Officer he would undoubtedly have undertaken for the removal of the Exiled Deputies; admitting the exigency, under all its relations, as it appeared to him to exist, and the then circumstances of the times, with all their bearings and dependencies, branching out into an infinity of collateral considerations, and involving in each a variety of objects political, physical, and moral; and these again under their distinct and separate heads, ramifying into endless subdivisions which it was foreign to his purpose to consider.

Having thus disposed of this part of his subject, Mr. Erskine passed in a strain of rapid and brilliant allusions over a variety of points characteristic of the conduct and disposition of the present Ministry; Mr. Burke’s metaphor of “the Swinish Multitude,” Mr. Reeves’ metaphor of the “Tree of Monarchy,” “the Battle of Tranent,” “the March to Paris,” the phrase of “Acquitted Felons,” and the exclamation of “Perish Commerce”—which last expression he declared he should never cease to attribute to Mr. Windham; so long, at least, as it should please the Sovereign Dispenser to continue to him the power of utterance and the enjoyment of his present faculties. He condemned the expedition to Quiberon, he regretted the “Fate of Messrs. Muir and Palmer,” he exulted in the “Acquittal of Citizens Tooke, Hardy, Thelwall, Holcroft and others,” and he blessed that Providence to which (as it had been originally allotted to him (Mr. Erskine) the talents which had been exerted in their defence) the preservation of those Citizens might perhaps be indirectly attributed. He then descanted on the captivity of La Fayette, and the Dividend on the Imperial Loan.

After fully exhausting these subjects, Mr. Erskine resumed a topic on which he had only slightly glanced before. In a most delicate and sportive vein of 34humour he contended, that if the people were a Swinish Multitude, those who represented them must necessarily be a Swinish Representation. It would be in vain to attempt to do justice to the polite and easy pleasantry which pervaded this part of Mr. Erskine’s speech. Suffice it to say that the taste of the Audience showed itself in complete unison with the genius of the Orator, and the whole of this passage was crowned with loud and reiterated plaudits. After a speech of unexampled exertion, Mr. Erskine now began to enter much at length into a recital of select passages from our most approved English authors, concluding with a copious extract from the several Publications of the late Mr. Burke; but such were the variety and richness of his quotations which he continued to an extent far exceeding the limits of this paper, that we found ourselves under the necessity, either of considerably abridging our original matter, or omitting them altogether, which latter alternative we adopted the more readily as the greater part of these brilliant citations have already passed through the ordeal of a public and patriotic auditory; and as there is every probability that the circumstances of the times will again call them forth on some future emergency.

Mr. Erskine concluded by recapitulating, in a strain of agonizing and impressive eloquence, the several more prominent heads of his speech:—He had been a Soldier and a Sailor, and had a son at Winchester school—He had been called by Special Retainers, during the summer, into many different and distant parts of the country—travelling chiefly in Post-chaises—He felt himself called upon to declare that his poor faculties were at the service of his Country—of the free and enlightened part of it at least—He stood here as a Man—He stood in the Eye, indeed in the Hand of GOD—to whom (in the presence of the Company and Waiters) he solemnly appealed—He was of Noble, perhaps, Royal Blood—He had a house at Hampstead—was convinced of the necessity of a thorough and radical Reform—His Pamphlet had gone through Thirty Editions—skipping alternately the odd and even numbers—He loved the Constitution, to which he would cling and grapple—And he was clothed with the infirmities of man’s nature—He would apply to the present French Rulers (particularly Barras and Reubel) the words of the poet:—

And for these reasons, thanking the Gentlemen who had done him the honour to drink his Health, he should propose “Merlin, the late Minister of Justice, and Trial by Jury!” Mr. Erskine here concluded a speech which had occupied the attention and excited the applause of his Audience during a space of little less than three hours, allowing for about three quarters of an hour, which were occupied by successive fits of fainting, between the principal subdivisions of his discourse.—Mr. Erskine descended from the Table, and was conveyed down stairs by the assistance of his friends. On arriving at the corner of the Piazzas, they were surprized by a very unexpected embarrassment. Mr. Erskine’s horses had been taken from the carriage, and a number of able Chairmen engaged to supply their place; but these fellows having contrived to intoxicate themselves with the money which the Coachman had advanced to them on account, were become so restive and unruly, so exorbitant in their demands (positively refusing to abide by their former engagement) that Mr. Erskine deemed it unsafe to trust himself in their hands, and determined to wait the return of his own more tractable and less chargeable animals. This unpleasant scene continued for above an hour.

Mr. Sheridan’s health was now drunk in his absence and received with an appearance of general approbation;—when in the midst of the applause Mr. Fox arose, in apparent agitation, and directed the attention of the Company to the rising, manly virtues of Mr. Macfungus.

Mr. Macfungus declared that to pretend he was not elated by the encomiums with which Mr. Fox had honoured him was an affectation which he disdained;—such encomiums would ever form the proudest recompense of his 35patriotic labours—he confessed they were cheering to him—he felt them warm at his heart—and while a single fibre of his frame preserved its vibration, it would throb in unison to the approbation of that Honourable Gentleman. The applause of the Company was no less flattering to him—he felt his faculties invigorated by it, and stimulated to the exertion of new energies in the race of mind. Every other sensation was obliterated and absorbed by it; for the present, however, he would endeavour to suppress his feelings, and concentre his energies for the purpose of explaining to the Company why he assisted now for the first time at the celebration of the Fifth Revolution which had been effected in regenerated France. The various and extraordinary talents of the Right Hon. Gentleman—his vehement and overpowering perception, his vigorous and splendid intuition would for ever attract the admiration of all those who were in any degree endowed with those faculties themselves or capable of estimating them in others; as such, he had ever been among the most ardent admirers, and on many occasions, among the most ardent supporters of the Right Hon. Gentleman—he agreed with him in many points—in his general love of Liberty and Revolution; in his execration of the War; in his detestation of Ministers; but he entertained his doubts, and till those doubts were cleared up, he could not, consistently with his principles, attend at the celebration of any Revolution whatever.

These doubts, however, were now satisfactorily done away. A pledge had been entered into for accomplishing an effectual radical Revolution; not for the mere overthrow of the present System, nor for the establishment of any other in its place; but for the effecting such a series of Revolutions as might be sufficient for the establishment of a Free System.

Mr. Macfungus continued he was incapable of compromising with first principles, of acquiescing in short-sighted temporary palliative expedients: if such had been his temper he should assuredly have rested satisfied with the pledge which that Right Hon. Gentleman had entered into about six months ago on the subject of Parliamentary Reform, in which pledge he considered the promise of that previous and preliminary Revolution, to which he had before alluded, as essentially implicated.

“Whenever this Reform takes place,” exclaimed Mr. Macfungus, “the present degraded and degrading system must fall into dissolution; it must sink and perish with the corruptions which have supported it. The national energies will awake, and shaking off their lethargy as their fetters drop from them, they will follow the Angel of their Revolution, while the Genius of Freedom soaring aloft beneath the orb of Gallic Illumination will brush away as with the wing of an Eagle all the cobwebs of Aristocracy. But before the Temple of Freedom can be erected in their place, the surface which they have occupied must be smoothed and levelled—it must be cleared by repeated Revolutionary Explosions from all the lumber and rubbish with which Aristocracy and Fanaticism will endeavour to encumber it, and to impede the progress of the holy work.—The sacred level, the symbol of Fraternal Equality, must be passed over the whole.—The completion of the Edifice will indeed be the more tardy, but it will not be the less durable for having been longer delayed—Cemented with the blood of tyrants, and the tears of the Aristocracy, it will rise a monument for the astonishment and veneration of future ages. The remotest posterity, with our children yet unborn, and the most distant portions of the Globe, will crowd around its Gates and demand admission into its Sanctuary.—The Tree of Liberty will be planted in the midst of it, and its branches will extend to the ends of the Earth, while the Friends of Freedom meet and fraternize and amalgamate under its consolatory shade. There our Infants shall be taught to lisp in tender accents the Revolutionary Hymn—there with wreaths of myrtle, and oak, and poplar, and vine and olive and cypress and ivy; with violets and roses and daffodils and dandelions in our hands we will swear respect to childhood and manhood and old age, and virginity and womanhood and widowhood; but above all to the Supreme Being.—There we will decree and sanction the Immortality of the Soul.—There pillars and obelisks, and arches and pyramids, will awaken the love of Glory and of our Country.—There Painters and Statuaries, with their chisels and colours, and Engravers with their engraving tools will perpetuate the interesting features of our Revolutionary Heroes; while our Poets and Musicians, with an 36honourable emulation, strive to immortalize their memory. Their bones will be entombed in the Vault below, while their sacred Shades continue hovering over our Heads—those venerated Manes which from time to time will require to be appeased by the blood of the remaining Aristocrats.—Then Peace and Freedom, and Fraternity and Equality will pervade the whole Earth—while the Vows of Republicanism, the Alter of Patriotism, and the Revolutionary Pontiff, with the thrilling volcanic Sympathies, whether of Holy Fury or of ardent Fraternal Civism, uniting and identifying, produce as it were an electric Energy.”

Mr. Macfungus here paused for a few moments, seemingly overpowered by the excess of Sensibility, and the force of the ideas which he was labouring to convey.—The whole Company appeared to sympathize with his unaffected emotions. After a short interval, he recovered himself from a very impressive silence, and continued as follows:

“These prospects, Fellow-Citizens, may possibly be deferred. The Machiavelism of Governments may for the time prevail, and this unnatural and execrable contest may yet be prolonged; but the hour is not far distant; Persecution will only serve to accelerate it, and the blood of Patriotism streaming from the severing axe will call down vengeance on our oppressors in a voice of Thunder. I expect the contest, and I am prepared for it.—I hope I shall never shrink nor swerve nor start aside wherever duty and inclination may place me. My services, my life itself, are at your disposal—Whether to act or to suffer, I am yours—With Hampden in the field, or with Sidney on the scaffold. My example may be more useful to you than my talents: and this head may perhaps serve your cause more effectually, if placed on a pole on Temple Bar, than if it was occupied in organizing your Committees, in preparing your Revolutionary Explosions, and conducting your Correspondence.”

Mr. Macfungus said he should give, as an unequivocal test of his sentiments, “Buonaparte and a Radical Reform”.

The conclusion of Mr. Macfungus’s speech was followed by a simultaneous burst of rapturous approbation from every part of the room. The applause continued for several minutes, during which Mr. Macfungus repeatedly rose to express his feelings.

The conversation now became more mixed and animated; several excellent Songs were sung, and Toasts drank, while the progressive and patriotic festivity of the evening was heightened by the vocal powers of several of the most popular Singers. A new Song written by Captain Morris received its sanction in the warmest expression of applause. The whole company joined with enthusiasm in their old favourite Chorus of Bow! Wow!! Wow!!!]

[Macfungus stands for Sir James Mackintosh, who, after studying medicine in Edinburgh, settled in London, and wrote for the opposition newspapers, particularly the Morning Post, Daniel Stuart, the proprietor, being his father-in-law. The first work that brought him into notice was his Vindiciæ Gallicæ (1791), in reply to Burke’s Reflections on the French Revolution, which splendid philippic it greatly surpassed in philosophic thought, sound feeling, and common sense. It was enthusiastically received by the Liberal party, whose leaders eagerly sought his acquaintance and co-operation; and when the Association of the Friends of the People was formed, he was appointed Secretary. His subsequent successful career as an Advocate, Indian Judge, Member of Parliament, Minister under Lord Grey, and as an English historian, bore out the promise of his youth. He was born in 1765 and died in 1832.—Ed.]

No. V. — THE SOLDIER’S WIFE. — THE SOLDIER’S FRIEND. DACTYLICS. — SONNET.—TO LIBERTY.

We have already hinted at the principle by which the followers of the Jacobinical sect are restrained from the exercise of their own favourite virtue of charity. The force of this prohibition, and the strictness with which it is observed, are strongly exemplified in the following poem. It is the production of the same author [Southey] whose happy effort in English Sapphics we presumed to imitate; the present effusion is in Dactylics, and equally subject to the laws of Latin Prosody.

We think that we see him fumbling in the pocket of his blue pantaloons; that the splendid shilling is about to make its appearance, and to glitter in the eyes, and glad the heart of the poor sufferer. But no such thing—the bard very calmly contemplates her situation, which he describes in a pair of very pathetical stanzas; and after the following well-imagined topic of consolation, concludes by leaving her to Providence.

38We conceived that it would be necessary to follow up this general rule with the particular exception, and to point out one of those cases in which the embargo upon Jacobin bounty is sometimes suspended;^[18] with this view we have subjoined the poem of

No. VI. — THE SOLDIER’S WIFE. [20] — THE COLLECTOR AND THE HOUSEHOLDER. — LATIN VERSES Written immediately after the Revolution of the 4th of September.

We cannot enough congratulate ourselves on having been so fortunate as to fall upon the curious specimens of classical metre and correct sentiment which we have made the subject of our late Jacobinical imitations.

The fashion of admiring and imitating these productions has spread in a surprising degree. Even those who sympathise with the principles of the writer selected as our model, seem to have been struck with the ridicule of his poetry.

There appeared in the Morning Chronicle of Monday a Sapphic Ode, apparently written by a friend and associate of our author, in which he is however travestied most unmercifully. And to make the joke the more pointed, the learned and judicious editor contrived to print the ode en masse, without any order of lines, or division of stanza; so that it was not discovered to be verse till the next day, when it was explained in a hobbling erratum.

