Part 1

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE

Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.

Bold text is denoted by =equal signs=.

The 3-star asterism symbol in the Catalog after the Index is denoted by ***.

Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and consultation of external sources. Many passages have deliberate misspelling for humorous effect.

More detail can be found at the end of the book.

THE CHOICE

HUMOROUS WORKS

Ludicrous Adventures, Bons Mots, Puns, and Hoaxes

OF

THEODORE HOOK

A NEW EDITION

WITH

_LIFE OF THE AUTHOR, PORTRAITS BY MACLISE AND D'ORSAY, CARICATURES, AND FACSIMILES_

London

CHATTO AND WINDUS, PICCADILLY

1883

CONTENTS.

PAGE

MEMOIR OF THEODORE HOOK 3

THE RAMSBOTTOM PAPERS:--

I. Mrs. Ramsbottom's Party 41

II. Miss Lavinia Ramsbottom 43

III. Miss Lavinia's Letter from Paris, forwarding her Mother's Journal in England and France 44

IV. Higginbottom and Ramsbottom 52

V. Miss Lavinia Ramsbottom forwards the Continuation of her Mother's Diary 53

VI. Adventures at Paris 60

VII. Further Adventures at Paris 62

VIII. Mrs. Ramsbottom back in London 66

IX. Mrs. Ramsbottom at Rome 69

X. Mrs. Ramsbottom objects to be _Dramatised_ 72

XI. Mrs. Ramsbottom writes from Dieppe 73

XII. Hastings 75

XIII. Mrs. Ramsbottom on the House of Commons 78

XIV. Mrs. Ramsbottom on the Canning Administration 81

XV. Mrs. Ramsbottom on Smoking 84

XVI. Mrs. Ramsbottom's Conundrums 85

XVII. A Letter from Cheltenham 87

XVIII. Hastings again 90

XIX. News from Hastings 94

XX. Mrs. Ramsbottom on the relative merits of Margate and Brighton 96

XXI. Mrs. Ramsbottom contemplates the Collection of her Letters into a volume 102

XXII. Mrs. Ramsbottom on Popery 105

XXIII. Mrs. Ramsbottom at the Royal Academy 108

XXIV. Mrs. Ramsbottom at the "Chiswick Fête" 111

XXV. A Letter from Walmer 117

XXVI. A Peck of Troubles 118

XXVII. Mrs. Ramsbottom on Public Events 120

XXVIII. Mrs. Ramsbottom declares herself a Convert to "Reform" 123

XXIX. Mrs. Ramsbottom on the House of Lords 128

POLITICAL SONGS AND SQUIBS:--

Carmen Æstuale 133

Ass-ass-ination 135

Michael's Dinner 138

Mrs. Muggins's Visit to the Queen 140

Hunting the Hare 147

The City Concert 152

Invitations to Dinner 156

Vacation Reminiscences 159

Reminiscences Continued 162

Gaffer Grey 166

The Idle Apprentice turned Informer 170

The Queen's Subscription 174

Opposition 178

The Invitation 184

The Beggars--A New Song 188

Bubbles of 1825 194

The Grand Revolution 197

Imitation of Bunbury's "Little Grey Man" 200

Humpty-Dumpty 203

Parody--"While Johnny Gale Jones" 204

Parody--"The young May Moon" 205

Disappointment 206

TENTAMEN; OR, AN ESSAY TOWARDS THE HISTORY OF WHITTINGTON, SOME TIME LORD MAYOR OF LONDON 207

MISCELLANIES, IN VERSE AND PROSE:--

Mr. Ward's Allegorical Picture of Waterloo 249

Letter from a Goose 259

The Hum-Fum Gamboogee Society 262

Moral Theatricals 269

Private Correspondence of Public Men 275

The Cockney's Letter 280

Byroniana 284

Lord Wenables 288

Lord Wenables Again 304

Modern Improvements (Two Letters) 309

Punning, with Cautionary Verses to Youth of both Sexes 316

Fashionable Parties 322

A Day's Proceedings of a Reformed Parliament 325

Clubs 333

Rachel Stubbs' Letter to Richard Turner 336

Mr. Minus the Poet 338

National Distress 339

Hints for the Levee 347

The Inconsistencies of Cant 350

Prince Puckler-Muskau's Tour 355

Prospectus for a General Burying Company 388

Letter from John Trot to John Bull 392

The March of Intellect 395

Sunday Bills 400

The Spinster's Progress 405

Errors of the Press 409

The Visit to Wrigglesworth 413

A Visit to the Old Bailey 440

The Toothpick-makers' Company 453

The Man-servant's Letter 464

The Bibliomaniac 468

Absence of Mind 469

A Distinguished Traveller 470

Daly's Practical Jokes 471

The Ballet 492

Toll-gates and their Keepers 496

Tom Sheridan's Adventure 499

Polly Higginbottom 503

Song--"Mary once had Lovers two" 504

Philip and Donna Louisa 505

The Blacksmith 506

