Obrázky stránek
PDF
ePub
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic]

TRE subject of the above engraving is a novel illustration for our pages; as the fine old ruin is merely an imaginative design, and does not represent a real object: nevertheless, we are assured our engraving will have many admirers, as it is a faithful copy of one of the magnificent views now exhibiting at The Diorama.

This fine picture represents a Gothic Gallery falling to decay, situate at the extremity of a narrow valley, beneath barren mountains. All is sombre, desolate, and mournful; the long-drawn aisles, at a first glance, are alone perceived, for a thick fog reigns without, and such is the illusion of the scene, that you actually fancy yourself chilled by the cold and damp air. By degrees, however, the fog disperses, and through the vast arches are plainly discovered the forests of pine and Îarch-trees that cover the valley. The magic of this effect of light is indeed most VOL. IX.

2 F

extraordinary, and the illusion is complete and enchanting. The execution of this picture reflects the highest honour on Mr. Daguerres, the artist, whose talents have been frequently exercised on other subjects which have been exhibited at The Diorama, but with none of which have we been more interested, than the present specimen, which entitles Mr. Daguerres to be ranked as one of the most distinguished painters that ever lived.

Another picture, painted by Mr. Bouton, is exhibited with the Ruins in a Fog: it is a View of St. Cloud and Environs of Paris, and the eye wanders over a rich landscape, which embraces in extent about forty miles of the country adjacent to the French metropolis. At our feet runs a road, which looks arid and dusty, by the side of which lies a man sleeping, which is life itself; this portion of the picture is executed in the most

260

masterly style. Beyond the bridge thrown over the Seine rise the fine chateau and eminences of St. Cloud, and the Lantern of Demosthenes, which, when illuminated, used to announce to the Parisians, that Napoleon had deserted their city for the palace of St. Cloud. Mount Valerian, the vineyards of Argenteuil, the mills of Sannoy, the steeple of St. Denis, may be recognized, and to the extreme right is Paris, the numerous edifices of which may be easily distinguished. In a work of such magnitude, and possessing so many claims to admiration, it is impossible to carry on a description which, at best, can but convey a feeble idea of this magnificent picture to our reader. We shall then desist from further detail, especially as the major part of our friends will doubtless take an opportunity of visiting the Diorama, and passing, as we have done, an agreeable hour in viewing this highly interesting exhibition.

An Idler's Album;

[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

How deliciously, yet how sadly, how like a tender and soul-stirring dream, come wandering at seasons over the mind, those scenes, and things, and persons, that delighted us in our childhood, that made the first impressions on our innocent and peaceful souls, and from which we may perchance date the origin-the awakening, at least of all our future impulses of feeling, taste, and sentiment! I am no metaphysician to unravel the mysteries of mind, and to assert with confidence that the child is the embryo of the man; if it were so, why is the adult too frequently as different as darkness and light, from his promise as a juvenile ? But I may with confidence assert of myself, that I should probably never have possessed an unbounded taste for all objects of nature and art, had I not been early led to admire them by my uncle, the virtuoso; and to his excellent library, of which I had in very early days the range. I fancy myself also indebted for the seeds of poetry and romance, which now, overpowering every mental faculty, are almost

a misfortune to me rather than a blessing, since they render real sober life, vapid, dreary, and annoying. In brief, I met in the virtuoso's library with Cervante's inimitable satire, which I then believed an authentic history, and Sir Walter Scott's beautiful poetry; and these gave me a decided bias towards antiquity, and all reminiscences and records of princely chivalry; at that period I led a charmed existence, to my enchanted gaze every gentleman was a knight every lady a disguised princess, and as I looked for castles in every house, I did, to my ineffable satisfaction, indeed find one, in the Old House belonging to my great uncle, the colonel; for this having been decorated, under the tasteful eye of the vir tuoso, in the Gothic style, coincided pretty well with my beau-ideal of such structures. Reader! after this long digression, thou art arrived at the Old House; there had I been long before, for these reflections formed but a trifling portion of what were mine, on revisiting it for the first time since mere childhood. How different were my sensations! as I looked over the oaken gallery into the great hall, it appeared now a mere nutshell, the house too was changed, every thing was changed; and yet I knew that all gazed upon retained its place and appearance as minutely as if I had only stepped away one moment and returned. The change, and this I felt, was in my own spirit. Oh! how sad too, and how mysterious it was! I have said I was looking from the gallery into the hall; faint gleams of twilight struggling through the coloured panes of a couple of Saracenic windows, showed murkily its black and grotesquely carved oaken wainscoat; here hung the antlers of some buck that bled, perhaps, centuries ago; there the remnants of armour, worn by some nameless hero, in the iron age; opposite to me, its honest face glaring white through the gloom, was the housedial; it struck, and forcibly brought to my memory, some exquisite lines of Chauncey Townsend's; for this too,—