We hardly know which to consider as the greater object of compassion in this case—the original Odist, thus parodied by his friend, or the mortified Parodist thus mutilated by his printer. “Et tu, Brute!” has probably been echoed from each of these worthies to his murderer, in a tone that might melt the hardest heart to pity.

We cordially wish them joy of each other, and we resign the modern Lesbian lyre into their hands without envy or repining.

Our author’s Dactylics have produced a second 41imitation (conveyed to us from an unknown hand), with which we take our leave of this species of poetry also.

42[The following is the Sapphic Ode alluded to above, which was intended by the poet of the Morning Chronicle as a “retort courteous” to the Friend of Humanity. The printer of that paper, unfortunately, being new to “such branches of learning,” and not dreaming it could be intended for poetry, printed it as below. The mistake seems to have been immediately discovered, for it re-appeared next day (Dec. 12) in the guise of verse.—Ed.]

H.

Greedy Collector, whither are you going, thus with your inkhorn in your buttonhole, and ledger so snugly underneath your coat? Say, greedy Collector.

C.

Much I rejoice that I have met you here, friend: turn back, I pri’thee, ’tis with you I want to speak; I am come on business of importance—gentle Householder.

H.

Greedy Collector, well I know your business, ’tis for my taxes you are come to dun me; well! ’tis the last time you will have a right to ask me for money. Buggy, no longer do I drive a smart one; smash went my gig, as long [ago] as Easter; down Highgate hill we tumbled altogether, horse, wife, and I, Sir. One broke his knees, and^[23] another broke his collar-bone; there’s an end of pleasuring on Sundays. Take my last payment; there is your two pounds twelve shillings and ninepence.

C.

Gentle householder, much are you mistaken; Order, Religion, Constitution, Laws, and rational freedom, all demand from you a—triple assessment.

H.

Triple Assessment! What beside the old tax?

C.

Certainly: come, deposit, I’m a waiting.

H.

Wait and be damned. What is it you are after?

C.

Ten pounds eleven.

H.

Ten pounds eleven! have I not informed thee gig I have none? I’ve sent it to the hammer; Pay for a gig and not [to] have it!

C.

But you had one at Easter!

H.

Easter is past and gone. I’ll never pay thee.

C.

Gentle Householder, then I must proceed to shew thee a little bit of parchment, called a writ of distringer [for distringas].

 

[Exit Collector to take possession of the Householder’s bed and furniture.

43The verses which we here present to the public were written immediately after the Revolution of the 4th of September. We should be much obliged to any of our classical and loyal correspondents for an English translation of them.

No. VII.

We have been favoured with a translation of the Latin verses inserted in our last Number. We have little doubt that our readers will agree with us, in hoping that this may not be the last contribution which we shall receive from the same hand.^[24]

No. VIII. — THE CHOICE. (FROM THE BATTLE OF SABLA, BY JAAFER BEN ALBA.) — THE DUKE AND THE TAXING-MAN. [27] — EPIGRAM ON THE PARIS LOAN, [32] CALLED THE LOAN UPON ENGLAND.

A correspondent has adapted the beautiful poem of the Battle of Sabla, in “Carlyle’s Specimens of Arabian Poetry,” to the circumstances of the present moment. We shall always be happy to see the poetry of other times and nations so successfully engaged in the service of our country, and of the present order of society.

51The following poem has been transmitted to us, without preface or introduction, by a gentleman of the name of Ireland.^[26] We apprehend from the peculiarities of the style, that it must be the production of a remote period. We are likewise inclined to imagine, that it may contain allusions to some former event in English history. What that event may have been, we must submit to the better judgment and superior information of our readers, from whom we impatiently expect a solution of this interesting question. The editor has been influenced solely by a sense of its poetical merit.

The Poet, with two companions, went forth to plunder the herds of ’Ukail, a neighbour-tribe, and was beset on his way back by detached parties of that tribe in the valley of Sahbal, whom he overcame and reached home safely.

No. IX. — ODE TO ANARCHY.

The following Song is recommended to be sung at all Convivial Meetings, convened for the purpose of opposing the Assessed-Tax Bill. The correspondent who has transmitted it to us informs us that he has tried it with great success among many of his well-disposed neighbours, who had been at first led to apprehend that the 1–20th part of their income was too great a sacrifice for the preservation of the remainder of their property from French Confiscation.

No. X. — LINES, WRITTEN AT THE CLOSE OF THE YEAR 1797. — TRANSLATION OF THE NEW SONG OF THE “ARMY OF ENGLAND”.

For the two following poems we are indebted to unknown correspondents. They could not have reached us at a more seasonable period.

The former, we trust, describes the feelings common to every inhabitant of this country. The second, we know too well, is expressive of the sentiments of our enemies.

No. XI. — EPISTLE TO THE EDITORS OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN. [40] — TO THE AUTHOR OF THE EPISTLE TO THE EDITORS OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN. — ODE TO LORD MOIRA.

We have said in another part of our paper of this day, “that though we shall never begin an attack, we shall always be prompt to repel it”.

On this principle, we could not pass over in silence the Epistle to the Editors of the Anti-Jacobin, which appeared in the Morning Chronicle of Wednesday, and from which we have fortunately been furnished with a motto for this day’s paper.

We assure the author of the epistle, that the answer which we have here the honour to address to him, contains our genuine and undisguised sentiments upon the merits of the poem.

Our conjectures respecting the authors and abettors of this performance may possibly be as vague and unfounded as theirs are with regard to the Editors of the Anti-Jacobin. We are sorry that we cannot satisfy their curiosity upon this subject—but we have little anxiety for the gratification of our own.

It is hardly to be expected, that the character of the epistle should be taken on trust from the editors of this volume; it is thought best, therefore, to subjoin the whole performance as it originally appeared—a mode of hostility obviously the most fair, and in respect to the combatants in the cause of Jacobinism, by much the most effectual. They are always best opposed by the arms which they themselves furnish. Jacobinism shines by its own light.

68To the respectable names which the author of the following address has thought proper to connect with the “Anti-Jacobin,” no apology is made for thus preserving this otherwise perishable specimen of dulness and defamation. He who has been reviled by the enemies of the “Anti-Jacobin,” must feel that principles are attributed to him, of which he need not be ashamed: and when the abuse is conveyed in such a strain of feebleness and folly, he must see that those principles excite animosity only in quarters of which he need not be afraid.

It is only necessary to add, what is most conscientiously the truth, that this production, such as it is, is by far the best of all the attacks that the combined wits of the cause have been able to muster against the “Anti-Jacobin”.

[This Ode, written by George Ellis, refers to the wish of a “Third Party” in the House of Commons, who were dissatisfied with the conduct of the war, the embarrassed state of the finances, and the alarming situation of the country, to have an interview with Lord Moira, with a view to effect a change of Ministry. The following extracts from a letter from his Lordship to Col. M‘Mahon, dated June 15, 1797, will throw some light on this negotiation. “They requested that I would endeavour, on the assurance of their support, to form an administration, on the principle of excluding persons, who had on either side made themselves obnoxious to the public. I strenuously recommended them to form an alliance with Mr. Fox’s party, that might be satisfactory to themselves, and reduce to strict engagement the extent of the measures, which Mr. Fox, when brought into office by themselves, would propose. Hitherto nobody has been designated to any particular office but Sir William Pulteney. The gentleman had said that he was the person whom they should be most gratified in seeing Chancellor of the Exchequer, and I had professed to them and to him that there was not any person with whom I could act more confidently. I added, the introduction of Lord Thurlow, Sir W. Pulteney, and myself, into the Cabinet, would not assure the public of a change of system.”—Ed.]

82

No. XII. — A BIT OF AN ODE TO MR. FOX. [82]

The following Ode[A] was dropped into the letterbox in our Publisher’s window. From its title—“A Bit of an Ode to Mr. Fox”—we were led to imagine there was some mistake in the business, and that it was meant to have been conveyed to Mr. Wright’s neighbour, Mr. Debrett, whom we recollected to have been the Publisher of the “Half of a Letter” to the same gentleman, which occasioned so much noise (of horse-laughing) in the world. Our politics certainly do not entitle us to the honourable distinction of being made the channel for communicating such a production to the public. But, for our parts, as we are “not at war with genius,” on whatever side we find it, we are happy to give this Poem the earliest place in our Paper; and shall be equally ready to pay the same attention to any future favours of the same kind, and from the same quarter.

The Poem is a free translation, or rather, perhaps, imitation, of the twentieth Ode of the second Book of Horace. We have taken the liberty to subjoin the passages of which the parallel is the most striking.

[The charge of Fox’s having sent Adair to St. Petersburg, to counteract the measures of Pitt’s government, first broached in Mr. Burke’s “Letter on the Conduct of the Minority,” has been vigorously contradicted, yet so late as April, 1854, it was alluded to as a fact by Lord Malmesbury in the House of Peers. It was, however, on this occasion again authoritatively denied by Lord Campbell, who took occasion to observe that Sir Robert Adair was “now in his 90th year, and for many years had served his country with great assiduity and fidelity. He had been sent by successive ministers [Mr. Fox, Lord Grey, Mr. Canning (who assisted in libelling him so often in the pages of the present work), Lord Wellesley, Lord Palmerston, the Duke of Wellington] to Vienna, to Constantinople, to Brussels, and to Berlin, and had represented the Crown of England upon some occasions of very great importance, in which he had uniformly acquitted himself to the satisfaction of the Government and for the benefit of his country. He believed a more honourable man had not lived in this country at any time.”

The following denial by Sir Robert Adair himself is copied from his autograph statement, prefixed to the Life of Wilberforce, published in 1838:—“This idle story is here accredited by Mr. Wilberforce, and inserted by his sons, without due examination. It was grounded on a journey I made to Vienna and St. Petersburg in 1791. Doctor Prettyman [sic], Bishop of Winchester, in a work entitled The Life of the Right Hon. William Pitt, published by him in 1823, brought forward the fact of my having gone upon this journey as a criminal charge against Mr. Fox, who, as he pretends, sent me upon it with the intent of counteracting some negociations then carrying on between Great Britain and Russia at St. Petersburg. I answered his accusation, I trust successfully, in two letters published by Longman & Co. [Two Letters from Mr. Adair to the Bp. of Winchester, in answer to the charge of a High Treasonable Misdemeanour brought by his Lordship against Mr. Fox and himself in his Life of the Rt. Hon. W. Pitt, 8vo., 1821], and explained the circumstances which induced me in my travels in 1791 to visit the two capitals above mentioned.—Robert Adair: 1838.”

87The “Mission” was, however, firmly believed in, and Pitt was urged, but in vain, by the Duke of Richmond and others of the Government, to arrest Fox for high treason.

The following extract from the Political Memoranda of Francis, fifth Duke of Leeds, now first printed from the Originals in the British Museum; edited by Oscar Browning, for the Camden Society, 1884, is an illustration of the rumours current at the time, and many years after.

“Saty. 24 Novr. 1792. Lord St. Helens dined with me. After the Ladies were gone upstairs we conversed, for some time on Foreign affairs.... Speaking of the Russian business of last year he reprobated in the strongest terms the conduct of Fox in sending an agent, Mr. Adair, to Petersburg to counteract the negociations of this Court at that of Russia. He told me he knew for certain that Mr. Adair had shewn to some English merchants at Petersburg the Empress’ Picture set in diamonds which had been given to him. That it was not one of the sort usually given, but of much greater value, being set round with large Brilliants, and the whole Picture covered with a Table Diamond instead of Chrystal. That this was a present seldom made but on some very particular occasion or to some great favorite (I remember to have seen such a one in the possession of P. Orlow). Ld. St. H. thought it must have been worth six or seven thousand pounds, and of too much value probably to have been meant for Mr. Adair. The conclusion we both very naturally drew from this circumstance was not very favorable to Mr. Fox.”

The following additional particulars relating to the connection between Fox and Adair may not be thought out of place here. They are extracted from the highly interesting and important Croker Papers, being the Correspondence and Diaries, 1809–1830, of the Rt. Hon. J. W. Croker, M.P., Edited by Louis J. Jennings. M.P., 3 vols., 8vo., 1884.

The first is in these terms: “When Adair, whose father was a surgeon, went as Fox’s Ambassador to Russia, Lord Whitworth, then the King’s Minister, made a good joke, which tended not a little to lower Adair, and defeat his object. ‘Est-ce un homme très considérable, ce M. d’Adair?’ asked the Empress. ‘Pas trop, Madame,’ replied Lord Whitworth, ‘quoique son père était grand seigneur [saigneur].’” The other is taken from a very long statement on various matters, made by K. George IV., when Prince of Wales, to Croker personally. Adair’s wife, the Prince said, was a Frenchwoman with whom Andreossi, when here as Buonaparte’s Minister, intrigued. The Duchess of Devonshire told him—the Prince of Wales—that Mrs. Adair had offered her a bribe of £10,000 down, and as much more whenever she might want it, if she would communicate the Cabinet secrets, with which the French thought she could not fail to be acquainted, through her intimacy with all the leaders of the Government. This caused a breach between Fox and Adair. But the former could only tell Adair that an obstacle—which he could neither reveal nor overcome, but which did not affect or alter Fox’s personal regard for him—prevented his appointment to be Fox’s Under-Secretary of State.—Croker Papers, i. 293.—Ed.]

No. XIII. — ACME AND SEPTIMIUS; OR, THE HAPPY UNION CELEBRATED AT THE CROWN AND ANCHOR TAVERN. — MR. FOX’S BIRTH-DAY.