"My Father did so before me" 507

"Throughout my Life the Girls I've pleased" 508

The Chambermaid 509

Song, "When I was a very little Fellow" 509

Sir Tilbury Tott 511

"Venice Preserved" 513

Daylight Dinners 515

Clubs! 516

Visitings 518

The Quill Manufacturer 522

Epigram on Twining's Tea 522

On the Latin Gerunds 522

The Splendid Annual 523

ANECDOTES, HOAXES, AND JESTS:--

The Berners-street Hoax 539

Romeo Coates 541

Hook, Mathews, and the Alderman 542

A Strange Dinner 544

Ludicrous Adventure at Sunbury 547

Charles Mathews and Hook 552

Hook's "First Appearance" 553

Hook and Dowton the Actor 554

Letter from Mauritius 555

Evading a Coach Fare 557

Unsuccessful Hunt for a Dinner 559

Hook at Lord Melville's Trial 560

The Thirty-nine Articles 562

"Chaffing" a Proctor 562

Summary Proceedings of Winter 563

"Something Wrong in the Chest" 564

Warren's Blacking 564

The Wine-cellar and the Book-seller 565

Sir Robert Peel's Anecdote of Theodore Hook 565

A Receipt against Night Air 566

Punting 566

"List" Shoes 567

"The Abattoir" 568

Putney Bridge 568

"Mr. Thompson is Tired" 568

The Original "Paul Pry" 569

Hook and Tom Hill 570

Hook's Politeness 570

A Biscuit and a Glass of Sherry 571

Much Alike 572

Private Medical Practice 572

Hook's Street Fun 572

A Misnomer 572

"Contingencies" 573

"The Widow's Mite" 573

Hook's Extempore Verses 573

Hook Extemporises a Melodrama 575

"Ass-ass-ination" 578

"Weather or No" 578

Diamond Cut Diamond 579

Tom Moore--Losing a Hat 579

"Good Night" 579

MEMOIR OF THEODORE HOOK.

MEMOIR OF THEODORE HOOK.

The life of the distinguished humourist whose _opera minora_ we now present to the world, was so chequered and diversified by remarkable incidents and adventures, and passed so much in the broad eye of the world and of society, as to be more than ordinarily interesting. The biography of a man of letters in modern times seldom affords so entertaining a narrative, or so instructive and pathetic a lesson, exhibiting how useless and futile are the most brilliant powers and talents, both original and transmitted, without a due admixture of that moral principle and wisdom in daily life necessary to temper and control them.

THEODORE EDWARD HOOK--one of the most brilliant wits, and one of the most successful novelists of this century--was born in London, at Charlotte Street, Bedford Square, on the 22nd of September, 1788, in the same year as Lord Byron, whose contemporary he afterwards was at Harrow. The first school that Theodore attended was an "academy," in the Vauxhall districts. The master, a Mr. Allen, had also other pupils in his charge who afterwards rose to eminence. Here he remained till his tenth year, when he was sent to a kind of seminary for young gentlemen, a green-doored, brass-plated establishment, in Soho Square. While at this school, he appears systematically to have played truant, to have employed his time in wandering about the streets, and to have invented ingenious excuses to explain his absence to the authorities. On the day of the illumination for the Peace of Amiens, he preferred to spend the morning at home, and informed his parents that a whole holiday had been given on account of the general rejoicings. Unfortunately, his elder brother, James, happened to pass through the Square, and observing signs of business going on as usual at the academy, he went in, made inquiries, and found that the young scape-grace had not made his appearance there for three weeks. Theodore, instead of witnessing the fireworks, was duly punished, and locked up in the garret for the rest of the afternoon.

Theodore was the second son of Mr. James Hook, the popular musical composer, whose pleasing strains had delighted the preceding generation, when Vauxhall Garden was a fashionable resort. His mother (a Miss Madden) is described as a woman of singular beauty, talents,[1] accomplishments, and worth. To the fact that he lost her gentle guidance at the early age of fourteen, may be attributed many of the misfortunes and irregularities of his after-life.