"Had still chim'd on, in the interval between,

While I was wand'ring far away, thro' many a

dreary scene:

Each other voice may alter, but Time's doth still remain

Unchang'd and stern, as caring not for human joy or pain."

Beneath it was the fireplace, after the antique fashion,-a plain and capacious stone hearth, with no grate, but an immense aperture for the emission of smoke, and the admission of air. Our ancestors were economical. On its left hand was a short flight of stairs, leading on one side

to an ante-room, which was furnished in the probable fashion of the year one; this was an entrance into the best, or great dining-room,a cheerless apartment, dark, lofty, and containing choice specimens of furniture in tapestry, damask, and carpet-stitch. A castle is nothing without a ghost, and my wild imagination of course took fright at this truly horrible room; nor was the long passage on the other side the little stairs a whit less terrible; this and the gallery I believed to be haunted, as devoutly as I credited the articles of my Christian faith; nay, with far more probability might the latter have been subjected to such a suspicion, hung round as it was with old black family portraits, resembling of themselves spectres from Hades. These, like so many fiends, were now grinning upon me; deeper and deeper fell the shades of evening; the wild autumnal wind whistled shrill amid the plantations that surrounded the Old House; the branches of many trees groaned and creaked in the furious blast; now a few straggling twigs flapped against the gothic windows, and now a rush of sudden rain swept down their coloured panes. It was an hour for Sweet and solemn memories; nor were such slow to visit my musing spirit; it was then that all events of joy and sorrow, and all years that had fled since last my childhood hallowed this spot, seemed crowded into the brief space of a moment; and it was then that I asked myself

[ocr errors]

'my kinsmen, the companions of my early days, where are they? And this spot that once my imagination sanctified, and that once I beheld with unmixed delight, -why is it not the same ?" Oh! the greater part of my cousins, who resided in the Old House, and whose heritage it was, were, as well as the virtuoso, who had so tastefully adorned it, married, and residing far off; my great uncle, the colonel, was with my revered aunt-gone

and seldom, it ever, relinquishes her power; nay, even as I stood, I almost expected to see the shade of my portly and turbulent great uncle appear at the stair-head from the long passage, or from his former dormitory, near me, in the oaken gallery; and to hear that of my revered aunt screaming forth, according to custom, her domestic commands and threats in every corner of the Old House.

But now were my ruminations, reminiscences, and reveries broken, by a servant lighting the hall-lamp; that identical lamp, which had gleamed on my cousins and me, when we acted plays, or played at ghosts, beneath its pensive ray; and this, too, had glimmered on, the same as ever, during the years of my absence. In the days of my childhood, I had thought it twinkled mirthfully in unison with the merry hearts that sported in the hall; in the days of my youth (saddened by many things, more than youth is wont to be,) the solitary lamp seemed to glimmer luridly on the gloomy panelling and accoutrements of that lone, deserted spot; well, the lamp beamed, candles were taken to the drawing-room, and thither I bent my steps, to converse with my solitary cousin on the past!

Poor Old House! This was my last visit to it for ever. It has since passed into other hands; for those, whose heritage it was, sold it, when circumstances obliged them all to abide far from it; its beauty is gone; it is a wreck; it is worse than nothing to me; and though I know that the family flourish abundantly on a better portion, it still seems that the quitting an ancient abode is the omen of its decay. Poor Old House! where happiness, that I shall never know again, first lighted and warmed my bosom, farewell! to me thou art dead, and the tribute that I owed I have thus paid to thy memory. M. L. B.

to "the house of all living," and only Origins and Inventions.

one of all their large family was now at home. As for the mansion itself, it had lost its novelty and romance,-it was truly changed; and while I slipped at every step I set on the ploughed gallery, I knew nevertheless that it was no longer a castle; the illusions of my childhood were dissipated, and I had unhappily become clear-sighted to realities. There was but one thing that remained as mysterious and romantic as ever-the great dining-room-yes, and another-the long passage;-and I would not even now have ventured alone into the one, or down the other at midnight; for superstition, when early gaining ascendancy over the mind, defies reason to annul her sway,

No. XXVI.