[The following account of the celebration of Fox’s Birth-day, printed in the Anti-Jacobin, has not hitherto appeared in the editions of the Poetry. The Song by Mr. Fox refers to the Subscription raised, after a meeting at the Crown and Anchor, in the summer of 1793, for relieving him in his then present need, and purchasing an Annuity for him. A Caricature by Gillray on this meeting was published on the 12th June, 1793.

The public, distracted with the various accounts of the celebration of Mr. Fox’s Birth-day, naturally turn to us for an authentic detail of that important event—from a recollection of the correct and impartial statement we gave in a former Number, of what passed at a Meeting of the Friends of Freedom [page 32].

To justify their confidence, we have had recourse to the Morning Post and Morning Chronicle (the Courier being too stupid for our purpose), whose statements we have carefully read, and corrected from the information of several gentlemen who were present. We are thus enabled to lay before our readers a genuine narrative of the whole proceeding, which we defy the tongue of Slander to controvert in any material point.

As Mr. Fox’s reputation had been for some time on the decline, it was thought necessary by the party (who are in great want of a Head) to make as respectable an appearance as possible on the present occasion. It was therefore suggested (at a previous meeting of confidential friends) that if the unfortunate shyness which subsisted between the Whig Club and the Corresponding Society could be opportunely removed by a few unimportant concessions on the part of the former, such a number of citizens might be readily procured from that respectable body as would serve to give the day an éclat it had not experienced since the fatal schism of 1792.

This hint, so reasonable in itself, was immediately adopted, and Sir Francis Burdett, who was well acquainted with their haunts, was ordered into the neighbourhood of Smithfield with a competent number of tickets. He was on the point of setting out, when the Editor of the Morning Post observed, that forgery^[106] was so common at present, that he hardly thought it prudent to admit all who might come with a bit of scribbled paper: on this it was determined to distribute the price of admission amongst a certain number of people to be selected by the Envoy:—these, it was rightly concluded, would not fail to appear, from motives of vanity, as they could have no other possible chance of dining with the Premier Dupe, we would say Duke, in England. It now remained to determine the sum: this, after a short discussion, was fixed at Eight Shillings and Sixpence per head, “which,” said the Editor of the Morning Post, “will shew we cannot he persons of mean rank, since we can afford, in hard times, to give so much for a dinner”;^[107] and Citizen Bosville was desired to advance the money upon the credit of the Whig Fund.

Previous to the meeting, the chairman dispatched a note to Sir William Addington, requesting that the Crown and Anchor might be exempted from the visitation of his runners during the morning of the 24th [Jan., 1798]. To this Sir William assented, on condition that it should be recommended to the 91gentlemen, to leave their pocket-books and watches at home, that there might be as little temptation as possible to break the peace. Thus everything was arranged with a precaution that seemed to set accident at defiance.

Before four o’clock the passage to the LARGE ROOM was crammed, when, on a hint that dinner was on the point of being served, one of the head waiters advanced to the great door, and opened a wicket for the admission of the company, as fast as they paid down their money. Two or three had already passed in good order, when Mr. John Nicholls advanced, and instead of 8s. 6d., produced to the astonished receiver, seventeen of his PRINTED SPEECHES, which, valuing them at sixpence a-piece, he contended would make up the sum required. These “assets” however, were absolutely rejected; and a violent dispute was on the point of commencing, when Sir Christopher Hawkins stept forward, and whispering a few words, which we did not hear, obtained leave for his friend to pass. The Speeches were therefore deposited, and Mr. Nicholls was already got within the wicket, when the man suddenly pulled him back by the coat, and the dispute recommenced with more violence than ever. Upon inquiry into the cause of this new tumult, we found that a wag (whom we afterwards discovered to be Mr. Jekyll) had played the member for Tregony a trick; having taken an opportunity, in the crowd, of extracting the genuine speeches from the pocket of the Honourable Member, and replacing them by the same number of the spurious ones, printed for Mr. Wright, the publisher of this Paper. These the waiter very properly refused to receive, alleging, and indeed truly, that instead of six pence a-piece, the whole seventeen were not worth six farthings.

This altercation continued so long, that the company grew impatient; and Mr. Bryan Edwards, a little ashamed of his friend, who still continued obstinate, offered to furnish his quota. Harmony now seemed to be restored, when all at once a cry of astonishment broke forth that beggars all description. On putting his hand into his pocket for the price of admission, Mr. E. suddenly turned pale, and exclaimed, “by G—, gentlemen, some of you have picked my pockets!” A hundred voices instantly repeated the same cry, and a dreadful scene of confusion and uproar took place.

What the consequence would have been, it is impossible to say, had not the waiter, with an air of authority, commanded the doors to be shut at each end of the passage, and every man to exhibit the contents of his pocket. A faint cry of No! No! was over-ruled; and Sir Francis Burdett produced an old Red Cap from the bosom of his shirt, which he put into the hands of the Duke of Bedford, who was appointed collector-general by acclamation. With this his Grace went, from man to man, executing his duty with the utmost fairness and impartiality; and when he had finished, poured out the contents of the cap before them all. These, it must be confessed, were a little heterogeneous, consisting, besides a large sum of money, of a brass knocker (this was immediately claimed by the landlord), a pewter pot squeezed together, a pair of pattens, a pint decanter, a duck ready trussed for dressing, a great quantity of potatoes, and a vinegar cruet. What was most extraordinary was, that though, as his Grace afterwards declared, the money was found in very unequal portions, yet the total sum, which was £222, 5s. 6d., being divided among the company, amounting to 523 persons, produced 8s. 6d. for each individual, with the exception of the Member for Tregony, who brought nothing but his speech, and Capt. Morris, who pays for everything with a Song.

Nothing material occurred during the Dinner, which was allowed to be excellent of its kind, and where no such dish as Cow-heel (as maliciously reported in The True Briton) made its appearance.

As soon as the cloth was removed, the Duke of Norfolk took the Chair amidst repeated plaudits,^[108] and addressed the Company in these words:

“Three virtuous Men, Citizens, have stood up in defence of Liberty—Maximilian Robespierre, Collot D’Herbois, and Charles James Fox:—The first is guillotined; the second transported to Cayenne; and the third”——Here 92all eyes were immediately upon Mr. Fox, who now entered the room, supported by Citizens John Gale Jones and John Horne Tooke—“As the Right Hon. Gentleman (resumed the Duke, a little peevishly) has mistaken his cue, and appeared sooner than he ought, I shall spare his modesty the panegyric I was preparing, and shortly conclude with proposing the health of Charles James Fox.”—This was drank with three times three.

As soon as the clamour had subsided, Mr. Fox arose and said, “That language, at least any which he could boast, was inadequate to the exquisite feelings of gratitude which at once delighted and oppressed him, at the sight of so numerous and so respectable a body of free and independent Citizens, met for a purpose which would make this the proudest and the happiest day of his life”. Having dwelt a little on this idea, Mr. Fox observed, “that he would not interrupt the conviviality of the day by a long Speech: he knew there were several present who came to hear him make a long Speech, but he would not make a long Speech—to what purpose should he do it?—what could he add to the Speech lately delivered by him, and so faithfully recorded in the Anti-Jacobin, a contemptible Publication, but one to which the praise of Accuracy could not be denied. The new and extraordinary circumstances of the times called for new and extraordinary measures: he would, therefore, if they pleased, compress what he had to say into a Song—(loud applauses)—One word only.—He owed both the burden and the idea of this Song to the Morning Chronicle. He had yesterday, the 23rd, found there A begging Address to the Nation, with Date Obolum Belisario prefixed to it as a Motto. This had pleased him much, and this morning at breakfast he had endeavoured to adapt it, mutatis mutandis, to his own circumstances: he should now have the honour of giving it.”

We know not how far Mr. Fox might have proceeded, had he not been interrupted by a jangling of bells from the Side-table which immediately drew all eyes that way. This proceeded from Capt. Morris, who had fallen asleep 93during Mr. Fox’s Song, and was now nodding on his chair, with a large paper Cap on his head, ornamented with gilt tassels and bells, which one of the company had dexterously whipped on unperceived. The first motion was that of indignation; but the stupid stare of the unconscious Captain, who half opened his eyes at every sound of the bells as his head rose or fell, and immediately closed them again, somno vinoque gravatus, had such a powerful effect on the risible faculties of the Company, that they broke, as if by consent, into the most violent and convulsive fits of laughter; Mr. Fox himself not being exempt from the general contagion.

As soon as the Captain was made sensible of the cause of this uproar, he attempted to pull off the Cap, but was prevented by a Citizen from the Corresponding Society, who maintained that the Company had a right to be amused by the Captain in what manner they pleased; and that, as he seemed to amuse them more effectually in that state than in any other, he insisted, for one, on his continuing to wear the Cap. This was universally agreed to, with the exception of the Duke of Norfolk. The Captain was therefore led to the upper table, with all his “jangling honours loud upon him!” Here, as soon as he was seated, his Noble Friend called upon him for a Song.

The Captain sang the “Plenipo” in his best manner.

This was received with great applause; and then the Duke gave “The Defenders—of Ireland”—(three times three).

Captain Morris then began

but was interrupted, before he had finished the first line, by Mr. Tierney, who declared he would not sit there and hear anything like ridicule on the Bible.^[110]—(Much coughing and scraping.)—Mr. Erskine took God to witness, that he thought the Captain meant no harm;—and a gentleman from Cambridge, whose name we could not learn, said, with great naïveté, that it was no more than was done every day by his acquaintance. Mr. Tierney, however, persisted in his opposition to the Song, and Captain Morris was obliged to substitute “Jenny Sutton” in the place of it.

But the good humour of the company was already broken in upon, and Mr. Tierney soon after left the room (to which he did not return) with greater marks of displeasure in his face than we ever remember to have seen there.

The Duke now gave Radical Reform (three times three, followed by continued shouts of applause).

A Counsellor Jackson attempted to sing “Paddy Whack,” but was soon silenced, on account of his stupid perversion of the words, and his bad voice.

Citizen Gale Jones then rose and said—that he was no Orator, though he got his living by oratory, being Chairman of a Debating Society. He had also written a book—which he was told had some merit. He did not rise to recommend it, but he thought it right to hint, that those who wished for Constitutional information might be supplied with it at the Bar; the price was trifling—Eighteen-pence was nothing to the majority of the Company;—to himself, indeed—(here Mr. Horne Tooke called out Order! Order! with some marks of impatience)—He begged pardon, he would say no more—there was no one whom he valued like Mr. Tooke, there was no one indeed to whom he was under such obligations; the very shoes he had on were charged by Citizen Hardy to Mr. Tooke’s account—Mr. Tooke was also a great friend to a Radical Reform—he loved a Radical Reform himself; the Poor must always love Radical Reforms—he should therefore beg leave to propose the health of Mr. John Horne Tooke.—(Three times three.)

Mr. Tooke rose, and spoke nearly as follows: “You all know, Citizens, in what detestation I once held the Man whose Birth-day we are now met to commemorate. You cannot yet have forgot the ‘Two Pair of Portraits’ I formerly published, nor the glaring light in which I hung up him and his father to the execration of an indignant posterity. You must also be apprized of the charges of Corruption, Insurrection, and Murder (much hissing and applause, 94the latter predominant) which I brought against him, justly, as I must still think, at a former Election for Westminster. How happens it then, you will say, that I now come forward to do him honour? I will tell you. At the last Election for Westminster, I had still my suspicions of his sincerity; he appeared too anxious to preserve measures with the spruce and powdered Aristocrats who usually attended him to the Hustings; nor was it till the fourth or fifth day before the close of the Poll, that those suspicions were removed. Aware that he was losing ground among the People, he determined to make one great effort to re-establish his popularity. He therefore came forward, and addressed the free and independent Electors in front of the Hustings, in a Speech, of which the remembrance yet warms my heart. From that moment, I marked him as my own! Retractation was impossible; and the panegyric he lately delivered on a Radical Reform, in a House which I despise too much to name, was the natural and inevitable consequence of that day’s declaration. You may remember, that when I addressed my Friends, I only said, ‘Gentlemen, Mr. Fox has spoken my sentiments; he has even gone beyond them—but I thank him’.—What I then said I now repeat, with regard to his Speech on a late occasion—‘I am most perfectly satisfied with his conduct; nor do I wish to advance one step in the cause of reform, beyond what Mr. Fox has pledged himself to go!!!’”^[111]

Mr. Tooke then begged leave to propose Mr. Fox’s health for the second time, and sat down amidst a thunder of applause.^[112]

The Duke of Norfolk observed to the Company, that as they had drunk the health of a Man dear to the People, he would now call upon them to drink the health of their Sovereign^[113]—here a hiccup interrupted his Grace, and a most violent cry of “No Sovereign! no Sovereign!” resounded through the room, and continued for several minutes, notwithstanding the earnest entreaties of the Duke to be heard. Order was, however, restored at length, when his Grace gently chid the Company for taking advantage of a slight infirmity of nature, to impute a design to him which was wholly foreign from his heart—(loud applause). He augured well, however, of their patriotism, and would now afford them an opportunity of repairing the injury they had done him, by giving the Toast as he intended—“The Health of our Sovereign—the Majesty of the People”.^[114]—(Loud and incessant shouts of applause.)

