book. This would be no objection I say, but, on the contrary, an advantage to all parties. For a book which directs people how to physic themselves ought to be entitled Every Man his own Poisoner, because it cannot possibly teach them how to discriminate between the resemblant symptoms of different diseases. Twice fortunate, therefore, would that person have reason to think him or herself, who, under such a misapprehension of its title, should purchase the Family Doctor! Ludicrous mistakes of this kind have sometimes happened. Mr. Haslewood's elaborate and expensive edition of the Mirror for Magistrates was ordered by a gentleman in the Commission of the Peace, not a hundred miles from the Metropolis; he paid for it the full price, and his unfortunate Worship was fain to take what little he could get for it from his Bookseller under such circumstances, rather than endure the mortification of seeing it in his book-case.* A lady who had a true taste as well as a great liking for poetry, ordered an Essay on Burns for the Reading Society of which she was a member. She opened the book expecting to derive much pleasure from a critical disquisition on the genius of one of her favourite Poets; and behold it proved to be an Essay on Burns and Scalds by a Surgeon! But in this case it would prove an Agreeable Surprise instead of a disappointment; and if the intention had been to mislead, and thereby entrap the purchaser, the end might be pleaded, according to the convenient morality of the age, as justifying the means. Lucky indeed were the patient who sending for Morison's Pills should be supplied with Tom D'Urfey's in their stead; happy man would be his dole who when he had made up his mind in dismal resolution to a dreadful course of drastics, should find that gelastics had been substituted, not of the Sardonian kind, but composed of the most innocent and salutiferous ingredients, Whoever purchased Southey's copy will find this anecdote in his own handwriting, on the fly leaf. I transcribed it from thence into my own copy many years ago. gently and genially alterative, mild in their operation, and safe and sure in their effects. On that score, therefore, there could be no objection to the publication of a Family Doctor. But believing as I believe, or rather, knowing as I know, that the Book is free from any such offence, -mal cupiera alli tal aspid en tales flores ; † maintaining that it is in this point immaculate, which I will maintain as confidently because as justly, and as publicly were it needful, (only that my bever must be closed) as Mr. Dymock at the approaching Coronation will maintain Queen Victoria's right to the Crown of these Kingdoms (God save the Queen!),—it is impossible that I should consent to a measure which must seem like acknowledging the justice of a charge at once ridiculous and wrongful. - I must not disesteem My rightful cause for being accused, nor must The most axiomatic of English Poets has said Do not forsake yourself; for they that do, Of the Book itself, — (the Opus)—I can say truly, as South said of the Sermon which he preached in 1662 before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of the city of London," the subject is inoffensive, harmless, and innocent as the state of innocence itself;" and of the particular chapter, that it is "suitable to the immediate design, and to the genius of the book." And in saying this I call to mind the words of Nicolas Perez, el Setabiense; el amor propio es nuestro enemigo mas perjudicial; es dificil acabar con el, por lo mismo un sabio le compara à la camisa, que es el ultimo de los vestidos que nos quitamos. Bear witness incorrupta Fides, nudaque Veritas! that I seek not to cover myself with what the Spaniard calls Self-Love's last Shirt; for I am no more guilty of Lese Modestie than of Lese Majesté. If there were a Court of Delicacy as there has been a Court of Honour, a Court Modest as there is a Court Martial, I would demand a trial, and in my turn arraign my arraigners, Porque en este limpio trigo Siembren zizaña y estrago.