Various
Bentley's Miscellany, Volume II
CHAPTER X
I returned to my lodging full of thought. What with the conversations I had heard in the coach, what with the strange sayings of Mrs. Figsby and her husband, I began to have my eyes a little more opened than they were before. I considered that, notwithstanding the flourishing exterior of things, and the general appearances of prosperity which had struck my eyes, there might be truth in the rumours which had been so current in Persia, that England was declining fast in greatness, and was on the brink of ruin. I had occasionally seen madmen in my own country, from whose brain all sense had fled when their minds were bent upon a particular subject, but who still upon others were rational, and acted like sane men. "May not that be the case here?" thought I; "and, if all the nation has run mad by one common consent upon this desire of change, they may have sapped the foundation of their real happiness and prosperity, although they still build fine houses and exhibit resplendent shops."
I determined, in conformity to my instructions from the asylum of the universe, to present my letters to the English vizier; to have a conversation with him, and then to settle whether I should deliver the fortunate letter, of which I was the bearer, from the king of kings to the King of England. Accordingly, I proceeded to a certain dark and obscure street, where, on former occasions, I recollected the sovereign had ordered his vizier to receive the ambassadors and ministers of foreign powers, and there to transact their business, and, sure enough, I found things just as I had left them; thus far there had been no reform. I found no parade of guards, executioners, officers, or heralds; but one little man seated in a great leather chair, and through his interference I was introduced into a dark room, without a single word of welcome being said, not even "Good morning," and "Fine day;" and there I was left until the vizier could speak to me.
I waited what appeared to me a long time, – quite long enough to consider, if this was an English palace, what must be an English prison! At length another infidel invited me to follow him, and, after having been paraded through a few rooms, I found myself in the presence of one whom I first took for the vizier, but who I soon found was only his deputy. He was very kind and civil, and asked my business in courteous language; upon which I told him that I was just arrived from the foot of the Persian throne, and was the bearer of a letter to the English vizier, as well as to his royal master. He seemed pleased at this information; but he asked me a question which made the wind fly out of my head.
"Pray, sir," said he, "do you bring us any letter from our minister in Persia? I do not think that we have been apprised of your mission."
Upon this I stroked down my beard, and, searching in the depths of my wit for a ready answer, I answered that I was despatched from the imperial stirrup as a courier, and not as a minister. "I have no letter but this;" upon which I drew from my breast the grand vizier's letter, which I delivered into his hand. He was at a loss whilst he unrolled it, for he evidently did not know the top from the bottom; and all communication must have ceased between us, had I not possessed the translation, which I had prudently caused to be made at Tabriz by one of my own countrymen who had received his education in England.
This, the vizier's deputy read over very attentively; and, as he read, I observed certain smiles break out on his features, from which I augured favourably. He then desired me to wait, whilst he took up the papers, and left the room to lay them before his chief, saying not a word of his own opinion upon their contents.
He soon returned, and, asking me to follow, he led the way into an adjacent room, where I found the English vizier in person. The appearance and manners of this personage were full of charm; and, although a man in his high office had usually the power of awing me into fear and diffidence of myself, still I felt no other sensations than what were agreeable when he addressed me.
"I have been reading strange things in this letter," said the vizier. "I am informed that my country is on the brink of ruin, and that his majesty the Shah, apprehending disaster might accrue to my own sovereign, has been pleased to offer him an asylum at his gate."
"That is, in truth, the object of my mission," said I. "You have spoken right."
"But how," said the vizier, "has this information travelled to Persia? It is new to me, as it is, I believe, to every member of his majesty's government."
"How do I know?" I answered, with some little confusion; for, in truth, I began to feel that I had come upon a fool's errand, and was about to swallow much abomination. "Our news in Persia is not printed every day upon paper as it is here, but comes to us as it may please the will of Allah! The asylum of the universe, upon whom be blessings! who knows all, and does all for the good of his subjects, was convinced of the fact; the same was confirmed by all strangers arriving at his imperial gate; and it was announced by the English minister himself that a great change was about to take place in his country; that old counsels, which had been followed since the recollection of the most ancient greybeards of the country, were about to be abolished and replaced by new; and that a certain thing, called People, whether man or beast we never could discover, was on the point of obtaining supremacy, and despoiling your reverend monarch, for whom the king of kings entertains the highest friendship, of his ancient hereditary throne."