A disgusting scene of uproar and confusion followed, which we shall not attempt to detail. The Chairman sank under the table in a state of stupefaction, and the rest of the Company, maddened alike with noise and wine, committed a thousand outrages, till they were literally turned into the streets by the Waiters. As many of them as could speak were conducted home by the watchmen; others were conveyed “in silent majesty” to the Round-house; and not a few of them slept out the remainder of the night upon the steps of the neighbouring houses. The Reporters of the Jacobin Papers were sought out, and conveyed home by the pressmen, devils, &c., and one poor youth, whom we afterwards found to be a Writer in the Morning Chronicle (hired for the day by The True Briton)^[115] had his pockets picked of a clean white Handkerchief and a Notebook, after being severely beaten for deserting his former Employers.

No. XIV. — TO THE AUTHOR OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN. — LINES. Written under the Bust of Charles Fox at the Crown and Anchor. — LINES. Written by a Traveller at Czarco-zelo under the Bust of a certain Orator, once placed between those of Demosthenes and Cicero.

It has been our invariable custom to suppress such of our correspondents’ favours as conveyed any compliments to ourselves; and we have deviated from it in the present instance, not so much out of respect to the uncommon excellence of the Poem before us, as because it agrees so intimately with the general design of our paper—to expose the deformity of the French Revolution, to counteract the detestable arts of those who are seeking to introduce it here, and above all, to invigorate the exertions of our countrymen against every Foe, foreign and domestic, by showing them the immense and inexhaustible resources they yet possess in British Courage and British Virtue!

To make our readers some amends for this miserable doggrel, we will present them, in our turn, with some lines written under a bust, NOT at the Crown and Anchor, by an English traveller just returned from Petersburgh. We believe they are more just; we are certain they are more poetical.

101

No. XV. — THE PROGRESS OF MAN. [121] — CANTO FIRST.

Contents.—The Subject proposed.—Doubts and Waverings.—Queries not to be answered.—Formation of the stupendous Whole.—Cosmogony; or the Creation of the World:—the Devil—Man—Various Classes of Being:—Animated Beings—Birds—Fish—Beasts—the Influence of the Sexual Appetite—on Tigers—on Whales—On Crimpt Cod—on Perch—on Shrimps—on Oysters.—Various Stations assigned to different Animals:—Birds—Bears—Mackerel.—Bears remarkable for their fur—Mackerel cried on a Sunday—Birds do not graze—nor Fishes fly—nor Beasts live in the Water.—Plants equally contented with their lot:—Potatoes—Cabbage—Lettuce—Leeks—Cucumbers.—Man only discontented—born a Savage; not choosing to continue so, becomes polished—resigns his Liberty—Priest-craft—King-craft—Tyranny of Laws and Institutions.—Savage Life—description thereof:—The Savage free—roaming Woods—feeds on Hips and Haws—Animal Food—first notion of it from seeing a Tiger tearing his prey—wonders if it is good—resolves to try—makes a Bow and Arrow—kills a Pig—resolves to roast a part of it—lights a fire—Apostrophe to fires—Spits and Jacks not yet invented.—Digression.—Corinth—Sheffield.—Love, the most natural desire after Food.—Savage Courtship.—Concubinage recommended.—Satirical Reflections on Parents and Children—Husbands 103and Wives—against collateral Consanguinity.—Freedom the only Morality, &c. &c. &c.

We are sorry to be obliged to break off here. The remainder of this admirable and instructive Poem is in the press, and will be continued the first opportunity.

[The following is the commencement of Knight’s poem:—

[Eminent as Richard Payne Knight was as a classical scholar and archæologist, his poetical powers were not highly appreciated by his literary contemporaries, as is amusingly shown in a letter from Horace Walpole, dated 22nd March, 1796, to the Rev. W. Mason, in which he declares how much he is “offended and disgusted by Mr. Knight’s new, insolent, and self-conceited poem”. He winds up thus: “I send you a parody on two lines of Mr. Knight, which will show you that his poem is seen in its true light by a young man of allowed parts, Mr. Canning, whom I never saw. The originals are the two first lines at the top of page 5:”—

It is evident from this that Canning had thought of parodying the poem immediately after its publication, and that Walpole had seen a specimen in manuscript, nearly two years before its publication in the Anti-Jacobin, in which the two lines (28, 29) are thus altered:—

By an oversight, Peter Cunningham, in his edition of Walpole’s Letters, attributes the latter’s attack to a previous production of Knight’s, published in 1794, entitled The Landscape: a didactic Poem in three Books, a work which had excited Walpole’s high indignation by expressing opinions opposed to his own.—Ed.]

No. XVI. — PROGRESS OF MAN.

The specimen of the poem on the “Progress of Man,” with which we favoured our Readers in our last Number, has occasioned a variety of letters, which we confess have not a little surprised us, from the unfounded, and even contradictory charges they contain. In one, we are accused of Malevolence, in bringing back to notice a work that had been quietly consigned to oblivion;—in another, of Plagiarism, in copying its most beautiful passages;—in a third, of Vanity, in striving to imitate what was in itself inimitable, &c., &c. But why this alarm? has the author of the “Progress of Civil Society” an exclusive patent for fabricating Didactic poems? or can we not write against Order and Government without incurring the guilt of Imitation? We trust we were not so ignorant of the nature of a didactic poem (so called from didaskein, to teach, and poema, a poem; because it teaches nothing, and is not poetical) even before the “Progress of Civil Society” appeared, but that we were capable of such an undertaking.

We shall only say further, that we do not intend to proceed regularly with our Poem; but having the remaining thirty-nine Cantos by us, shall content ourselves with giving, from time to time, such extracts as may happen to suit our purpose.

The following passage, which, as the reader will see by turning to the Contents prefixed to the head of the Poem, is part of the First Canto, contains so happy a 108deduction of Man’s present state of Depravity, from the first slips and failings of his Original State, and inculcates so forcibly the mischievous consequences of social or civilized, as opposed to natural society, that no dread of imputed imitation can prevent us from giving it to our readers.

No. XVII. — IMITATION, &c. [152] — THE NEW COALITION. [157] — The Honey-Moon of Fox and Tooke.

We are obliged to a learned correspondent for the following ingenious imitation of Bion.—We will not shock the eyes of our fair readers with the original Greek, but the following Argument will give them some idea of the nature of the Poem here imitated.

Venus is represented as bringing to the Poet, while sleeping, her son Cupid, with a request that he would teach him Pastoral Poetry—Bion complies, and endeavours to teach him the rise and progress of that art:—Cupid laughs at his instructions, and in his turn teaches his master the Loves of Men and Gods, the Wiles of his Mother, &c.—“Pleased with his lessons,” says Bion, “I forgot what I lately taught Cupid and recollect in its stead only what Cupid taught me.”

Something like the same idea seems to have dictated the following Stanzas, which appear to be a loose imitation of the beautiful Dialogue of Horace and Lydia, and for which, though confessedly in a lower style of poetry, and conceived rather in the slang, or Brentford dialect, than in the classical Doric of the foregoing Poem, we have many thanks to return to an ingenious academical correspondent.

[Another version of this Ode published in the Anti-Jacobin Review, vol. 1, pp. 597–8 (the successor to the Anti-Jacobin), may perhaps not be considered out of place here. It was written by the Rev. C. E. Stewart, a constant contributor to the former journal.

118

No. XVIII. — ODE.

We are indebted for the following exquisite imitation of one of the most beautiful Odes of Horace, to an unknown hand. All that we can say is, that it came to us in a blank cover sealed with a ducal coronet, and that it appears evidently to be the production of a mind not more classical than convivial.

[The preceding Ode, written in the character of Charles Howard, eleventh Duke of Norfolk, refers to the famous toast, “Our Sovereign’s health—the Majesty of the People,” proposed by his Grace at a Banquet at the “Crown and Anchor Tavern,” Strand, on the 24th January, 1798, given to celebrate the birth-day of C. J. Fox. For this toast and other sentiments promulgated at the meeting, his Grace a few days after received notice of his dismissal from the Lord-Lieutenancy of the West Riding of Yorkshire and his Colonelcy in the Militia, and on the 6th of February Earl Fitzwilliam was gazetted to the former office, vice the Duke of Norfolk, resigned. But sixteen years earlier, this Toast was not considered seditious; for in the General Advertiser of the 13th of April, 1782, then edited by Perry (afterwards the eminent proprietor of the Morning Chronicle), we find an account of a dinner of the electors of Westminster held the preceding day at the Shakespeare Tavern, Earl Fitzwilliam in the chair. The first toast given by his Lordship was, “The Majesty of the People”. It was drunk by the Earl of Effingham, the Earl of Surrey (afterwards Duke of Norfolk, and the subject of the present remarks), Mr. Secretary Fox, Burke, Windham, Dean Jebb, J. Churchill, Brand Hollis, Dr. Brocklesby, &c. Thus the identical toast was proposed and drunk by the Earl of Fitzwilliam, to whom the Lord-Lieutenancy now taken from the Duke of Norfolk was given. It is not a little remarkable that Lord Fitzwilliam himself was dismissed by his new Tory allies, Oct. 23, 1819, from the same Lord-Lieutenancy of the West Riding of Yorkshire, having signed the requisition for the York meeting, at which resolutions were passed condemning the measures of Ministers (Lords Liverpool, Eldon, Bathurst, Castlereagh, Palmerston, &c.), respecting the Manchester Reform Meeting, called by Henry Hunt, on 16th August, at which occurred what is known as the “Peterloo Massacre”.—Ed.]

The company was a very large one, but the estimated number of 2000 diners is surely an error. The Duke of Norfolk presided, supported by the Duke of Bedford, the Earls of Lauderdale and Oxford, Sheridan, Tierney, Erskine, Capt. Morris (who produced three new songs for the occasion), and Horne Tooke; the latter became reconciled to Fox by the explanation the latter gave of his sentiments on parliamentary reform. On the cloth being removed, he rose and said, “We are met in a moment of most serious difficulty to celebrate the birth of a man dear to the friend of freedom. I shall only recall to your memory that not twenty years ago, the illustrious George Washington had not more than two thousand men to rally round him when his country was attacked. America is now free. This day full two thousand men are assembled in this place. I leave the application to you. I propose to you the health of Charles James Fox.”

In the course of the evening the Duke’s health was drunk with great enthusiasm. 123He returned thanks, and concluded his speech with these words, “Give me leave to call on you to drink, Our Sovereign’s health,

After this toast had been drunk and warmly applauded, the Duke gave successively, “The Rights of the People,” “Constitutional Redress of the Wrongs of the People,” “A speedy and effectual Reform in the Representation of the People in Parliament,” “The genuine Principles of the British Constitution,” “The People of Ireland, and may they be speedily restored to the Blessings of Law and Liberty”.

On the 6th of February, the next monthly meeting of the Whig Club was held at the London Tavern, Ludgate Hill. The Duke of Norfolk presided. He gave as a toast, “The Man who dares be honest in the worst of times—

Fox returned thanks, and then toasted

He subsequently proposed the health of the Duke of Norfolk in a most powerful speech. He adverted to the dismissal of the Duke. “No reason had been officially assigned; it was, however, generally understood that it had arisen from the eulogium pronounced on General Washington. Was it to be wondered at, that the noble Duke, who had uniformly opposed the American war, should have done so? What Englishman, what man of any country, whose heart was animated with a love of freedom, did not venerate the name of that illustrious patriot? It seems also “a toast” has given offence—the Majesty of the People. I do not know upon what times we are fallen, but the sovereignty of the people of Great Britain is surely a thing not new to the language, to the feelings, nor the hearts of Englishmen. It is the basis of the whole system of our Government. It is an opinion, which if it be not true, King William was an usurper. By what right did the glorious and immortal King William the Third, whose portrait is placed on our chair, come to the throne of these realms, if not by that of the sovereignty of the people?... The King holds his title by an Act of Parliament. Who called that Parliament? King William the Third. By what right did he obtain it? By a Convention representing the sovereignty of the people. The Convention of Representatives in fact did the thing. It is whimsical enough to deprive the noble Duke of his appointments for an offence which, if he had not committed during the reigns of George I. and George II., would have subjected him to the charge of being a Jacobite, and an adherent of the exiled family.... Of the persons of his Majesty’s Ministers I will not say a word. There are several of them to whom I may fairly say this sentiment is not new. One member of the Cabinet (the Duke of Portland) is still a member of this club; another (Mr. Windham) was a member; and a third (Earl Spencer) long gloried in holding the same tenets. How often with the two first have we drunk the sentiment in this room! What did they mean when they drank the Sovereignty of the People? What, but that they recognised by this approved and customary method a truth which belongs to all people in reality, but is the avowed basis of the Government of England, that the people of every country are its legitimate Sovereign, and that all authority is delegated from and for them? I should be ashamed, on account of my old respect for those persons, if they did not honestly avow this to be their sense of the sentiment.”

While adverting, on this occasion, to the dismissal of the Duke of Norfolk from his Lord-Lieutenancy and Colonelcy of Militia, Fox remarked, “I have nothing the Ministers can take from me. I am still indeed a Privy Councillor, at least I know nothing to the contrary; and if this sentiment entitles the Noble Duke to this animadversion, I shall certainly feel that I am equally entitled to this mark of his Majesty’s displeasure.” This anticipation was verified shortly afterwards.

