Part 30

"The illiberality of the English Church would not allow me this satisfaction, and the preacher sent an old woman to tell me that I must sit down. As it is not the custom in Catholic churches to interrupt the devotions of a congregation on such light grounds, even if strangers go in without any caution to view whatever is worth seeing in the church, I might justly wonder that English Protestant piety should have so little confidence in its own strength, as to be thus blown about by the slightest breath. The riddle was explained to me afterwards: I should have to pay for my seat, and the truly pious motive was the sixpence. However, I had had enough, and left their mummery without paying."

The substantial veracity of this narrative who can doubt? but that no preacher at Radcliffe Church ever took the slightest notice of his highness we will venture to affirm; the pew-opener might have thought that such a fine man as his highness would like to sit down, or the beadle might have thought it civil to an Israelite--for which he seems to have generally been mistaken--to show him a little Christian charity.

Passing over his highness's account of Bath, and Mr. Beckford, "a sort of Lord Byron in prose, who pays fifty guineas a week for leave to walk in a nursery garden and pick what flowers he chooses;"--of Salisbury, where the prince meets another specimen--"a very pretty young girl," a dress-maker,--and of course takes an opportunity of libelling the bishop, the venerable and excellent Dr. Burgess,--who "never preaches, and draws 15,000_l._ a-year from his see!"--of Wilton, to which house he obtains admission by a story, and under an assumed name, which he rejoices to hear the housekeeper could neither pronounce nor write;--and some other seats and towns,--we reach London,--his highness's description of which is to occupy the two first, but as yet unpublished, volumes of this work. When he has sufficiently reinspected the "grand foyer," he again mounts the box for Canterbury, criticises the cathedral, the peculiar beauty of which he considers to arise from its not having a screen! and satirizes the archbishop, who enjoys "the rank of a prince" within his jurisdiction, "but not in London,"--as if London were not in the heart of his Grace's jurisdiction,--"moreover, he has sixty thousand a-year! and may marry!" (in the teeth, we presume, of the statute against bigamy.) The "illustrious stranger" proceeds to Dover--thence to Calais--dines with, and of course abuses, Mr. Brummel,--having, by-the-bye, gained admission to his table, as he had done to Lord Pembroke's gallery, under a feigned name! The "thorough lustre" of his principality is then enshrined in the cabriolet of a diligence; he eats smoking hot plinzen with the coachman, and arrives in Paris, where for the present we shall leave him,--and that "sweltering venom" which is luckily neutralized by an unfailing effusion of dulness.

We are sorry that the first Prussian castigator of our manners should have been a prince! We had, at one time, been led to expect the notice of a personage, who, though of not quite princely rank, could have told a much more amusing story,--described "specimens" of a higher order than bar-maids--pecuniary incidents more important than the loss of a ten-pound note out of a sac-de-nuit,--and even wound up his "picture of insular existence" with an interesting appendix to the "Mémoires d'un Homme d'Etat."

PROSPECTUS FOR A GENERAL BURYING COMPANY.

CAPITAL, £500,000. SHARES, £50.

The immediate object of this institution is to rob death of its terrors, and, by following the example of our Parisian friends, blend the graceful with the grave, and mingle the picturesque with the pathetic:--in short, the directors feel confident, that when their scheme is fully developed, the whole system of inhumation will be changed, and the feelings and associations connected with interments in general, assume so novel a character, that it will be rather pleasant than otherwise to follow our friends and relations to the tomb.

It is proposed to purchase an extensive domain in the neighbourhood of Primrose Hill and Caen Wood, where the diversified undulations of ground, and the soothing commixture of trees and water, afford the most flattering promise of success in the undertaking. No difficulty is anticipated in the purchase of the property, since the will of the late noble owner distinctly points out that it shall remain "grass land" to all eternity; and, "since all flesh is grass," no reasonable objection can be raised to its appropriation as a public cemetery.