"Your news," observed the vizier, "was partly right, and partly false. That a change has taken place in the government of this country," said he, "is true; and our minister's words are confirmed. A change has taken place; but change does not argue total destruction."
Recollecting that I was here at the fountain-head of information, and that the vizier's words were words to be repeated to the king of kings, I inquired, "As I am less than the least, may it please you to inform your slave what is this change?"
"The principal change has been in giving the people a better means than they had before of making their wishes known through their representatives. You know, of course," said he, "what our 'parliament' means?"
"Yes," said I. "I believe I am right in saying that a representative means a man who is supposed to be a concentrated essence of the thousands and tens of thousands of those who choose him; and that he cries out 'black' or 'white' as the fit seizes him. A collection of such men means a parliament."
"You have a tolerable notion of what I mean," said the vizier, smiling. "Now, certain of these representatives could only cry out 'black' or 'white' as it choosed to please, not themselves, but certain khans or omrahs of our country, who sent them instead of the people. That is the principal change we have made."
"I understand – I understand!" I exclaimed, as if a new light had opened upon me. "The omrahs, therefore, are displeased, and cry out 'Ruin!' and the people are overjoyed, and cry out, 'We are sovereigns;' and both are wrong."
The vizier seemed greatly amused with my great discovery, and then entered into certain long explanations concerning the various topics which I had heard discussed between the smooth and rough infidels whom I had met in the coach, and which only tended to obscure the great conclusion to which I had come by the light of my own wit. I allowed him to talk, and he seemed pleased to do so, as if he were defending himself from imputations, and of which, in truth, I understood not one word. However, he seemed amazingly struck, when, in rising to go, I said,
"It is plain, then, that some great mistake has been committed somewhere; otherwise, why should this great country be so terribly torn from one end of it to the other by animosities, which seem to have led it to the brink of anarchy?"
"No great change," said he, "can take place without producing a great shock of interests and opinions, and consequently animosities."
"And that is just what a good and wise government ought to avoid," said I. "Our Shah is called Zil Allah, the Shadow of the Almighty; and, according to the saying of one of our ancient sages, the acts of a king ought to follow the same course perceivable in the dispensations of Providence, and in the laws by which God, the great and good, directs the fates of his creatures. All changes in government ought to be as gradual as changes in the seasons. If a great change takes place without a previous preparation of the people's minds, and an almost imperceptible one in their habits, of course the sudden transition will produce a shock so violent, that the mischief may perhaps be without remedy. If, during the heats of summer, the Almighty were to give this globe a sudden accelerated turn, and throw us at once into the snows of winter, the effects might almost produce sudden death upon one half of his creatures; but he allows the intervening autumn gradually to blend the two extremes, and thus produces a healthy action in the operations of nature."
He did not seem so much struck by the wisdom of this speech as I was, and I was about leaving him, when I recollected the letter with which I was charged from the Shah-en-Shah, the king of kings, and asked when I should deliver it. He paused a little in thought, and then said,
"Perhaps it may be as well that we hear something from our minister in Persia before you deliver your letter." Upon which, seeing that my countenance was turned upside down, he said, with great kindness of manner, "There will be no harm done if you deliver it immediately. The King of England is ready to receive the application of every one, from the peasant in the field to the greatest potentate."
MY UNCLE
A FRAGMENT
He kept a store,
A place of refuge to which all might fly
In the dark hour of bleak adversity,
When sunshine friends, like summer birds, had flown.
He was misfortune's shield, – a goodly man!
In fact, so kind a soul could scarce be found;
For he would lend to any graceless wight
A sum of money, and would never ask
His bond or bill, or even say "Be sure
To pay me this again next week, or so."
He never craved a debtor in his life!