On the 1st of May following, at the Freemasons’ Tavern, another dinner of the Whig Club took place. Fox was in the chair, and gave, as the first toast—

124The Duke of Norfolk proposed “The Health of the Man who dares be Honest in the worst of Times—

Fox responded in a most impressive speech. He said: “On any other occasion, he should have contented himself with returning thanks, but in the very peculiar embarrassments in which the country was now plunged, he thought it necessary to say a few words in the only place in which he thought it might be useful for him to deliver his sentiments. The circumstances and events of public affairs of late had induced him and many of his friends to abstain from their usual assiduous attendance in Parliament. Their exertions for the preservation of the Constitution had been of no avail; two years ago they had seen the repeal of the Bill of Rights carried by a triumphant majority; they had seen the functions of the Constitutional Law suspended, on alarm created by the Ministers themselves; and however well-founded the alarm might now be, he scorned the idea that it was necessary for him to attend in his place in the House of Commons, for the purpose only of vindicating himself from the vulgar calumny that he was not an enemy to a foreign invasion. It would be an insult on his whole life if such a declaration could be expected from him. He believed there was not a voice in the assembly he addressed which was not in unison with his own—namely, that every man who heard him was both ready and willing to stand forth in defence of his country, with the spirit that belongs to Englishmen. He found no fault with those who thought it necessary to make these professions elsewhere. Thus much only would he say in this place for himself. The present Government of the country, he had no hesitation in saying, was a Government of Tyranny. They had adopted the principles of Robespierre, and their object was to establish tyranny in England. Look at the situation of the Sister Kingdom; our own will soon be the same. He had no remedy to recommend but that the friends of freedom should be united and firm, and wait for better times. Tyranny was now the order of the day in every country in Europe. Notwithstanding the arbitrary proceedings of our own Ministers, he was persuaded the unanimous feeling of the country, the universal determination of every man in it was to be ready to take the field against a foreign foe; and, indeed, they had a powerful motive to do so, for if they were united, they had a better chance to get rid of the tyranny of their own Ministers than they could possibly have by the success of a foreign invasion. Even in his present retirement he should be ready to come forward, in every constitutional effort, to regain our lost liberties; and he should be in the foremost of the ranks to repel the invasion of a daring enemy.”

This speech led to a most important consequence—the erasing from the Privy Council Book the name of one of the most illustrious statesmen which had ever adorned it. Fox’s name was struck out by the King on the 9th of May.

On the 6th of June, after the dinner at the Whig Club, the Duke of Bedford proposed “The Health of Charles Fox,” and remarked in severe terms on Ministers having caused the King to strike his name out of the list of the Privy Council. Fox said: “It would be most unfit for him to say a word respecting the Noble Duke’s allusion to a circumstance personal to himself. Would to God the time of the Ministers had been always employed in such frivolous fooleries as settling who should be Honourable and who Right Honourable, and deliberating on the titles most befitting their friends and supporters.” Fox, with some of his supporters, seceded from Parliament in 1797, and returned to the House of Commons in 1802 to defend the Peace of Amiens, and he was persuaded to continue his parliamentary attendance by the urgent request of friends, with whose wishes he felt himself bound to comply.—Ed.]

No. XIX. — CHEVY CHASE. [171]

For the authenticity of the enclosed Ballad we refer our readers to a volume of MS. Poems discovered upon the removal of some papers, during the late alterations which have taken place at the Tax-office, in consequence of the Reports of the Finance Committee.

It has been communicated to our printer by an ingenious friend of his, who occasionally acts for the Deputy Collector of the Parish of St. Martin in the Fields; but without date, or any other mark, by which we are enabled to guess at the particular subject of the composition.

No. XX. — ODE TO JACOBINISM.

131[The original poem, of which the above is an imitation, is subjoined:—

No. XXI. — THE PROGRESS OF MAN. CANTO TWENTY-THIRD. CONTENTS. — PROGRESS OF MAN. EXTRACT.

We promised in our Sixteenth Number, that though we should not proceed regularly with the publication of the Didactic Poem, the Progress of Man,—a work which, indeed, both from its bulk, and from the erudite nature of the subject, would hardly suit with the purposes of a Weekly Paper,—we should, nevertheless, give from time to time such extracts from it as we thought were likely to be useful to our readers, and as were in any degree connected with the topics or events of the times.

The following extract is from the 23rd Canto of this admirable and instructive Poem;—in which the author (whom, by a series of accidents, which we have neither the space, nor indeed the liberty, to enumerate at present, we have discovered to be Mr. Higgins, of St. Mary Axe) describes the vicious refinement of what is called civilized society, in respect to marriage; contends with infinite spirit and philosophy against the factitious sacredness and indissolubility of that institution; and paints in glowing colours the happiness and utility (in a moral as well as political view) of an arrangement of an opposite sort, such as prevails in countries which are yet under the influence of pure and unsophisticated nature.

In illustration of his principles upon this subject, the author alludes to a popular production of the German Drama, the title of which is the “Reformed Housekeeper” 134[The Stranger], which he expresses a hope of seeing transfused into the language of this country.

On Marriage.—Marriage being indissoluble the cause of its being so often unhappy.—Nature’s laws not consulted in this point.—Civilized nations mistaken.—Otaheite: Happiness of the natives thereof—visited by Captain Cook, in his Majesty’s Ship Endeavour—Character of Captain Cook.—Address to Circumnavigation.—Description of His Majesty’s Ship Endeavour—Mast, rigging, sea-sickness, prow, poop, mess-room, surgeon’s mate—History of one.—Episode concerning naval chirurgery.—Catching a Thunny Fish.—Arrival at Otaheite—cast anchor—land—Natives astonished.—Love—Liberty—Moral—Natural—Religious—Contrasted with European manners.—Strictness—License—Doctor’s Commons.—Dissolubility of Marriage recommended—Illustrated by a game at Cards—Whist—Cribbage—Partners changed—Why not the same in Marriage?—Illustrated by a River.—Love free.—Priests, Kings.—German Drama.—Kotzebue’s “Housekeeper Reformed”.—Moral employments of Housekeeping described—Hottentots sit and stare at each other—Query, WHY?—Address to the Hottentots—History of the Cape of Good Hope.—Resumé of the Arguments against Marriage.—Conclusion.

138[The following extracts will give some idea of Payne Knight’s poem.

After a glowing description of the amours of a shepherd and shepherdess, he thus speaks of Marriage:—

In illustration of these peculiar doctrines of Love and Marriage, the authors of the present Parody introduced into the first twenty lines of the preceding “Extract,” the very free statements on these subjects which appear in Chapters 8, 12, 14, 16, 17, of the narrative of Cook’s First Voyage to the Pacific in the “Endeavour,” in 1768, derived, by the editor, Dr. John Hawkesworth, from the Diary of Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks, who accompanied Captain Cook.—Ed.]

[Lord Erskine, after dinner, inveighed bitterly against Marriage; and smarting, I suppose, under the recollection of his own unsuccessful choice, concluded by saying that a wife was a tin canister tied to a man’s tail, which very much excited the indignation of Lady Ann Culling Smith, who was of the party. “Monk” Lewis took a sheet of paper, and wrote the following neat epigram on the subject, which he presented to Her Royal Highness [the Duchess of York]:—

139[Richard Payne Knight, eminent as he was as a classical scholar and archæologist, was not successful as a poet or moralist, and this is shown in an amusing manner in a letter from Horace Walpole to the Rev. W. Mason, dated 22nd March, 1796, in which he declares how much he is offended and disgusted by Knight’s “new insolent and self-conceited poem,” alluding to his Progress of Civil Society,—the former one being “The Landscape, a didactic poem in three books,” 4to, pub. 1794, of which mention has already been made.

In 1816 he was examined before a Select Committee of the House of Commons on the proposed purchase by the Government of the Elgin Marbles; but his estimate of their value as works of the highest art was much below that of other artistic witnesses, such as Flaxman, Westmacott, Chantrey, B. West, and others. For these statements he was severely criticised in vol. 14 of the Quarterly Review, and in a squib, reprinted in the New Whig Guide in 1819. He valued the collection at £25,000; Gavin Hamilton’s estimate was £60,800, and Lord Aberdeen’s £35,000; for which latter sum they were obtained by the Government. He bequeathed his collection of ancient Bronzes, Greek Coins, &c.—valued at £50,000—to the British Museum.

He represented Ludlow till 1806. He was a supporter of Fox, upon whom he wrote a Monody. He was never married, and he was succeeded in his fine property, including Downton Castle, near Ludlow, &c., on his death in 1824, by his brother, Thomas Andrew Knight, one of the most scientific of horticulturists, and he in turn was succeeded by his grandson, Andrew Johnes Rouse Boughton, second son of the late Sir W. E. Rouse Boughton, Bart., who added by royal license in 1856 the name of Knight to his patronymic.—Ed.]

[The drama (here nicknamed The Reformed Housekeeper), but entitled by the author “Misanthropy and Repentance,” was produced at Drury Lane Theatre, Sheridan being then lessee, as “The Stranger,” on the 24th March, 1798. The following was the cast:—The Stranger, J. P. Kemble; Baron Steinfort, John Palmer; Francis, R. Palmer; Peter, Suett; Tobias, J. Aikin; Solomon, Wewitzer; Count Wintersen, Barrymore; Mrs. Haller, Mrs. Siddons; Countess Wintersen, Mrs. Goodall; Charlotte, Miss Stuart. It was considered by competent authorities as one of Kemble’s finest efforts, and was performed on twenty-six successive nights. Some of our most eminent actors and actresses have essayed the principal parts. Miss O’Neill made her last appearance on the stage in the character of Mrs. Haller, 13th of July, 1818.

The acting version purported to be altered from the German by Benj. Thompson (afterwards Count Rumford), but it is likely that all or most of the alterations came from the skilful hands of Sheridan, assisted by Kemble. The pathetic song introduced, “I have a silent sorrow here,” was written by the former. Two other versions of the drama appeared in the year 1798—one by A. Schinck, and the other by G. Papendick—but neither has been acted.

Kotzebue tells us in his Autobiography that this play of his was acted at the Imperial Palace of The Hermitage, St. Petersburg, under his superintendence while manager of the Imperial Company of German Comedians, and excited visible emotion in the Emperor Paul. He himself saw it acted at Tobolsk during his exile in Siberia. The vast and splendid palace of The Hermitage is now given up to the Arts. It contains the enormous collection of Pictures accumulated by the Russian sovereigns (including the Houghton Gallery formed by Sir Robert Walpole), together with a Gallery of Sculpture, one of the finest assortments of Antique Gems in the world, a museum of Grecian and Etruscan Antiquities, and a library of rare Books and Manuscripts.

An awful event took place during the performance of this play a short time after its production. John Palmer, an eminent comedian, while acting the principal character, at Liverpool, on the 2nd of August, 1798, expired on the stage. He had recently suffered severe domestic bereavements, which are supposed to have given a painful application to some passages in the third act in which he had to utter the words: “There is another and a better world”. In the first scene of the fourth act, his agitation increased; he fell into the arms of the performer of the part of Baron Steinfort, and died without a groan. A narrative of this shocking event, published immediately afterwards, by the same performer, disposes of the generally-received but more emotional tradition that 140Palmer’s earthly career was terminated while pronouncing the above words. He was in his fifty-seventh year.

This is not the only instance of so impressive an end, for a similar death-stroke overtook Joseph Peterson, an excellent actor, in October, 1758, while representing The Duke in Measure for Measure. In act 3, sc. 1, in reciting the words—

he dropped into the arms of Moody, who personated Claudio, and never spoke more!—Ed.]

[“One other noted character we visited—the one who, according to William Taylor of Norwich, was the greatest of all. This was August von Kotzebue, the very popular dramatist, whose singular fate it was to live at variance with the great poets of his country, while he was the idol of the mob. He was at one time (about this time (1801) and a little later) a favourite in all Europe. One of his plays, The Stranger, I have seen acted in German, English, Spanish, French, and, I believe, also Italian. He was the pensioner of Prussia, Austria, and Russia. The odium produced by this circumstance, and the imputation of being a spy, are assigned as the cause of his assassination by [C. L. Sand] a student of Jena, a few years after our visit [March 3, 1819]. He was living, like Goethe, in a large house and in style. I drank tea with him, and found him a lively little man, with small black eyes. He had the manners of a petit-maître.”—Crabb Robinson’s Diary (1801), i. 115.—Ed.]

No. XXII. — TO THE EDITOR OF THE ANTI-JACOBIN. — THE JACOBIN.

Sir,—I saw, with strong approbation, your specimen of ancient Sapphic measure in English, which I think far surpasses all that Abraham Fraunce, Richard Stanyhurst, or Sir Philip Sidney himself, have produced in that style—I mean, of course, your sublime and beautiful Knife-Grinder, of which it is not too high an encomium to say, that it even rivals the efforts of the fine-eared democratic poet, Mr. Southey. But you seem not to be aware, that we have a genuine Sapphic measure belonging to our own language, of which I now send you a short specimen.

144

No. XXIII. — LOVES OF THE TRIANGLES. [196] ARGUMENT OF THE FIRST CANTO. — THE LOVES OF THE TRIANGLES. A Mathematical and Philosophical Poem, INSCRIBED TO DR. DARWIN.

We cannot better explain to our readers the design of the poem from which the following extracts are taken, than by borrowing the expressions of the author, Mr. Higgins, of St. Mary Axe, in the letter which accompanied the manuscript.

We must premise, that we had found ourselves called upon to remonstrate with Mr. H. on the freedom of some of the positions laid down in his other didactic poem, the “Progress of Man”; and had in the course of our remonstrance hinted something to the disadvantage of the new principles which are now afloat in the world, and which are, in our opinion, working so much prejudice to the happiness of mankind. To this Mr. H. takes occasion to reply—^[195]

“What you call the new principles are, in fact, nothing less than new. They are the principles of primeval nature, the system of original and unadulterated man.