The public cemetery, like the _Daily Advertiser_, will be open to all parties--dead or alive, of all religions, or, indeed, of none; and it does not need the practical knowledge attainable by a visit to the French metropolis to convince the world that by laying out the ground in a parklike manner, with umbrageous walks, alcoves, bowers, and fish-ponds, a link will be created between the past and present generation, and the horrid idea of having deposited a parent, a husband, or a sister, in a cold, damp grave, or a gloomy vault, refined into the agreeable recollection that they repose in a picturesque garden or a shady grove, at an easy distance from the most fashionable part of the town.

The directors intend opening a convenient hotel and tavern on the spot, at which persons visiting the cemetery, either as mourners or in search of quiet retreats for themselves, may procure every sort of refreshment. A _table-d'hôte_ will be constantly prepared at five shillings a-head, for which cold meat and _vin de grave_ will be furnished; and on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, during the summer, after burying-hours, Collinet's band will be regularly engaged for quadrilles, and the grounds illuminated with variegated lamps.

A committee of taste will be appointed to regulate the designs of tombs; and the directors think it may save trouble to state in the outset that no allusions to death, nor any representations of skulls, cross-bones, skeletons, or other disagreeable objects, will be permitted. The Royal Society of Literature will be solicited to revise the inscriptions, epitaphs, and elegies, and twelve ladies belonging to the different _corps-de-ballet_ of the King's Theatre, and the Theatres Royal Covent Garden and Drury Lane, are engaged to enliven the ground as mourners at newly-erected tombs.

These young ladies may be engaged by the day or hour, at a moderate price, and find their own garlands.

Mr. Samuel Rogers is appointed master of the ceremonies, and will appear dressed in the uniform of the establishment.

The directors have appointed Mr. Botibol, of Soho-square, their artificial florist, who will provide all sorts of flowers for strewing graves; but ladies and gentlemen are requested not to leave the decorations on the tombs at night, but to return them to the directress at the bar of the tavern: and, it may be necessary to add, that no ladies will be allowed to appear at the dances with the same ornaments which have been previously used in the grounds funereally.

Lord Graves has been solicited to accept the office of president, and Sir Isaac Coffin that of vice-president. The College of Surgeons will be constant visitors of the Institution, and under such patronage ultimate success appears to be a dead certainty. Ladies and gentlemen wishing to be buried in romantic situations are requested to make early application to Mr. Ebers, of Bond-street, where the grave-book, with a plan of the cemetery, may be seen.

Persons subscribing for family mausoleums are entitled to free admission to all the balls of the season.

Gloves, hatbands, white pocket-handkerchiefs, cephalic snuff, and fragrant essence of onions, for producing tears, to be had of the waiters.

N.B. No objection to burying persons in fancy dresses.

POSTSCRIPT.--The prospectus says that "an eligible site having offered itself"--this must have been a very curious site indeed--the temptation is too great to be resisted, and the public are invited to unite in a joint stock, "Capital £200,000, in shares of £25 each," to contrive something more agreeable for our resting-places than mere vaults and churchyards, and prepare a retreat, after the fashion of the cemetery of _Père la Chaise_, in the neighbourhood of that ever gay and lively city--Paris.

"Within this area," continues the prospectus, "public bodies and individuals may obtain ground for interment, and liberty to erect mausoleums and monuments after their own designs; and vaults and catacombs will also be constructed for general use."

This is giving great latitude--mausoleums and monuments erected promiscuously, after the designs of their future inhabitants, will no doubt present a beautiful variety of tastes and elevations. It should seem, however, that the vaults and catacombs are not to be used exclusively for burying, for, in contradistinction to the interments to which the mausoleums and monuments are to be appropriated, the prospectus states that the vaults and catacombs are for general use. _Déjeuners à la fourchette_, or _petits soupers_ by moonlight, perhaps. We say by moonlight, because illuminating the gardens in the evening does not yet appear to form part of the design.