* * * * *
Around his house, in many a goodly pile,
All sorts of wares were ranged in order nice,
Shoes, hats, great-coats, and gowns, with many pairs
Of certain parts of dress (not pantaloons),
Which, it is said, some married females wear.
Above his door
Invitingly were hung three golden balls,
As if to say, "Who pennyless would go?"
Here is a banking-house, whence every man
Who has an article to leave behind,
May draw for cash, nor fear his cheque unpaid.
Ah me! full many an ungrateful wight
In this same store, without a sigh or tear,
Parted his bosom friend, altho' he knew
That friend must dwell among the unredeemed.
WHY THE WIND BLOWS ROUND ST. PAUL'S
BY JOYCE JOCUND
Whoever has walked round St. Paul's church-yard must have had good evidence of the wind being always boisterous there, on the most balmy day of spring, in summer's more sultry hour, in autumn's bracing time, or in winter's chilling air; all tides and every season bear strong testimony that the wind is ever blowing there, not in those gentle gales that love to play and wanton round other edifices, but in such rude, boisterous burstings, that the traveller is fain to look to his footing, and put up with a blow which is neither to be parried nor returned. I cannot fix the precise date, but it was during the last century, that a bit of a breeze was kicked up in the higher circles among the Winds; and, from the strife that ensued, more serious consequences seemed to threaten than were at first apprehended. Whether the East was intent on going westward, or the North determined on veering to the south, is of trifling import. From words the disputants nearly came to blows, and the weathercocks were sadly put to their shifts during all the changes that occurred: those who consulted them found how little attention was paid to the cardinal points, which from time immemorial had been considered their cardinal virtues; in short, it was impossible to tell which way the wind lay. Nothing was to be heard among them but wranglings, wailings, and contentions.
"As for you," roared old Boreas, addressing a mild-looking individual personifying the South wind, "a poor, soft, effeminate creature, only fit to breathe o'er a bed of violets, what, in the name of all that's trifling, can you possibly presume to know?"
"I may not be so bluff as you, nor so excellent a bully," replied the other; "yet I flatter myself that I am equally esteemed by mankind."
"Doubtless! by old maids, invalids, and anglers."
"And I prefer their welcome to the maledictions so lavishly heaped upon you, by the aged, the gouty, and the suffering," was the rejoinder.
"Fie! fie!" lisped the West wind, an exquisite of the most exclusive order. "If you persist, I shall positively arraign you at the bar of good breeding and fashion."
"Which I believe is not situated on my side Temple-bar," exclaimed the East, in a tone that reminded one of the equinox.
"Your intimacy with the bar is confined to the Old Bailey," chirruped his opponent, who commenced,
"Cease rude Boreas, blustering railer:
List ye."
At this personal attack the North looked particularly black, and the East BLEW with increased violence.
"How the puppy squalls!" said the latter, in reference to the singing.
"Rather more melodious than your howling," replied the tormentor; for the West wind is occasionally pretty sharp when its powers are exerted.
With this slight specimen you may suppose that the Winds began to get very high; ill-natured replies followed angry remarks; while the East wind distributed his usual cutting retorts with unsparing profusion. In short, the only subject on which they appeared agreed was to perform "The Storm," ad libitum, with hail and rain accompaniments. There is an old adage, "as busy as the Devil in a high wind: " how busy that may be, let others determine; but truly his Satanic Majesty was never more occupied than on this memorable occasion, for he seemed to have possessed the contending parties with an implacable spirit of opposition, and contrived to divide his influence so impartially that each played the very devil with the other. When the uproar had sufficiently subsided to permit observation, it was clearly apparent that the North, as was his wont, rather sided with the East, and the South as plainly inclined to the West; so, after amusing himself with their differences, the crafty instigator of the feud proposed that the affair should be permitted to blow over, and, by way of cooling themselves, that the four Winds should accompany him on a stroll through London streets, towards the City; where he promised them plenty of adventures, with many sights worthy their attention. After a few more gusts of passion exhibited by the North and East, venting their spite upon their more peaceful opponents, the party set forth on their ramble, with something like outward decency of demeanour, although opposition and dissatisfaction were rankling in their hearts. Their cicerone pointed to a plot of ground in Hyde Park.