146“If you mean by my addiction to new principles that the object which I have in view in my larger work [meaning the ‘Progress of Man’] and in the several other concomitant and subsidiary didactic poems which are necessary to complete my plan, is to restore this first, and pure simplicity; to rescue and to recover the interesting nakedness of human nature, by ridding her of the cumbrous establishments which the folly, and pride, and self-interest of the worst part of our species have heaped upon her;—you are right. Such is my object. I do not disavow it. Nor is it mine alone. There are abundance of abler hands at work upon it. Encyclopedias, Treatises, Novels, Magazines, Reviews, and New Annual Registers, have, as you are well aware, done their part with activity and with effect. It remained to bring the heavy artillery of a didactic poem to bear upon the same object.

“If I have selected your paper as the channel for conveying my labours to the public, it was not because I was unaware of the hostility of your principles to mine, of the bigotry of your attachment to ‘things as they are,’ but because, I will fairly own, I found some sort of cover and disguise necessary for securing the favourable reception of my sentiments; the usual pretexts of humanity, and philanthropy, and fine feeling, by which we have for some time obtained a passport to the hearts and understandings of men, being now worn out or exploded. I could not choose but smile at my success in the first instance, in inducing you to adopt my poem as your own.

“But you have called for an explanation of these principles of ours, and you have a right to obtain it. 147Our first principle is, then—the reverse of the trite and dull maxim of Pope—‘Whatever is, is right’. We contend, that ‘Whatever is, is wrong’; that institutions, civil and religious, that social order (as it is called in your cant) and regular government, and law, and I know not what other fantastic inventions, are but so many cramps and fetters on the free agency of man’s natural intellect and moral sensibility; so many badges of his degradation from the primal purity and excellence of his nature.

“Our second principle is, the ‘eternal and absolute perfectibility of man’. We contend, that if, as is demonstrable, we have risen from a level with the cabbages of the field to our present comparatively intelligent and dignified state of existence, by the mere exertion of our own energies; we should, if these energies were not repressed and subdued by the operation of prejudice, and folly, by King-Craft and Priest-Craft, and the other evils incident to what is called civilized society, continue to exert and expand ourselves in a proportion infinitely greater than anything of which we yet have any notion:—in a ratio hardly capable of being calculated by any science of which we are now masters: but which would in time raise man from his present biped state to a rank more worthy of his endowments and aspirations; to a rank in which he would be, as it were, all Mind; would enjoy unclouded perspicacity and perpetual vitality; feed on oxygene, and never die, but by his own consent.

“But though the poem of the Progress of Man alone would be sufficient to teach this system and enforce these doctrines, the whole practical effect of 148them cannot be expected to be produced, but by the gradual perfecting of each of the sublimer sciences;—at the husk and shell of which we are now nibbling and at the kernel whereof, in our present state, we cannot hope to arrive. These several sciences will be the subjects of the several auxiliary Didactic Poems which I have now in hand (one of which, entitled The Loves of the Triangles, I herewith transmit to you), and for the better arrangement and execution of which, I beseech you to direct your bookseller to furnish me with a handsome Chambers’s Dictionary; in order that I may be enabled to go through the several articles alphabetically, beginning with Abracadabra, under the first letter, and going down to Zodiac, which is to be found under the last.

“I am persuaded that there is no science, however abstruse, nay, no trade or manufacture, which may not be taught by a didactic poem. In that before you, an attempt is made (not unsuccessfully, I hope) to enlist the imagination under the banners of Geometry. Botany I found done to my hands. And though the more rigid and unbending stiffness of a mathematical subject does not admit of the same appeals to the warmer passions, which naturally arise out of the sexual (or, as I have heard several worthy gentlewomen of my acquaintance, who delight much in the poem to which I allude, term it, by a slight misnomer no way difficult to be accounted for—the sensual) system of Linnæus;—yet I trust that the range and variety of illustration with which I have endeavoured to ornament and enlighten the arid truths of Euclid and Algebra, will be found to have smoothed the road of Demonstration, to have softened the rugged 149features of Elementary Propositions, and, as it were, to have strewed the Asses’ Bridge with flowers.”

Such is the account which Mr. Higgins gives of his own undertaking, and of the motives which have led him to it. For our parts, though we have not the same sanguine persuasion of the absolute perfectibility of our species, and are in truth liable to the imputation of being more satisfied with things as they are, than Mr. Higgins and his associates;—yet, as we are, in at least the same proportion, less convinced of the practical influence of didactic poems, we apprehend little danger to our readers’ morals from laying before them Mr. Higgins’s doctrine in its most fascinating shape. The poem abounds, indeed, with beauties of the most striking kind,—various and vivid imagery, bold and unsparing impersonifications; and similitudes and illustrations brought from the most ordinary and the most extraordinary occurrences of nature—from history and fable—appealing equally to the heart and to the understanding, and calculated to make the subject of which the poem professes to treat rather amusing than intelligible. We shall be agreeably surprised to hear that it has assisted any young student at either University in his mathematical studies.

We need hardly add, that the plates illustrative of this poem (the engravings of which would have been too expensive for our publication) are to be found in Euclid’s Elements, and other books of a similar tendency.

Warning to the profane not to approach—Nymphs and Deities of Mathematical Mythology—Cyclois of a pensive turn—Pendulums, on the contrary, playful—and why?—Sentimental Union of the Naiads and Hydrostatics—Marriage of Euclid and Algebra.—Pulley the emblem of Mechanics—Optics of a licentious disposition—distinguished by her telescope and green spectacles.—Hyde-Park Gate on a Sunday morning—Cockneys—Coaches.—Didactic Poetry—Nonsensia—Love delights in Angles or Corners—Theory of Fluxions explained—Trochais, the Nymph of the Wheel—Smoke-Jack described—Personification of elementary or culinary Fire.—Little Jack Horner—Story of Cinderella—Rectangle, a Magician, educated by Plato and Menecmus—in love with Three Curves at the same time—served by Gins, or Genii—transforms himself into a Cone—the Three Curves requite his passion—Description of them—Parabola, Hyperbola, and Ellipsis—Asymptotes—Conjugated Axes.—Illustrations—Rewbell, Barras, and Lepaux, the three virtuous Directors—Macbeth and the Three Witches—the Three Fates—the Three Graces—King Lear and his Three Daughters—Derby Diligence—Catherine Wheel.—Catastrophe of Mr. Gingham, with his Wife and Three Daughters overturned in a One-horse Chaise—Dislocation and Contusion two kindred Fiends—Mail Coaches—Exhortation to Drivers to be careful—Genius of the Post-Office—Invention of Letters—Digamma—Double Letters—Remarkable Direction of one—Hippona the Goddess of Hack-horses—Parameter and Abscissa unite to overpower the Ordinate, who retreats down the Axis-Major, and forms himself in a Square—Isosceles, a Giant—Dr. Rhomboides—Fifth Proposition, or Asses’ Bridge—Bridge of Lodi—Buonaparte—Raft and Windmills—Exhortation to the recovery of our Freedom—Conclusion.

157

No. XXIV. — THE LOVES OF THE TRIANGLES. A Mathematical and Philosophical Poem.

No. XXV. — BRISSOT’S GHOST. [235]

[The preceding ballad is parodied from the one by Glover, entitled—

No. XXVI. — LOVES OF THE TRIANGLES.

The frequent solicitations which we have received for a continuation of the Loves of the Triangles have induced us to lay before the public (with Mr. Higgins’s permission) the concluding lines of the Canto. The catastrophe of Mr. and Mrs. Gingham, and the episode of Hippona, contained, in our apprehension, several reflections of too free a nature. The conspiracy of Parameter and Abscissa against the Ordinate is written in a strain of poetry so very splendid and dazzling as not to suit the more tranquil majesty of diction which our readers admire in Mr. Higgins. We have therefore begun our extract with the Loves of the Giant Isosceles, and the Picture of the Asses-Bridge, and its several illustrations.

[The following lines of Dr. Darwin’s, in Canto ii., gave great offence to the Government:—

[The general features of Dr. Darwin’s extraordinary poems, the “Loves of the Plants,” and the “Economy of Vegetation,” which are so admirably ridiculed in the preceding pages, may be gathered from the following specimens:—

The Genius of the place invites the Goddess of Botany—She descends—is received by Spring and the Elements—Addresses the Nymphs of Fire—Love created the Universe—Chaos explodes—All the Stars revolve—Colours of the Morning and Evening Skies—Exterior Atmosphere of inflammable Air—Fires at the Earth’s Centre—Animal Incubation—Venus visits the Cyclops—Phosphoric Lights in the Evening—Bolognian Stone—Ignis fatuus—Eagle armed with Lightning—Discovery of Fire—Medusa—The Chemical Properties of Fire—Lady in Love—Gunpowder—Steam-engine—Labours of Hercules—Halo round the Heads of Saints—Fairy rings—Death of Professor Richman—Cupid snatches the thunderbolt from Jupiter—The great Egg of Night—Naiad released—Frost assailed—Whale attacked—Ice-Islands navigated into the Tropic Seas—Rainy Monsoons—Elijah on Mount Carmel—Departure of the Nymphs of Fire like sparks from Artificial Fireworks, &c.

These poems, produced in that dreary time for English poetry which elapsed between the disappearance of Cowper and Burns and the advent of Scott and Byron, had, in spite of their glaring absurdities, no lack of warm admirers. Miss Seward, in her Life of Dr. Darwin, published in 1804, sets no limits to her admiration:—“We are presented,” she says, “with an highly imaginative and splendidly descriptive poem, whose successive pictures alternately possess the sublimity of Michael Angelo, the correctness and elegance of Raphael, with the glow of Titian; whose landscapes have, at times, the strength of Salvator, and at others the softness of Claude; whose numbers are of stately grace, and artful harmony; while its allusions to ancient and modern history and fable, and its interspersion of recent and extraordinary anecdotes, render it extremely entertaining. * * * Each part is enriched by a number of philosophical notes. They state a great variety of theories and experiments in Botany, Chemistry, Electricity, Mechanics, and in the various species of Air, salubrious, noxious, and deadly,” &c.]

[Thomas Muir, the younger, of Hunter’s Hill, a promising young advocate of the Scottish Bar, and of nigh respectability, was tried at Edinburgh, 30th and 31st of August, 1793, before Lord Justice Clerk (Braxfield), Lords Henderland, 178Swinton, Dunsinnan, and Abercromby, for Sedition. The weightiest charge against him was that of “lending” a copy of Paine’s Rights of Man to a person who begged a reading of that popular book. He was found guilty, and sentenced to fourteen years’ transportation. On the 17th of the ensuing month, the Rev. Thos. Fyshe Palmer, a Unitarian Minister of Dundee, and an ex-fellow of Queen’s College, Cambridge, was tried at Perth for publishing a seditious Address, and sentenced to seven years’ transportation. On their arrival at Woolwich, in a revenue cutter, they were put on board separate hulks, and assisted at the common labour on the banks of the river. Muir, soon after his arrival in New South Wales, effected his escape, in an American vessel, to South America, whence he proceeded to Spain. During this voyage, in an action with a British frigate, he received a wound in the head, from which he recovered; but on his arrival at his destination, he was imprisoned by the Spanish authorities, until, on the application of M. de Talleyrand in the name of the then government of France, he obtained his release. He then went to France, and died at Bourdeaux [or Chantilly] in 1799; aged 33. Palmer served out his seven years, but died on the homeward voyage.

Other Trials soon followed. At the close of December, 1793, Mr. Skirving, Mr. Gerrald, and Mr. Margarot were tried at Edinburgh on similar charges of seditious practices, and were all sentenced to fourteen years’ transportation. The former two died soon after reaching New South Wales. Maurice Margarot, who appears to have conducted himself throughout with the most abandoned and shameless profligacy, was the only one of these convicts—his fourteen years over—who ever set foot again in Britain.

Gerrald was a man of very superior ability, and a favourite pupil of Dr. Parr’s, as is mentioned by De Quincey in his famous essay on that noted Whig pedagogue.

On the Scottish “political martyrs” Lord Cockburn, in his posthumous Examination of the Trials for Sedition in Scotland, published in 1888, which deals with the twenty-five trials of the above-named five and of thirty-two others, between 1793 and 1849, passes his deliberate verdict, that, with the exception of Muir, not one of them was guiltless. But, like ordinary criminals, they were entitled to a fair and impartial trial; and their trials were, one and all, iniquitous. Of the six judges who presided in the first fourteen (1793–94), five were dull, timid nonentities; the sixth, Lord Justice Clerk Braxfield, was, says Lord Cockburn, “a profound practical lawyer, and a powerful man; coarse and illiterate ... utterly devoid of judicial decorum, and though pure in the administration of civil justice, when he was exposed to no temptation, with no other conception of principle in any political case except that the upholding of his party was a duty attaching to his position. Over the five weak men who sat beside him, this coarse and dexterous ruffian predominated as he chose.” But Jedburgh—no, nor the Bloody Assize itself—could scarcely match one scene in Gerrald’s trial:—“‘After all,’ he was urging in his defence, ‘the most useful discoveries in philosophy, the most important changes in the moral history of man, have been innovations. The Revolution was an innovation, Christianity itself was an innovation.’ Instantly upon this, the following interruption took place:—Lord Braxfield: ‘You would have been stopped long before this, if you had not been a stranger. All that you have been saying is sedition. And now, my Lords, he is attacking Christianity.’ Lord Henderland: ‘I allow him all the benefit of his defence. But ... I cannot sit here as a judge without saying that it is a most indecent defence....’ The juries were packed as never, surely, before, or afterwards.”