The following condition we have no doubt will be highly advantageous in a pecuniary point of view to the proprietary, but it sounds disagreeable:--

"Subscribers on or before the 30th day of June, 1830, will be entitled to tickets of precedence, after the rate of one ticket for every five shares; which ticket will entitle the holder to a preference, according to the numerical order of the shares, in the choice of a situation for a grave or a monument. These tickets to be transferable without the shares upon which they shall have been granted, and capable of being held by persons who may not be subscribers or proprietors."

Now, however seriously captious sticklers for rank and pre-eminence may regard the article of precedence, we must say that the case of going out of the world differs a good deal from that of going out of a drawing-room; and we suspect, if the committee of this deadly-lively society could contrive to invert the order of departure, they would dispose of a much greater number of shares than are likely to go off under "existing circumstances." To the pleasure of walking about a burying-ground, with a plan in one's hand, like the Opera House box-book, to select a good place, we confess ourselves somewhat insensible; but we have no doubt that if this job takes, in less than five years we shall see "Graves in a good situation to let," posted at Sams' and Ebers', and "a transferable admission to a catacomb," to be sold for the season, just as a ticket for the pit is at present.

LETTER FROM JOHN TROT TO JOHN BULL.

SIR,--I feel great diffidence in addressing you, and should hesitate a long time before I ventured to throw myself upon your consideration, and through you upon that of the public; but the state of my case is desperate, and since it has recently been decided that beggary is a crime, and that those who dare to relieve distress with their own money are punishable by law, I prefer at once appealing to you.

The fact is, sir, that I am a superannuated lady's footman, my present situation is unbearable--I began the world in the service of the Margravine of Anspach, and was then accounted--I say it with all possible modesty--a remarkably fine young man. Her highness never admitted _low_ persons (I mean in stature) to the honour of her livery; and many a time, until the present Sir Lumley Skeffington chose a cream-coloured coach for her highness instead of a yellow, have I, under favour of the foreign scarlet, been taken for one of the _élite_ of Carlton House.

The Margravine went away, and I became the hanger-on of a duchess's carriage, who shall be nameless, since she is no more. The black breeches and gold bands did not quite suit my taste, and I rejoice to find that they are now _out_ to all intents and purposes. However, speaking figuratively, as well as literally, I hung on until her grace dropped off, then _me voilà_! I had an offer from the Lord Mayor's household. The livery was handsome, and one changes one's master there, like an almanack, every year; but the Lord Mayors have an unpleasant smell about them, and they go to the Old Bailey and the Blue-coat School, and all those horrible places, where one might catch unpleasant disorders, so I declined, and made a push for Pall Mall--but it would not do.

I then, sir, thought of Mr. Coutts,--the late very respectable banker,--but just as I expected a character from the late Mr. Raymond, of Drury-lane Theatre, he was taken ill and died, and when I was about to renew my negotiations, a melancholy circumstance occurred which determined me not to engage in a place where I might, perhaps, be kicked out at a moment's warning.

There _was_ a house, which shall be nameless, in Surrey, where an opening presented itself, but tallow-candles were whispered to me, and I fell back. I had at that time a fancy for Sir H---- W---- W----'s service, for I thought the sugar-loaf buttons were becoming; but the story about the sister and the annuity disgusted me, and I cut that. So I went on, sipping and smelling and never coming to the point, like Macheath, in the operative mendicant's opera; for I was made for a lady's footman, and I will even now back myself against any other two yards and an eighth of humanity behind a carriage, or at candle-light in that capacity. However, to my distress.

I embarked in the service of a _nouveau riche_ (not Hayne, upon my honour), one of the mushrooms who blazed for a season, and then not only went out, but went off, _me voilà!!_ again I looked round me. I was then nearly fifty, called myself young, bought Tyrian dye, which turned my hair blue, and rubbed the bald place on the crown of my head with Russia oil, which smelt unpleasantly. Still no place; the ladies all voted me too old, too fat, too this thing and too that thing, until at last, dear Mr. Bull, I got a situation in a place where I daresay you have never been, but which I know you have heard of, called Montagu-place, Bedford-square, next door but one to your excellent friend, Mrs. Ramsbottom.