"Here," said he, "will be erected an imperishable monument to that greatest of modern heroes, the victor of a hundred fights. In every land shall his matchless deeds be known, and his fame proclaimed by – "
"The four Winds!" exclaimed they all.
"Yonder will be his town-residence," resumed their guide, "the scarcely less than princely mansion of the nation's idol; yet, so evanescent is popularity, and so great is the distinction between civil matters and military, that coming years will display his windows barricaded against the assaults of that people whose opinions are as changeable as the – "
"What?" said his hearers in a breath, ready to take offence should he indulge in any personal allusion.
"As changeable as – as the weather."
"Oh!" exclaimed the East, with a significant whistle, that sounded very like the blast of a war-trumpet.
They walked some distance without further remark, until reaching Pall-Mall.
"This," said the Devil, directing their attention to a range of buildings on the right, "this will ere long disappear. Of yon regal habitation, the scene of revelry and delight, not a vestige will remain; vast local improvements will be completed, magnificent residences erected; and here a lofty column shall be raised, on whose 'tall pillar, pointing to the skies,' will be placed the statue of a princely commander – "
"Who will doubtless be highly indebted to the people," observed the North, in his most unpleasant manner.
"And what may be that heavy-looking temple opposite?" inquired the East, pointing to the Opera-house.
"That is celebrated as the resort of beauty, rank, wealth, and fashion."
Here the West wind nodded his assent, as if perfectly cognisant of affairs so particularly appertaining to his quarter of the metropolis.
"Where the aristocracy of this kingdom assemble to lavish their wealth and favours on foreign artistes, as they are called, while native industry and talent are neglected and unrequited. But my sentimentality outruns my prudence; I patronise the Opera, notwithstanding," said the Devil.
"And I," said the West.
Continuing their perambulation, they reached the present site of Waterloo-bridge.
"A splendid structure," observed their conductor, "will here span that mighty stream, on whose waves float a thousand argosies freighted with riches from every distant land. Speculation will soon furnish means sufficient for the enterprise, and – "
"The profits?" inquired old Boreas, too far north to lose sight of the main chance.
"Will be shared among the subscribers."
"By what rule?"
"Short division," was the answer.
"This building on the right is Somerset House, where the Royal Academy holds its annual exhibition of British artists, at which persons pay a shilling to view their own portraits that have cost most exorbitant sums, if painted by popular professors of the art."
"A noble institution," said the South, in simplicity of soul, "and most encouraging to rising talent."
"Very," was the devilish dry reply.
"And where young exhibitors have fine opportunities afforded them to profit by the experience, skill, and fostering care of their superiors."
"Exactly," said the Devil, with a malicious smile. "In the arrangement and distribution of the pictures the committee show an intimate knowledge of 'light and shade,' which is particularly instructive to others. They appropriate all the 'light' to their own pictures, and the 'shade' to their neighbours'. Yonder dirty-looking gate is Temple-bar, where in the olden time traitors' heads stood in goodly row, as plentiful as the portraits in the Exhibition, only that the 'bodies' never came to own them. But" – and here the Devil sighed like a furnace – "innovation and improvement have destroyed all venerable customs."
So, venting his regrets, they journeyed down Fleet-street, when the attention of the gentle South was attracted to the large gloomy edifice which is so prominent in that locality.
"Ah!" said their guide, "that is the Fleet."
"Where?" said the East, springing up at the idea of stiff breezes and swelling sails; "I see no ships."
"Yet there is no lack of craft, I promise you," replied the Devil. "One of the considerate laws of this realm declares that a debtor shall pay in person what he is deficient in pocket: a sapient method to man his Majesty's fleet, and as pretty a piece of legislation as I would propose."