With such judges, such juries, and, at least, in two cases, false witnesses, it might seem easy to anticipate the result; but the result transcends anticipation. In almost every case a light sentence would have amply met the requirements of justice; but the judges all shared Lord Swinton’s opinion that “it is impossible to punish Sedition adequately, now that torture has been abolished”. So they strove to supply the deficiency by Transportation, a punishment unwarranted by precedent.

With respect to Margarot’s trial at Edinburgh, the following is a vivid memory of Lord Cockburn’s boyhood:—

“Margarot came from the Black Bull [in Leith Street] to be tried, attended 179by a procession of the populace and his Convention friends, with banners and what was called a tree of liberty. This tree was in the shape of the letter M, about twenty feet high and ten wide. The honour of bearing it up by carrying the two upright poles was assigned to two eminent Conventionalists, and the little culprit walked beneath the circular placard in the centre, which proclaimed liberty and equality, &c. I was looking out of a window in the old Post-Office, which was then the northmost house on the west side of the North Bridge. I think I see the scene yet. The whole North Bridge, from the Tron Church to the Register Office, was quite empty at first; not a single creature venturing on that bit of sand, over which the waves were so soon to break from both ends. The Post-Office and the adjoining houses had been secretly filled with constables, and sailors from a frigate in the roads (I think The Hind, Capt. Cochrane), all armed with sticks and batons. No soldier appeared, it being determined that this civic insurrection should be put down by the civil force, unaided, at least, by scarlet. As soon as the tree, which led the van, emerged from Leith Street, and appeared at the north end of the bridge, Provost Elder and the Magistrates issued from some place they had retired to (I believe the Tron Church), and appeared, all robed, at the south end. The day was good. There was still not one person—I doubt if there was even a dog—on any part of the space, being the whole length of the bridge, between the two parties. But the rear of each was crammed with people, who filled up every inch as those in front moved on. The Magistrates were in a line across the street, with the Provost in the centre, the city officers behind this line, and probably a hundred loyal gentlemen in the rear of the officers. The two parties advanced steadily towards each other, and in perfect silence, till they met just about the Post-Office. The Provost stepped forward about a pace, so that he almost touched the front line of the rebels, when, advancing his cane, he commanded them to retire. This order probably would not have been obeyed; but, at any rate, it could not have been obeyed speedily, from the crowd behind. However, all this was immaterial; for, without waiting one instant to see whether they meant to retire or not, the houses vomited forth their bludgeoned contents, and in almost two minutes the tree was demolished and thrown over the bridge, the street covered with the knocked down, the accused dragged to the bar, and the insurrection was over.”

On February 20th, 1837, a meeting took place at the Crown and Anchor Tavern, Strand, for commencing a subscription to erect monuments in London and Edinburgh to the memory of the above five Reformers. Joseph Hume, M.P. was in the chair; Colonel Perronet Thompson, Mr. Dan. Whittle Harvey, and fifteen other members of Parliament were present. A lofty obelisk was erected on the Calton Hill to the memory of the “Scottish Martyrs,” but London did not sympathize with the movement.—Ed.]

[Joel Barlow, born in 1756 in Connecticut, was educated as a Presbyterian minister, but afterwards turned Deist. Before this change he translated the Psalms into metre, and his version is still used in the churches of New England. He now adopted the Law, and engaged in periodicals—one, The Anarchist, which was political in its character, and exercised great influence. In 1788, after visiting England, he went to Paris, where he joined the Girondists. In 1791, he returned to England, where he published the first part of his Advice to the Privileged Orders, in which he assails the whole system of Government pursued in monarchical Europe, the Church establishments, the standing armies, the judicial organisations, and the financial systems which belong to the old governments. In February, 1792, he published a political poem, which he entitled The Conspiracy of Kings; also a Letter to the Convention advising the separation of Church and State. So great did his reputation become that he was fixed on by the London Constitutional Society to present their Address to the Convention. After various political transactions in the interest of France, and also in commercial speculations which made him a rich man, he left Paris in 1805, living on his estate in America till 1811, when he was sent as Minister 180Plenipotentiary to Paris. But Napoleon being on his Russian Expedition, he followed him to Wilna; but the fatiguing journey proved fatal: he died 26th December, 1812. He wrote at an early age a poem, The Vision of Columbus, which acquired great popularity, and which he afterwards enlarged as The Columbiad. Among other works he published (in 1796) a mock-heroic poem, Hasty Pudding, which is generally considered his best work.—Ed.]

[Theobald Wolfe Tone, the founder of the Association of United Irishmen, was born in Dublin in 1764, and, after passing through Trinity College, came to London to prosecute his legal studies, which he soon forsook for politics, being induced thereto by the indignation excited in his breast by the persecution of the Irish Catholics, whose cause, although himself a Protestant, he warmly advocated. With the view of getting their grievances redressed, he founded the society of United Irishmen, which gave great alarm to the English Government. His liberty being menaced, he went to America, and thence to France, where he arranged with Gen. Hoche the expeditions to Bantry Bay and the Texel. Being appointed Adjutant-General, he served in several of the French armies, and lastly in Gen. Hardi’s expedition to Ireland in October, 1798. The vessel he was aboard of was captured by the English, and he was conveyed to Dublin, tried by a Court-Martial, and sentenced to be hanged. He anticipated his execution, however, by committing suicide in prison, 19th November, 1798.—Ed.]

[On the 21st and 22nd May, 1798, Arthur O’Connor (proprietor of a Dublin newspaper, The Press), John Binns (an active member of the London Corresponding Society), John Allen, Jeremiah Leary, and Jas. O’Coigly, alias Jas. Quigley, alias Jas. John Fivey (a Priest), were tried at Maidstone for High Treason. Robert Fergusson was counsel for Allen. O’Coigly only was found Guilty, and was executed 7th June, on Pennenden Heath. After being suspended for ten minutes, he was cut down and his head severed from his body: the disgusting remainder of his sentence was remitted. He met his death with great fortitude, and denying to the last the charge of treasonable correspondence abroad. In the State Trials, vols. 26 and 27, are included the Life of the prisoner; Observations on his Trial; Address to the People of Ireland; and Letters, all written by himself during his confinement in Maidstone Gaol. His real name, he says, was the Rev. Jas. Coigly, and his age 36. “Can you imagine a man more treacherous and profligate than O’Coigly?” said Sir James Mackintosh to Dr. Parr. “Yes, Sir, he might have been worse: he was a parson—he might have been a lawyer; he was a traitor—he might have been an apostate; he was an Irishman—he might have been a Scotchman.” When it is recollected that Mackintosh was a Scotchman and a lawyer, and that he had written in defence of the French Revolution against Burke, these observations of Dr. Parr were both insolent and uncalled for.

A Portrait of “Arthur O’Connor, late Member in the Irish Parliament for Borough of Philipstown, painted by J. Dowling, engraved by W. Ward,” was published in London, 18th April, 1798. Another Portrait in military uniform is to be found in Barrington’s Memoirs of the Union. He figures also in several of Gillray’s Caricatures.

In the Birmingham Daily Post of April 2, 1888, it is stated that The Hon. R. E. O’Connor, M.A., barrister-at-law, the latest addition to the Legislative Council of New South Wales, is a grandson of Arthur O’Connor, one of the leaders of the United Irishmen, who died a General in the service of France.

When O’Connor was acquitted by the Jury, on the above-named occasion, but before the Judge had given orders for his release, a strange scene occurred in court, an attempt being made, as it was alleged, by Sackville, Earl of Thanet, Robert Fergusson (in after years known as Cutlar Fergusson, Judge-Advocate-General), and others to facilitate his escape in order to avoid further charges about to be preferred against him, Binns also being implicated for this exploit, which was unsuccessful, but attended with violence. These 181confederates were tried at the Bar of the Court of King’s Bench, 25th April, 1799. The Counsel for the Crown were Sir John Scott [Lord Eldon], Law [Lord Ellenborough], Sir W. Garrow, Sir C. Abbot, &c., while the defendants had the powerful advocacy of Erskine and others. His Lordship and Mr. Fergusson were found guilty after a long and ingenious defence by the latter, which presaged his future eminence as a Counsel. Lord Thanet was ordered to pay a fine of £1000; to be imprisoned in the Tower for a year; and to give security for good behaviour for seven years on the expiration of the sentence; himself in £10,000, and two sureties in £5000 each. Fergusson was ordered to pay a fine of £100; to be imprisoned in the King’s Bench prison for one year; to give security for good behaviour for seven years from the expiration of the sentence; himself in £500, and two sureties in £250 each.—See State Trials, vols. 26 and 27.—Ed.]

[“A person who afterwards made a considerable figure in the local affairs of Ireland raised himself about this time into considerable notoriety by his patriotic exertions. This was Mr. James Napper Tandy, a gentleman in the middle station of life, without talent or natural influence, had become a warm advocate in the corporation of Dublin; he debated zealously in public, he argued strenuously in private, and persevered in both with indefatigable ardour. His person was ungracious—his language neither eloquent nor argumentative—his address neither graceful nor impressive—but he was sincere and persevering—and though in many instances erroneous and violent, he was considered to be honest. His private character furnished no ground to doubt the integrity of his public one—and, like many of those persons who occasionally spring up in revolutionary periods, he acquired celebrity without being able to account for it, and possessed influence without rank or capacity. In 1796, Mr. Tandy lost all his popularity, and nearly his life, by his apparent want of courage in an affair between him and Mr. Toler, then Solicitor-General, afterwards Lord Norbury, and Chief Justice of the Common Pleas. Mr. Tandy having signified to Mr. Toler his desire to fight him, the Chief Justice readily accepted the offer. Both parties manœuvred very skilfully; but Mr. Tandy delaying his ultimatum too long for the impatience of the Solicitor-General, he brought him before the House of Commons for a breach of privilege, and prosecuted him for sedition. Mr. Tandy escaped to the Continent, entered the French Service, invaded Ireland, was, with his confederates, arrested by the British Envoy at Hamburg, 24 Nov., 1798, contrary to the law of nations: the Minister of France claimed them as French citizens, and the Senate, unwilling to offend either power, came to no decision on the subject. Tandy was thereupon taken to Ireland and condemned to be hanged—was pardoned by Lord Cornwallis, and sent back to France, where he died a French General.”—Barrington’s Memoirs of the Union, vol. 1, where is a portrait of Tandy.—Ed.]

No. XXVII. — A CONSOLATORY ADDRESS TO HIS GUN-BOATS. — ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF JEAN BON ST. ANDRÉ. — ELEGY; OR, DIRGE.

The gallant defence of the Isles of St. Marcou would justify a more serious celebration than is attempted in the following poem; and the modest and unassuming manner in which Lieutenant Price gives the account of services so highly meritorious, adds to the hope which we entertain that he will meet a more solid reward than any verse of ours or of our correspondent’s could bestow.

Citizen Muskein, if he understands Horace, and can read English, will be amply rewarded for the victory of which he has, no doubt, by this time, made a pompous report to the Directory, by the perusal of the 14th Ode of the 1st Book, for which we have to return our thanks to a classical correspondent.

[Muskein was an inhabitant of Antwerp, whom the Directory not only appointed to superintend the construction of the flat-bottomed boats for the invasion of Great Britain (usually called by the French sailors “bateaux à la Muskein”), but made a “capitaine de vaisseau”. An attack was ordered to be made upon the two small islands of Saint Marcouf (each not more than 200 yards in length), of which, in July, 1795, Sir Sidney Smith, with the Diamond frigate, had taken unobstructed possession, and which were considered to give to the English great facility in intercepting between the ports of Havre and Cherbourg. The islands are situated off the river Isigny, on the coast of Normandy, and about four miles distant from the French shore. After being garrisoned with about 500 seamen and marines, including a great proportion of invalids, these small islands were placed under the command of Lieut. Charles Papps Price, of The Badger, a cruiser-converted Dutch hoy, mounting four, or at most six, guns.

On the 8th April, 1798, Muskein, with 33 flat-bottomed boats, with a body of troops on board, and a few gun-brigs, was about to make a combined attack on the two islands, but was driven off by two British frigates, The Diamond, Capt. Sir R. J. Strachan, and The Hydra, Capt. Sir Francis Laforey, and stood into Caen river. While there for three weeks, repairing damages, he was joined by seven heavy gun-brigs, and about 40 flat-boats and armed fishing vessels, bringing with them additional troops.

On the 6th May, Lieut. Price received information that an attack was meditated during the night. By 10 p.m., owing to the prevailing calm, the small naval force on the station, consisting of the 50–gun ship, Adamant, Capt. Wm. Hotham, 24–gun ship, Eurydice, Capt. John Talbot, and 18–gun brig-sloop, Orestes, Capt. W. Haggitt, had not been able to approach nearer to the islands than six miles—precisely what the assailants wanted. The attacking force consisted of 52–gun brigs and flat-bottomed boats, having on board, as was reported, about 6000 men. At day-break, on the 7th, the flotilla was seen drawn up in a line opposite to the south-west front of the western redoubt; and instantly was opened, upon the brigs and flats composing it, a fire from 17 pieces of cannon, consisting of four 4, two 6, and six 24 pounder long guns, and three 24 and two 32–pounder carronades, being all the guns that would bear. The brigs remained at a distance of from 300 to 400 yards, in order to batter the redoubt with their heavy long guns, while the boats, with great resolution, rowed up until within musket-shot of the battery. But the guns of the latter, loaded with round, grape, and canister, soon poured destruction amongst these, cutting several of the boats “into chips,” and compelling all that could keep afloat to seek their safety in flight. Six or seven boats were seen to go down, and one small flat, No. 13, was afterwards towed in, bottom upwards. She appeared, by some pieces of paper found in her, to have had 144 persons on board, including 129 of the second company of the Boulogne battalion.