DOOMSDAY BOOK.

(For the Mirror.)

THIS book was made by order of William the Conqueror, in which the estates of the kingdom were registered. It is still in existence, fair and legible, consisting of two volumes, a greater and a less. Some of the capital letters and principal passages are touched with red ink; and some have strokes of red ink run across, as if scratched out. It was begun in the year 1081, but not completed till the year

1087. Mr. Turner, in his History of the Anglo-Saxons, (vol. iv.) says, "All the prerogatives and rights of the AngloSaxon cyning, or king, were definite and ascertained. They were such as had become established by law and custom, and could be as little exceeded by the sovereign as withheld by the people. They were not arbitrary privileges of an unknown extent. Even William the Conqueror found it necessary to have an official survey of the royal rights taken in every part of the kingdom; and we find the hundred, or similar bodies in every county, making the inquisition to the king's commissioners, who returned to the sovereign that minute record of his claims upon his subjects, which constitutes the Domes-day Book. The royal claims in Domes-day Book were, therefore, not the arbitrary impositions of the throne, but were those which the people themselves testified to their king to have been his legal rights. Perhaps no country in Europe can exhibit such an ancient record of the freedom of its people, and the limited prerogatives of its ruler. For the execution of this great survey, some of the king's barons were sent commissioners into every shire, and juries summoned in each hundred, out of all orders of freemen, from barons down to the lowest farmers, who were sworn to inform the commissioners what was the name of each inanor, who held it then? how many hides, how much wood, how much pasture, how much meadow land it contained, how many ploughs were in the demesne part of it, and how many in the tenanted part, how many mills, how many fishponds or fisheries belonged to it? what had been added to it, or taken away from it? what was the value of the whole together, in the time of King Edward? what, when granted by William? what at the time of this survey? and whether it might be improved, or advanced in value? They were, likewise, to mention all the tenants, of every degree, and how much each of them had held, or did hold, at that time; and what was the number of slaves: nay, they were even to return a particular account of the live stock on each manor. These inquisitions or verdicts were first methodized in the county, and afterwards sent up into the king's exchequer. The lesser Domes-day Book, containing the originals so returned from the three counties of Essex, Norfolk, and Suffolk, includes the live stock; the greater comprehending all the counties of England, except Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmoreland, Durham, and part of Lancashire, were never surveyed, being then in a waste and desolate condi

tion. This survey, at the time it was made, gave great offence to the people; and created a jealousy, that it was intended for some new impositions-the knowledge it gave to the government, of the state of the kingdom, was a necessary ground work for many improvements, with relation to agriculture, trade, and the increase of the people, in different parts of the country, as well as a rule to proceed by in levying taxes. It was also of no small utility for the ascertaining property, and for the speedy decision or prevention of law suits. But notwithstanding all the precaution taken by the conqueror, to have this survey faithfully and impartially executed, it appears, from indisputable authority, that a false return was given in by some of the commissioners, and that, as it is said, out of a pious motive. This was particularly the case with the abbey of Croyland, in Lincolnshire, the possessions of which were greatly underrated, both with regard to quantity and value. This ancient record was called Domes-day Book, because a sentence, arising from the evidence therein contained, could no more be appealed from, or eluded, than the final doom at the day of judgment. Its name being formed from the Saxon dom; doom, judg ment, sentence; and day, which has the same force, so that domes-day is no more than a reduplicate, importing, judgment, judgment. This book, which Camden calls Gulielmi Librum Censualem, i. e. King William's tax-book, was formerly kept under three different locks and keys; one in the custody of the treasurer, and the others of the two chamberlains of the exchequer. It is now deposited in the Chapter-house at Westminster, where it may be consulted, on paying to the proper officers a fee of 6s. 8d. for a search, and fourpence per line for a transcript.

PEDANTS.

P. T. W.

(For the Mirror.)