And now hear me. In this dreadful solitude, all one sees is the new painted house of Old Cavendish (what a place for a Cavendish!) at the corner a mews, where a man lets glass-coaches (I heard Mr. Raikes make a joke at my master's about a singer in a glass-coach, he called him _Veluti in Speculum_; Mr. Raikes dines with us on off days, and always makes this joke everywhere), and a gothic window out of a modern house in Russell-square. Well, sir, in this infernal place I am obliged to be up every morning before nine (the butler has been in the family twenty years, wears cotton stockings, and never washes his feet); they allow no eggs, only cold meat for breakfast; there is no regular housekeeper; my mistress's own maid is a dowdy, with fingers like radishes unwashed, with squat nails, not nice; the two housemaids absolute gorgons, and the coachman, who is admitted to the privilege of _our_ servants' hall, a dreadful person, smelling of the stable worse even than Mrs. Hopkins' batch. _Oh, Giovi Omnipotente!_ as the Dutch say, what am I to do?

A particularly ill-done dinner is put down about one; sometimes coarse shoulders of mutton (a joint for which my cousin John left the service of a noble lord in the Cabinet some years since), or cold meat, or hashes, or perhaps that workhouse turbot, a brill, or some skate, with very secondary butter for sauce. However, this I could bear; but the carriage, built by some man nobody ever heard of, is called to the door, the steps are so hard and stiff there is hardly any pulling them down; my mistress having thick legs and no daughters, makes things worse, and after having rammed and jammed an infernal brass fist with a stick in it, which my master considers elegant, by way of handle to his coach, till I get it fast, up I mount and away we go, and anybody may see my calves in cotton (no silk in the morning) shaking like elongated moulds of blancmange all the way we rattle along,--all the fault of the builder, no Leader, no Goddal, Baxter and Macklew, no Houlditch, but some goth in Whitechapel. This I could bear; but will you believe it, sir? my master drinks port wine at and after dinner, and enforces my attendance in the room--what can I do?--no claret, no flirtations, no look-out, sniffing the drift air of St. Giles's, and seeing nothing but hackney-coaches. I cannot give up the place, although I don't get more than a half-pay lieutenant in the navy after all; but I am an oppressed man, I feel myself injured, and am, I confess, discontented: if you would take me in hand, and recommend me to some person of taste and judgment, I would go for half the money; but till I am sure of another berth, I should be foolish to risk the bird in hand. Will you say one word in your correspondence, or put in my letter altogether? It may excite inquiry and compassion, and if anybody wishes to communicate with me, any of the Highgate or Kentish Town stages will bring the letter; for, upon my word, I hardly know whether this district is within the range of the regular twopenny post.

I am, Sir, yours in affliction, JOHN TROT.

To John Bull, Esq.

THE MARCH OF INTELLECT.

It happened on the 31st of March, 1926, that the then Duke and Duchess of Bedford were sitting in their good but old house, No. 17, Liberality-place (the corner of Riego-street), near to where old Hammersmith stood before the great improvements, and, although it was past two o'clock, the breakfast equipage still remained upon the table.

It may be necessary to state that the illustrious family in question, having embraced the Roman Catholic faith (which at that period was the established religion of the country), had been allowed to retain their titles and honourable distinctions, although Woburn Abbey had been long before restored to the Church, and was, at the time of which we treat, occupied by a worshipful community of holy friars. The duke's family estates in Old London had been, of course, divided by the Equitable Convention amongst the numerous persons whose distressed situation gave them the strongest claims, and his grace and his family had been for a long time receiving the compensation annuity allotted to his ancestors.

"Where is Lady Elizabeth?" said his grace to the duchess.