The loss sustained by the British garrison amounted to one private-marine 185killed, and two private-marines and two seamen wounded. According to one French account, the invaders lost about 900 in killed or drowned, and between 300 and 400 wounded. As a reward for their conduct on this occasion, Lieutenants Price and Bourne were each promoted to the rank of Commander. The former died a Post Captain, at Hereford, in 1813, aged 62.—James’s Naval History, vol. ii., pp. 128–131: ed. 1886.—Ed.]

[M. Pléville was Minister of Marine, and, shortly after this unsuccessful début of the famous flotilla, was succeeded by Rear-Adm. Bruix, who directed Rear-Adm. La Crosse to take the command, and to make a second attack upon the islands. This, however, the French Government declined to make.—Ed.]

Helen Maria Williams.—[“Among the literary celebrities of the French Revolution was Helen Maria Williams, at whose house were wont to assemble the most distinguished of the liberal writers of France, her own reputation giving considerable éclat to these meetings. She wrote some of the most beautiful hymns in our language, was a prisoner under the reign of terror, and published a work on the French Revolution which is full of the most touching incidents, and adorned with specimens of the ardent and pathetic poetry, the product of French genius under the excitement of those most mysterious days. A. Humboldt was much attached to her, and committed to her care the translation and publication of some of his most elaborate works.

“She had two nephews, Athanas and Charles Coquerel, whom she educated, and who both attained considerable fame, one in the theological and the other in the political field. Athanas was for some time the preacher in the Protestant Church at Amsterdam, and married the daughter of a Swiss gentleman, the only person I have ever known on the Continent to adopt the dress and profess the opinions of an English Quaker. Miss Williams maintained intimate relations with her English friends, was familiar with the great lights of the Revolution, and her conversation was most instructive, entertaining, and varied. All her sympathies were on the side of freedom, and though she was not so prominent as to be persecuted by the Emperor, like Madame de Staël, she was the object of a good deal of suspicion and narrowly watched by the police.”—Autobr. Recollections by Sir John Bowring, pp. 353–4.—Ed.]

[Miss Williams, for some years, wrote that portion of the New Annual Register which relates to France. Among many other productions she was the author of the song Evan Banks (to the tune of Savourna Delish), which has often been attributed to Burns; a novel called Julia, and a Tour in Switzerland. Horace Walpole called her in his Correspondence a “scribbling trollop”.

She lived for many years, and until the death of that gentleman—in Paris, 1818—under the protection of John Hurford Stone, a man of letters, who in the early part of the French Revolution had removed with his wife to Paris, where he formed an intimacy with Miss Williams. She was born about 1762, and died in Paris in 1827 as a friend to the Bourbons, and the enemy of the Revolution!

This Mr. Stone was born at Tiverton in 1763. While in Paris he was in the confidence of the Directory, and became one of the chief printers there. In 1805, he brought out an edition of the Geneva Bible, and published several English reprints; also Miss Williams’s translation of Humboldt’s Travels. His brother, Wm. Stone, was tried in 1796 for High Treason, for holding treasonable correspondence with him.—Ed.]

The following exquisite tribute to the memory of an unfortunate republican is written with such a touching 186sensibility, that those who can command salt tears must prepare to shed them. The narrative is simple and unaffected; the event in itself interesting; the moral obvious and awful.—We have only to observe, that as this account of the transaction is taken from the French papers, it may possibly be somewhat partial.—The Dey’s own statement of the affair has not yet been received. Every friend of humanity will join with us in expressing a candid and benevolent hope, that this business may not tend to kindle the flames of war between these two unchristian powers; but that, by mutual concession and accommodation, they may come to some point (short of the restoration of Jean Bon’s head on his shoulders, which in this stage of the discussion is hardly practicable) by which the peace of the Pagan world may be preserved. For our part, we pretend not to decide from which quarter the concessions ought principally to be made. It is but candid to allow that there are probably faults on both sides, in this, as in most other cases. For the character of the Dey we profess a sincere respect on the one hand; and on the other, we naturally wish that the head of Jean Bon St. André should be reserved for his own guillotine.

On recurring to the French papers to verify our Correspondent’s statement of this singular adventure of Jean Bon St. André, we discovered, to our great mortification, that it happened at Algiers, and not at Tunis. We should have corrected this mistake, but for two reasons—first, that Algiers would not stand in the verse; and, secondly, that we are informed by the young man who conducts the Geographical Department of the Morning Chronicle, that both the towns are in Africa, or 190Asia (he is not quite certain which), and, what is more to the purpose, that both are peopled by Moors. Tunis, therefore, may stand.

[Marshal Bernadotté, the French Prince of Monté Corvo, died as Charles John XIV., King of Sweden, 8th March, 1844, in his eighty-first year. He married, in 1798, Eugenia-Bernardina-Désirée de Clary, daughter of a Marseilles merchant, and sister of Madame Joseph Buonaparte (Queen of Spain). “She, who was not a common-place person,” says Madame de Rémusat, in her valuable Memoirs, “had before her marriage been very much in love with Napoleon, and appears to have always preserved the memory of that feeling! It has been supposed that her hardly extinguished passion caused her obstinate refusal to leave France.” She survived her husband many years, and died in Paris, in the Rue d’Anjou Saint Honoré. Her husband was succeeded on the throne of Sweden by their son, Oscar I., who married Joséphine, daughter of Eugène Beauharnais, Duc de Leuchtenberg, and granddaughter of the Empress Josephine.

Bernadotté owed his elevation to the throne to the misgovernment of Gustavus IV., who had brought the nation to the verge of ruin, and who was deposed in 1809, when his uncle, the Duke of Sudermania, became king as Charles XIII.; and the next year, Bernadotté was elected Crown Prince, and successor to the throne.

In 1813, he rendered great assistance to the Allies, for, as Crown Prince, he joined the confederacy against France with 30,000 men; and, after defeating Marshal Ney, with great loss, on the 6th September, he, on the 18th October, with the co-operation of Blücher, again defeated him at the decisive Battle of Leipsic; and, on the 19th, the Emperor Alexander, the King of Prussia, and the Crown Prince, entered the great square of Leipsic, amidst the acclamations of the inhabitants. He was a decided democrat, and hated by Napoleon, but was the only sovereign of the revolutionary branch who was permitted to retain his dominions after the great reaction in 1814. The choice made of this great soldier of fortune excited the surprise of all Europe at the time, but the wisdom of it was soon demonstrated by his prudent conduct. He had distinguished himself from all Napoleon’s other marshals by his clemency in victory. For half a century before his accession, Sweden had not known the peace and prosperity in which he left the country on his death.

In T. Raikes’s Diary will be found some interesting anecdotes of Bernadotté’s gratitude for services rendered him while a young subaltern. But one is of a more startling nature, as it records his narrow escape from the death intended for him by the widow of the late king, who had purposely prepared a poisoned cup of coffee for him, which she herself presented to him at her own table. Having been suddenly warned, he succeeded in forcing it upon her. She resolutely accepted her fate, and died during the night.—Ed.]

No. XXVIII. — TO THE EDITOR OF THE “ANTI-JACOBIN”. — ODE TO MY COUNTRY. MDCCXCVIII.

We have received the following letter, with the poem that accompanies it, from a gentleman whose political opinions have hitherto differed from our own; but who appears to feel, as every man who loves his country must, that there can be but one sentiment entertained by Englishmen at the present moment.

Were we at liberty, we should be happy to do justice to the author, and credit to ourselves, by mentioning his name.

Sir,—However men may have differed on the political or constitutional questions which have of late been brought into discussion—whatever opinions they may have held on the system or conduct of administration—there can surely be now but one sentiment as to the instant necessity of firm and strenuous union for the preservation of our very existence as a people; and if degrees of obligation could be admitted, where the utmost is required from all, it should seem that in this cause the opposers of administration stand doubly pledged; for with what face of consistency can men pretend to stickle for points of constitutional liberty at home, who will not be found amongst the foremost at their posts to defend their country from the yoke of foreign slavery?

That there should be any set of men so infatuated as not to be convinced that the object of the enemy must 192be the utter destruction of these countries, after making the largest allowance for the effects of prejudice and passion, it is not easy to conceive. Such, however, we are told, there are. They believe, then, that after a long series of outrage, insult, and injury, in the height of their animosity and presumption, these moderate, mild, disinterested conquerors will invade us in arms, out of pure love and kindness, merely for our good, only to make us wiser, and better, and happier, and more prosperous than before!

Future events lie hid in the volume of Fate, but the intentions of men may be known by almost infallible indications. Passion and interest, the two mighty motives of human action, determine the Government of France to attempt the abolition of the British Empire! and if, abandoned by God and our right arm, we should flinch in the conflict, that destruction will be operative to the full of their gigantic and monstrous imaginations!—Harbours filled up with the ruins of their towns and arsenals, the Thames rendered a vast morass, by burying the Imperial City in her bosom—but I will not proceed in the horrible picture.

Are we then, it may be asked, to wage eternal war?—No; a glorious resistance leads to an honourable peace. The French people have been long weary of the war; their spirit has been forced by a system which must end in the failure of the engagement to give them the plunder of this country. They will awake from their dream, and raise a cry for peace, which their government will not dare to resist. The monarchs of Europe must now begin clearly to perceive that their fate hangs on the destiny of England; they will unite to compel a satisfactory 193peace on a broad foundation; and peace, when war has been tried to the utmost, will probably be permanent. A few years of wise economy and redoubled industry will place us again on the rising scale; and if the pressure of the times may have rendered it necessary sometimes to have cast a temporary veil over the statue of Liberty, she may again safely be shown in an unimpaired lustre.

Of the following verses I have nothing to say: if it should be decided that the greatness of the object cannot bear out the mediocrity of the execution, I will not appeal from the decision.

No. XXIX. — ODE TO THE DIRECTOR MERLIN. HORACE, B. I., O. V.

In a former number, we were enabled, by the communication of a classical correspondent, to compliment Citizen Muskein with an Address to his Gun-boats, imitated from a favourite Ode of Horace. Another (or perhaps the same) hand has obligingly furnished us with a composition, which we have no doubt will be equally acceptable to the citizen to whom it is addressed.

200[Thiers, in his History of the French Revolution, frequently asserts the incorruptibility (with the exception of Barras) of the French Directory. But Alison, in his History, exposes the extraordinary conduct of M. de Talleyrand, then Minister of Foreign Affairs, towards the Envoys from the United States of America, who complained that an immense number of American vessels had been seized by the French Government under a decree of Jan., 1798, which directed that all ships having for their cargoes, in whole or in part, any English merchandise, should be held lawful prize, whoever was the proprietor thereof, from the single circumstance of its coming from England or its foreign settlements. The Envoys were told that nothing could be done till their Government had advanced a sum equal to 1,280,000l. as a loan, and 50,000l. as a douceur to the Directors. These terms were, of course, indignantly rejected. The Hanse Towns, too, only obtained licenses to navigate the high seas by the secret payment of 150,000l. to the Republican rulers.—Ed.]

No. XXX. — THE ROVERS; OR, THE DOUBLE ARRANGEMENT. — PROLOGUE. [268] — THE ROVERS; OR, THE DOUBLE ARRANGEMENT. — ACT I. SCENE I. — SONG.

Our ingenious correspondent, Mr. Higgins, has not been idle. The deserved popularity of the extracts which we have been enabled to give from his two didactic poems, the Progress of Man, and the Loves of the Triangles, has obtained for us the communications of several other works which he has in hand, all framed upon the same principle, and directed to the same end. The propagation of the New System of Philosophy forms, as he has himself candidly avowed to us, the main object of all his writings. A system, comprehending not politics only and religion, but morals and manners, and generally whatever goes to the composition or holding together of human society; in all of which a total change and revolution is absolutely necessary (as he contends) for the advancement of our common nature to its true dignity, and to the summit of that perfection which the combination of matter, called Man, is by its innate energies capable of attaining.

Of this system, while the sublimer and more scientific branches are to be taught by the splendid and striking medium of didactic poetry, or ratiocination in rhyme, illustrated with such paintings and portraitures of essences and their attributes as may lay hold of the imagination while they perplex the judgment;—the more ordinary parts, such as relate to the conduct of common life and the regulation of social feelings, are naturally the subject of a less elevated style of writing; 202of a style which speaks to the eye as well as to the ear,—in short, of dramatic poetry and scenic representation.

“With this view,” says Mr. Higgins (for we love to quote the very words of this extraordinary and indefatigable writer),—“with this view,” says he, in a letter dated from his study in St. Mary Axe, the window of which looks upon the parish pump,—“with this view I have turned my thoughts more particularly to the German stage, and have composed—in imitation of the most popular pieces of that country, which have already met with so general reception and admiration in this—a Play; which, if it has a proper run, will, I think, do much to unhinge the present notions of men with regard to the obligations of civil society, and to substitute, in lieu of a sober contentment, and regular discharge of the duties incident to each man’s particular situation, a wild desire of undefinable latitude and extravagance,—an aspiration after shapeless somethings that can neither be described nor understood,—a contemptuous disgust at all that is, and a persuasion that nothing is as it ought to be;—to operate, in short, a general discharge of every man (in his own estimation) from every tie which laws, divine or human, which local customs, immemorial habits, and multiplied examples, impose upon him; and to set them about doing what they like, where they like, when they like, and how they like,—without reference to any law but their own will, or to any consideration of how others may be affected by their conduct.