Turning from the prison and its solid-looking brickwork, the first glimpse of St. Paul's met their astonished gaze. The strangers were enraptured at that mighty monument of man's power and perseverance. After surveying the exterior, the Winds expressed an eagerness to view the inside of the cathedral; but their importunities were negatived by their companion, who intimated in strong terms his repugnance to such a proposition. "Besides," he observed, "which of you will pay the twopences demanded for admission? By-the-bye, do me the favour to wait here a few moments. Some most intimate and particular friends are now assembled at the Chapter Coffee-house."
"Do not let us detain you unwillingly," growled the North.
"We are much indebted for your care and guidance," murmured the South.
"I feel more at home in my own quarter of the town," said the East; "let me prove no hindrance."
"But promise me to remain, – rely upon my speedy return," said the Devil.
"Agreed!" roared the North, who seemed to think the spot a good place to make himself heard.
"Then I depend upon your awaiting my coming. For the present, farewell!"
"Au revoir!" lisped the West, as the arch deceiver disappeared down one of the narrow avenues which abound in that locality.
Well, the poor Winds went whistling up and down, looking at the shops, watching the crowd, and amusing themselves as best they could under such disagreeable circumstances. They made several rounds of the church, the hands of the clock made several rounds of the dial, yet the absent one appeared not; and their patience was nearly exhausted, when the South modestly offered to sing them a song, if indeed such feeble powers could lighten the time and lessen their suspense, and then breathed the following words to a soft plaintive air:
SONG OF THE SOUTH
I
I love to roam where the spice-groves send
Their mingled sweets o'er the fragrant air,
Where orange-blossoms their bright buds lend
To weave a wreath for the blushing fair;
And I waft each shining tress aside
That shades the brow of the blooming bride.
II
I love to roam at the sunset hour,
To breathe farewell to the parting day,
And kiss the dew from each star-lit flower,
That ever weeps as light fades away.
Oh! I woo them all with my softest sighs,
And gently whisper, – that Love never dies!
"Enough! enough!" grumbled the East; "I cannot waste my time in such frivolities. Where is the fellow who brought us here?"
"Ay!" said the North, "does he fancy we have nothing better to occupy us than attending his pleasure, dancing attendance?"
And thereat the watchers became mighty impatient. At length the North declared that he had business of great importance that night upon the coast.
"What fools we were to pledge ourselves! My engagements are imperative, – go I must!" roared he with vehemence.
"And I," added the East, with similar violence.
"I have made an appointment in Bond-street," muttered the West, mentioning the fashionable lounge of that period; "moreover, the Countess of B – expects me at her party. I am irrevocably bound to the countess, and would not disappoint the sweet creature for worlds."
"I cannot remain alone in this gloomy place," sighed the South.
"Listen!" said the North, puffing himself up to an unusual pomposity, even for him; "I have a plan to remedy the dilemma. I go, – that is settled. You three can easily find an excuse for my absence."
"And mine," cried the East. "Two are very good company, – three damp conversation."
"As I have nothing particular to communicate, I shall follow your example," said the West, looking significantly at the East.
"I was assured the puppy would oppose me," grunted the latter; "'tis his constant practice."
Thus affairs appeared in tolerable train for a repetition of the former bickering, when it was at last decided, but not without much turbulent and acrimonious feeling, that each should wait in turn, and give timely notice to the others of the truant's arrival; and with this understanding they separated, leaving one on guard. It is hardly necessary to state that the Devil never reappeared. He always leaves his votaries in the lurch; and on this occasion his boon companions at the Chapter gave him such good cheer, that he forgot the poor winds, who have ever since been alternately looking, but in vain, for his arrival. To their honour be it told, that they each and every one performed his promise of remaining for a stated period, neither excepting the boisterous North, the cutting East, the fashionable West, nor the gentle South. Their various watchings may be easily distinguished by their respective degrees of violence in the neighbourhood, and to this very hour is one of them to be heard either roaring, blowing, moaning, or sighing for their emancipation. And this accounts for the fact of their constant presence, and shows why "the wind blows round St. Paul's."
The tradition inculcates a moral. Had the four Winds pursued the "path of duty," this trial had been spared them; but they listened to the tempter. Let all profit by their example: Men, as well as Winds, should "keep within compass."