* It is said in the very interesting and affecting Memoir of Mr. Smedley's Life that he had projected with Mr. Murray "a castigated edition of the Faery Queen.” He was surprised, says the biographer, "to find how many passages there were in this the most favourite poem of his youth, which a father's acuter vision and more sensitive delicacy discovered to be unfit for the eyes of his daughters." It appears, too, that he had actually performed the task; but that "Mr. Murray altered his opinion as to the expediency of the publication, and he found to his annoyance that his time had been employed to no purpose." Poor Smedley speaks thus of the project in one of his letters. "I am making the Faery Queen a poem which may be admitted into family reading, by certain omissions, by modernising the spelling and by appending, where necessary, brief glossarial foot-notes. I read Spenser so very early and made him so much a part of the furniture of my mind, that until I had my attention drawn to him afresh I had utterly forgotten how much he required the pruning-knife, how utterly impossible it is that he should be read aloud: and I cannot but think that when fitted for general perusal, he will become more attractive by a new coat and waistcoat. If we were to print Shakespeare, and Beaumont and Fletcher, or even Milton, literatim from the first editions, the spelling would deter many readers. Strange to say, when Southey was asked some time ago whether he would undertake the task, he said, 'No, I shall print every word of him!' And he has done so in a single volume. Can he have daughters? Or any who, like my Mary, delight in such portions as they are permitted to open ?" Portuguese say, enfarinhadamente - which is, being interpreted, mealy-mouthedly. Indeed his moral and intellectual constitution must be much feebler than I suppose it to be, if his daughters are not "permitted to open" any book in his library. He must have been as much astonished to hear that the Faery Queen was unfit for their perusal as he could have been when he saw it gravely asserted by an American Professor, Critic and Doctor of Divinity, that his Life of Wesley was composed in imitation of the Iliad! Scott felt like Southey upon this subject, and declared that he would never deal with Dryden as Saturn dealt with his father Uranus. Upon such publications as the Family Shakespeare he says, "I do not say but that it may be very proper to select correct passages for the use of BoardingSchools and Colleges, being sensible no improper ideas can be suggested in these seminaries unless they are introduced or smuggled under the beards and ruffs of our old dramatists. But in making an edition of a Man of Genius's Works for libraries and collections, (and such I conceive a complete edition of Dryden to be), I must give my author as I find him, and will not tear out the page even to get rid of the blot, little as I like it. Are not the pages of Swift, and even of Pope, larded with indecency and often of the most disgusting kind, and do we not see them upon all shelves, and dressing-tables and in all boudoirs? Is not Prior the most indecent of tale-tellers, not even excepting La Fontaine? and how often do we see his works in female hands. In fact, it is not passages of ludicrous indelicacy that corrupt the manners of a people; it is the sonnets which a prurient genius like Master Little sings virginibus puerisquè,it is the sentimental slang, half lewd, half methodistic, that debauches the understanding, inflames the sleeping passions, and prepares the reader to give way as soon as a tempter appears." How could Mr. Smedley have allowed himself to be persuaded that a poem like the Faery Queen which he had made from early ་ youth a part of the furniture of his own mind," should be more injurious to others than it had proved to himself? It is one of the books which Wesley in the plan which he drew up for those young Methodists who designed to go through a course of academical learning, recommended to students of the second year. Mr. Todd has noticed this in support of his own just estimate of this admirable poet. "If," says he, 66 our conceptions of Spenser's mind may be taken from his poetry, I shall not hesitate to pronounce him entitled to our warmest approbation and regard for his gentle disposition, for his friendly and grateful conduct, for his humility, for his exquisite tenderness, and above all for his piety and morality. To these amiable points a fastidious reader may perhaps object some petty inadvertencies; yet can he never be so ungrateful as to deny the efficacy which Spenser's general character gives to his writings, as to deny that Truth and Virtue are graceful and attractive, when the road to them is pointed out by such a guide. Let it always be remembered that this excellent Poet inculcates those impressive lessons, by attending to which the gay and the thoughtless may be timely induced to treat with scorn and indignation the allurements of intemperance and illicit pleasure." When Izaak Walton published "Thealma and Clearchus," a pastoral history written long since in smooth and easy verse by John Chalkhill, Esq., he described him in the Title page as "An Acquaintant and Friend of Edmund Spenser." He says of him "that he was in his time a man generally known and as well beloved, for he was humble and obliging in his behaviour, a