There was but one other child of Mr. James Hook's first marriage, the late Dr. James Hook, Dean of Worcester; and he being Theodore's senior by eighteen years, had left the paternal roof long before the latter was sent to school.

The Dean, with a great deal of the wit and humour that made his brother famous,[2] and with perhaps much the same original cast of disposition and temper generally, had possessed one great advantage over him at the start of life. His excellent mother watched over him all through the years of youth and early manhood. Theodore could only remember her, and fondly and tenderly he did so to the last, as the gentle parent of a happy child. He had just approached the first era of peril when this considerate and firm-minded woman was lost to her family. The composer soon afterwards married again; but Theodore found not, what, in spite of a thousand proverbs, many men have found under such circumstances--a second mother. But for that deprivation we can hardly doubt that he might, like his more fortunate brother, have learned to regulate his passions and control his spirits, and risen to fill with grace some high position in an honourable profession. The calamitous loss of his mother is shadowed very distinctly in one of his novels, and the unlucky hero (Gilbert Gurney) is represented as having a single prosperous brother, exactly eighteen years older than himself. But, indeed, that novel is very largely autobiographical: when his diary alludes to it as in progress, the usual phrase is, "Working at my Life."

Born in the same year with Lord Byron and Sir Robert Peel, he was their schoolfellow at Harrow, but not in the same memorable form, though he often alluded to the coincidence of dates with an obvious mixture of pride and regret--perhaps we ought to say, remorse.

We have met with no account of him whatever by any one who knew him familiarly at that period. That he was as careless and inattentive to the proper studies of the place, as he represents his Gurney to have been, will not be thought improbable by most of his readers. But his early performances, now forgotten, display many otiose quotations from the classics, and even from the modern Latin poets; and these specimens of juvenile pedantry must be allowed to indicate a vein of ambition which could hardly have failed, with a mind of such alacrity, to produce some not inconsiderable measure of attainment.

His entrance at Harrow was signalized by the perpetration of a practical joke, which might have been attended with serious consequences. On the night of his arrival, he was instigated by young Byron, whose contemporary he was, to throw a stone at a window where an elderly lady, Mrs. Drury, was undressing. Hook instantly complied; but, though the window was broken, the lady happily escaped unhurt. Whatever degree of boyish intimacy he might at this time have contracted with his lordship, it was not sufficient to preserve him from an ill-natured and uncalled-for sneer in the "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers," an aggression amply repaid by the severe strictures which appeared in the _John Bull_ on certain of the noble bard's effusions, and on the "Satanic school of poetry" in general. The acquaintance, such as it was, was broken off by Hook's premature withdrawal from Harrow, and does not appear to have been resumed.

In 1802, his excellent mother died, and with her perished the only hope of restraining the youthful Theodore within those bounds most essential to be preserved at his age, and of maintaining him in that course of study, which, if persevered in for a few years more, might have enabled him to reach a position not less honourable than that enjoyed by his more prosperous brother. Mrs. Hook appears, indeed, to have been one of those best of wives and women, who, by the unobtrusive and almost unconscious exercise of a superior judgment, effect much towards preserving the position and respectability of a family constantly imperilled by the indiscretion of its head--one who, like a sweet air wedded to indifferent words, serves to disguise and compensate for the inferiority of her helpmate.

Theodore's father, a clever but weak man, was easily persuaded not to send him back to Harrow. He was proud already of his boy, found his company at home a great solace at first, and even before the house received its new mistress, had begun to discover that one of his precocious talents might be turned to some account financially. Theodore had an exquisite ear, and was already, living from the cradle in a musical atmosphere, an expert player on the pianoforte; his voice was rich, sweet, and powerful; he could sing a pathetic song well, a comic one charmingly. One evening he enchanted his father especially by his singing, to his own accompaniment, two new ballads, one grave and one gay. Whence the airs--whence the words? It turned out that verse and music were alike his own: in the music the composer perceived much that might be remedied, but the verses were to him faultless--meaning probably not much, but nothing more soft than the liquid flow of the vocables, nothing more easy than the balance of the lines. Here was a mine for the veteran artist; hitherto he had been forced to import his words; now the whole manufacture might go on at home. Snug, comfortable, amiable domestic arrangement! The boy was delighted with the prospect--and at sixteen his fate was fixed.