THAT a man is better able to expatiate on what he knows, or thinks he knows, than on what he knows not, is certain; but he should recollect that all do not pretend to similar knowledge; and what gratifies himself may not gratify others; nor is the pleasure he derives from certain studies, a ground for presuming that they will afford to all equal gratification. The logician, however highly he admires his art, need not invariably speak in syllogisms; nor the mathematician, however delighted by absolute certainty, support every assertion with a demonstration; pro

bably the former would be better understood without his logic, and the latter believed more firmly without the demonstration.

Among the different species of pedants, there are two or three which are most prominent, and which do not claim, but force themselves on our attention. There is the ignorant pedant, and the semilearned pedant, and the learned pedant; all of them have equal assurance, but not equal ability to support it. It is rather difficult to say which of them is preferable; he who professes to know what he does not know; he who possessing a little knowledge is always retailing it; or he who is really learned, and withal superlatively anxious that you should know it; who talks of physics and metaphysics with eternal volubility; who despises all who cannot argue, and yet cannot brook to any opposition.

The ignorant pedant is exposed to many disasters; while uttering his counterfeit learning he is often detected by a keen inspector, and sometimes must feel abashed, from a consciousness of his ignorance; still, however, he may support his character, by talking unintelligibly, and using a certain bead-roll of scientific terms; indeed, in this the whole art consists. One who pronounces so readily, and so precisely, the terms of science, may well be supposed perfectly acquainted with their meaning; but alas! words and ideas have sometimes no connexion.

The ignorant pedant is somewhat clever in escaping detection, as he employs the whole vocabulary of science (though in a very strange manner) in defence of his, opinions; he overwhelms his opponents, not with arguments, but with wonderful words; and they cannot reply, because they really know not what to reply to; thus he gains the victory, and feels emboldened to attempt future conquests.

The semi-learned pedant is one who knows nothing of comparing his intellectual possessions with those of others; he knows a little not generally known, and he thinks himself marvellously wise, so wise that he is above confutation, and will not degrade himself to refute an opponent, but magnanimously despise him, or inwardly pity his ignorance, while he feels elated with his own fancied superiority of knowledge. Really some of this class are the most obstinate and impenetrable creatures existing; able to trace an argument a little way, but unable to pursue it, they are impervious to conviction, and to submit to be instructed is to admit their own ignorance. Some of these pedants, when they do engage in argument, employ tactics peculiar to them

selves; they wander from one subject to another to perplex their antagonist, and deny the most cogent argument; nay, sometimes ignorantly resist demonstration to startle him. They know little of arguing for truth's sake; all they know is arguing for victory.

There is also the semi-learned pedant in natural philosophy, who is for ever amusing one with deductions, and inductions, and what not. Such pedants are ever ready to seize an advantage to display their abilities, and some are very clever this way; observe that a tea cup is too large in diameter, you are answered with an account of the diameters of the planets; notice the excessive heat of a fire, you have a dissertation on caloric; remark the brilliant colours of a hearth-rug, you are obliged to listen to a lecture on optics; lament the fate of some one who was drowned, you are directly furnished with a disquisition on specific gravity; you are told that about four pounds of cork will prevent a human body's sinking, and desired to examine the process by which the assertion is proved: talk of the overturning of a coach, you are reminded of the centre of gravity:-indeed, say what you will, you may calculate on a dissertation, and that sometimes of no very limited length.

There are some semi-learned pedants who are metaphysicians, who scorn mere experimenting, and pretend to investigato the mind, and know the causes of its various operations, and the nature of sensation; some of them are rather physiologists than metaphysicians. If you burn your finger, you are told something about the insinuating of the particles of caloric between the animal fibre; and if you cut it you are told of the discerptibility of the same material. But others of this class ascend into higher regions; they talk of the fitness of things, of conservation and volition, liberty and necessity, power and energy; a man tortured by the gout is told that his pains arise from the fitness of things, that he could not but be subject to such gnawings and burnings; for if he had not suffered, the order of nature would have been broken.

There are semi-learned pedants in every branch of knowledge; the orthoepical, who despises him who mispronounces a syllable; and the etymological, who is continually telling you how differently you use words to what their etymology warrants, and how ignorant it is to do so: indeed, what art or science is there exempted from semi-learned pedants, who have great learning, without knowing its rudiments, and profound science, though ignorant of its principles So true is it,

« PředchozíPokračovat »