gentleman, a scholar, very innocent and prudent, and indeed his whole life was useful, quiet, and virtuous." Yet to have been the friend of Edmund Spenser was considered by the biographer of Hooker and Donne and Bishop Sanderson and George Herbert, as an honourable designation for this good man, a testimonial of his worth to posterity, long after both Chalkhill and Spenser had been called to their reward. It was well that Mr. Murray gave up the project of a Family Faery Queen. Mr. Smedley when employed upon such a task ought to have felt that he was drawing upon himself something like Ham's malediction. With regard to another part of these projected emendations there is a fatal objection. There is no good reason why the capricious spelling of the early editions should be scrupulously and pedantically observed in Shakespeare, Milton, or any author of their respective times;- - no reason why words which retain the same acceptation, and are still pronounced in the same manner, should not now be spelt according to the received orthography. Spenser is the only author for whom an exception must be made from this obvious rule. Malone was wrong when he asserted that the language of the Faery Queen was that of the age in which Spenser lived; and Ben Jonson was not right when, saying that Spenser writ no language, he assigned as the cause for this, his "affecting the Ancients." The diction, or rather dialect, which Spenser constructed, was neither like that of his predecessors, nor of his contemporaries. Camoens also wrote a language of his own, and thereby did for the Portuguese tongue the same service which was rendered to ours by the translators of the Bible. But the Portuguese Poet, who more than any other of his countrymen refined a language which was then in the process of refining, attempted to introduce nothing but what entirely accorded with its character, and with the spirit of that improvement which was gradually taking place: whereas both the innovations and renovations which Spenser introduced were against the grain. Yet such is the magic of his verse, that the Faery Queen if modernised, even though the structure of its stanza (the best which has ever been constructed) were preserved, would lose as much as Homer loses in the best translation. Mr. Wordsworth has modernised one of Chaucer's Poems with "no farther deviation from the original than was necessary for the fluent reading and instant understanding of the author, supplying the place of whatever he removed as obsolete with as little incongruity as possible." This he has done very skilfully. But the same skill could not be exercised upon the Faery Queen with the same success. The peculiarities of language there are systematic; to modernise the spelling, as Mr. Smedley proposed, would in very many cases interfere with the rhyme, and thus dislocate the stanza. The task, therefore, would have been extremely difficult; it would have been useless, because no one who is capable of enjoying that delightful Poem ever found any difficulty in understanding its dialect, and it would have been mischievous, because it would have destroyed the character of the Poem. And this in the expectation of rendering Spenser more attractive by a new coat and waistcoat! Spenser of whom it has been truly said that more poets have sprung from him than from all other English writers; Spenser by whom Cowley tells us he was made a Poet; of whom Milton acknowledged to Dryden that he was his original; and in whom Pope says "there is something that pleases one as strongly in one's old age as it did in one's youth. I read the Faery Queen," he proceeds, "when I was about twelve, with a vast deal of delight, and I think it gave me as much when I read it over about a year or two ago." So said Skelton three centuries ago, and for myself I say once more what Skelton would have been well pleased to have heard said by any one. Aballiboozo! Dear Author, says one of those Readers who deserve to be pleased, and whom, therefore, there is a pleasure in pleasing, dear Author! may I not ask wherefore you have twice in this Chapter Extraordinary given us part of your long mysterious word, and only part, instead of setting it before us at full length? Dear Reader! you may; and you may also ask unblamed whether a part of the word is not as good, that is to say, as significant, as the whole? You shall have a full and satisfactory answer in the next Chapter. CHAPTER CXLVIII. WHEREIN A SUBSTITUTE FOR OATHS, AND OTHER PASSIONATE INTERJECTIONS IS EXEMPLIFIED. What have we to do with the times? We cannot cure 'em : Let them go on: when they are swoln with surfeits Aballiboozobanganorribo; No, a new suit of clothes would not render Spenser