In the course of the following six years Theodore Hook produced at least a dozen vaudevilles, comic operas, and dramatic pieces for the stage, which all enjoyed a considerable run of popularity in their time, but are now entirely, and perhaps deservedly, forgotten. His _coup-d'essai_ in this line appeared in 1805, under the title of "The Soldier's Return; or, What can Beauty do? a comic opera in two acts, as performed at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane."

It would be as absurd to criticise such a piece as last year's pantomime--like that, it answered its purpose and its author's, and no more is to be said. At the same time, amidst all its mad, impudent nonsense, there are here and there jokes which, if unborrowed, deserved the applause of the pit. A traveller coming up to an inn-door, says, "Pray, friend, are you the master of this house?" "Yes, sir," answers Boniface, "my wife has been dead these three weeks." We might quote one or two more apparently genuine Theodores. The dialogue, such as it is, dances along, and the songs read themselves into singing.

His _modus operandi_ in producing this earliest piece, was ingenious. He bought three or four French vaudevilles, filched an incident from each, and thus made up his drama.

The production of this little piece brought the young author into contact with Mathews and Liston. These distinguished comedians were both considerably his seniors. Both had their own peculiar style, and yet both seemed at their best when treading the boards together. With the view of providing an opportunity for their joint appearance, Theodore Hook planned his second afterpiece, "Catch Him who Can" (1806), in which abundant opportunity was contrived for exhibiting the grave irresistible drollery of Liston in contrast with the equally matchless vivacity and versatility of the prince of mimics and ventriloquists. In the course of the farce Mathews figured in, we think, seven different disguises. Such acting would have insured the triumph of even a worse thing than the "Soldier's Return,"--but this was better than that in every respect. One of Liston's songs was long in vogue, perhaps still survives--

"I sing the loves, the smiling loves, Of Clutterbuck and Higginbottom."

There are three other readable songs, "Mary," "Donna Louisa Isabella," and the "Blacksmith," and not a few meritorious points in the dialogue. It is impossible, however, as we have already hinted, to be sure of the originality of anything either in the plot or the dialogue of these early pieces. Hook pilfers with as much audacity as any of his valets, and uses the plunder occasionally with a wonderful want of thought. Liston's sweetheart, for instance, a tricky chambermaid, knocks him down with Pope's famous saying, "Every man has just as much vanity as he wants understanding."

"The Invisible Girl" next followed (1806). The idea appears to have been taken from a newspaper account of a new French vaudeville;[3] but it was worked out by the adapter with very great cleverness.

The fun is, that with a crowd of _dramatis personæ_, a rapid succession of situations, and even considerable complication of intrigue, no character ever gets out more than _yes_, _no_, a _but_, a _hem_, or a _still_--except the indefatigable hero Captain Allclack--for whose part it is difficult to believe that any English powers but Jack Bannister's in his heyday could ever have been adequate. This affair had a great run; and no wonder. If anybody could play the Captain now, it would fill the house for a season. Under a somewhat altered form, and with the title of "Patter _versus_ Clatter," it has indeed been reproduced by Mr. Charles Mathews, with great success.

In the following year (1807) a drama, by Hook, in three acts, entitled "The Fortress," and also taken from the French, was produced at the Haymarket. As a fair specimen of the easy jingle with which these pieces abounded, we select a song sung by Mathews, in the character of Vincent, a gardener, much in vogue in its day:--

"When I was a chicken I went to school, My master would call me an obstinate fool, For I ruled the roast, and I roasted all rule, And he wondered however he bore me; I fired his wig, and I laughed at the smoke, And always replied, if he rowed at the joke, Why--my father did so before me!

I met a young girl, and I prayed to the miss, I fell on my knee, and I asked for a kiss, She twice said no, but she once said yes, And in marriage declared she'd restore me. We loved and we quarrell'd, like April our strife, I guzzled my stoup, and I buried my wife, But the thing that consoled me at this time of life Was--my father did so before me!

Then, now I'm resolved all sorrows to blink, Since winkin's the tippy, I'll tip them the wink, I'll never get drunk when I cannot get drink, Nor ever let misery bore me. I sneer at the Fates, and I laugh at their spite, I sit down contented to sit up all night, And when the time comes, from the world take my flight, For--my father did so before me!"

"Tekeli, or the Siege of Mongratz," produced about the same time, is now chiefly remembered as having occasioned some caustic lines in the "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers:"--

"Gods! o'er those boards shall Folly rear her head Where Garrick trod, and Kemble lives to tread? On those shall Farce display Buffoonery's mask, And Hook conceal his heroes in a cask?"