more attractive, not even if to a coat ONCE more, Reader, I commence with and waistcoat of Stultz's fabric, white satin pantaloons were added, such as the handsomest and best dressed of modern patriots, novelists and poets was known by on the public walk of a fashionable watering-place. Save us from the Ultradelicates and the Extrasuperfines! for if these are to prevail-Reader! not if I were before the High What can it avail To drive forth a snail Or to make a sail Of divers manner of style, And sin to exile, To teach or to preach As reason will reach ? Do not suppose that I am about to let thee into the mysteries of that great decasyllabon! Questo è bene uno de' piu profondi segreti ch' abbia tutto il mondo, e quasi nessuno il sa; e sia certo che ad altri nol direi giammai.* No, Court of Parliament, and the House of Commons should exert all its inquisitorial and tyrannical powers to extort it from me, would I let the secret pass that proc ódóvrov within which my little trowel of speech has learned not to be an unruly member. I would behave as magnanimously as Sir Abraham Bradley King did upon a not BIBBIENA. Suum, mun, hey no nonny, Dolphin, my boy, my boy, Another was that from the ballad in honour of the Earl of Essex, called Queen Elizabeth's Champion, which Johnson quoted in the Isle of Sky; and Johnson is not the only omnivorous reader in whose memory it has stuck; Raderer too, tandaro tee Radarer, tandorer, tan do ree. And he had treasured up the elder frag ment, Martin Swart and his men. Sodledum, sodledum, Martin Swart and his men, altogether dissimilar occasion. Sir Abraham an insult to the French, he used to say and might have said of his secret as Henry sing in corrupted form, More says of the Epicurean Philosophy, "Truly it is a very venerable secret; and not to be uttered or communicated but by some old Silenus lying in his obscure grot or cave; nor that neither but upon due circumstances, and in a right humour, when one may find him with his veins swelled out with wine, and his garland fallen off from his head through his heedless drowsiness. Then if some young Chromis and Mnasylus, especially assisted by a fair and forward Egle, that by way of a love-frolic will leave the tracts of their fingers in the blood of mulberries on the temples and forehead of this aged Satyr, while he sleeps dog-sleep, and will not seem to see for fear he forfeit the pleasure of his feeling, - then I say, if these young lads importune him enough, — he will utter it in a higher strain than ever." But by no such means can the knowledge of my profounder mystery be attained. I will tell thee, however, good Reader, that the word itself, apart from all considerations of its mystical meaning, serves me for the same purpose to which the old tune of Lilliburlero was applied by our dear Uncle Toby,our dear Uncle I say, for is he not your Uncle Toby, gentle Reader? yours as well as mine, if you are worthy to hold him in such relationship; and so by that relationship, you and I are Cousins. The Doctor had learned something from his Uncle William, which he used to the same effect, though not in the same way. William Dove in that capacious memory of his, into which everything that he heard was stored, and out of which nothing was lost, had among the fragments of old songs and ballads which he had picked up, sundry burdens or choruses, as unmeaning as those which O'Keefe used to introduce in some of the songs of his farces, always with good farcical effect. Uncle Toby's favourite was one of them; Sodledum bell, With hey troly loly lo, whip here Jack, Alumbeck, sodledum, syllerum ben, Martin Swart and his merry men. He had also this relic of the same age, relating as it seems to some now forgotten hero of the strolling minstrels, * Rory-bull Joyse, Rumble down, tumble down, hey, go now now. Here is another, for he uttered these things as he had eaten ballads." A story strange I will you tell, But not so strange as true, Of a woman that danced upon the rope, With a dildo, dildo, dildo, And he had one of Irish growth, which he sometimes tacked on to this last for the rhyme's sake Callino, callino, Era ëe, Era ëe All these were favourites with little Daniel; and so especially for his name's sake, was My juggy, my puggy, my honey, my coney, My deary, my love, my dove. There was another with which and the Dovean use thereof, it is proper that the reader should now be made acquainted, for it would otherwise require explanation, when he meets with it hereafter. This was the one which, when William Dove trotted Without knowing that it was designed as little Daniel upon his knee, he used to sing Lilli burlero bullen a-la; Lero lero, lilli burlero, lero lero, bullen a-la; CC |