"She is making the beds, duke," replied her grace.

"What, again to-day?" said his grace. "Where are Stubbs, Hogsflesh, and Figgins, the females whom, were it not contrary to law, I should call the housemaids?"

"They are gone," said her grace, "on a sketching tour with the manciple, Mr. Nicholson, and his nephew."

"Why are not these things removed?" said his grace, eyeing the breakfast-table, upon which (the piece of furniture being of oak without covering) stood a huge jar of honey, several saucers of beet-root, a large pot of half cold decoction of sassafrage, and an urn full of bean-juice, the use of cotton, sugar, tea, and coffee, having been utterly abolished by law in the year 1888.

"I have rung several times," said the duchess, "and sent Lady Maria up-stairs into the assistants' drawing-room to get some of them to remove the things, but they have kept her, I believe, to sing to them; I know they are very fond of hearing her, and often do so."

His grace, whose appetite seemed renewed by the sight of the still lingering viands which graced the board, seemed determined to make the best of a bad bargain, and sat down to commence an attack upon some potted seal and pickled fish from Baffin's Bay and Behring's Straits, which some of their friends who had gone over there to pass the summer (as was the fashion of those times) in the East India steamships (which always touched there) had given them; and having consumed a pretty fair portion of the remnants, his favourite daughter, Lady Maria, made her appearance.

"Well, Maria," said his grace, "where have you been all this time?"

"Mr. Curry," said her ladyship, "the young person who is good enough to look after our horses, had a dispute with the lady who assists Mr. Biggs in dressing the dinner for us, whether it was necessary at chess to say check to the queen when the queen was in danger or not. I was unable to decide the question, and I assure you I got so terribly laughed at, that I ran away as fast as I could."

"Was Duggins in the assistants' drawing-room, my love?" said the duke.

"No," said Lady Maria.

"I wanted him to take a message for me," said his grace, in a sort of demi-soliloquy.

"I'm sure he cannot go, then," said Lady Maria, "because I know he is gone to the House of Parliament (there was but one at that time), for he told the other gentleman who cleans the plate, that he could not be back to attend at dinner, however consonant with his wishes, because he had promised to wait for the division."

"Ah," sighed the duke, "this comes of his having been elected for Westminster."

At this moment Lord William Cobbett Russell made his appearance, extremely hot and evidently tired, having under his arm a largish parcel.

"What have you there, Willy?" said her grace.

"My new breeches," said his lordship;--"I have called upon the worthy citizen who made them, over and over again, and never could get them, for of course I could not expect him to send them, and he is always either at the academy or the gymnasium: however, to-day I caught him just as he was in a hot debate with a gentleman who was cleaning his windows, as to whether the solidity of a prism is equal to the product of its base by its altitude. I confess I was pleased to catch him at home; but unluckily the question was referred to me, and not comprehending it, I was deucedly glad to get off, which I did as fast as I could, both parties calling after me--'There is a lord for you--look at my lord!'--and hooting me in a manner which, however constitutional, I cannot help thinking deucedly disagreeable."

At this period, what in former times was called a footman, named Dowbiggin, made his appearance, who entered the room, as the duke hoped, to remove the breakfast-things--but it was, in fact, to ask Lady Maria to sketch in a tree in a landscape, which he was in the course of painting.

"Dowbiggin," said his grace in despair, "I wish you would take away these breakfast-things."

"Indeed!" said Dowbiggin, looking at the duke with the most ineffable contempt--"you do--that's capital--what right have you to ask me to do any such thing?"

"Why, Mr. Dowbiggin," said the duchess, who was a bit of a tartar in her way--"his grace pays you, and feeds you, and clothes you, to----"

"Well, duchess," said Dowbiggin, "and what then? Let his grace show me his superiority. I am ready to do anything for him--but please to recollect I asked him yesterday, when I _did_ remove the coffee, to tell me what the Altaic chain is called, when, after having united all the rivers which supply the Jenisei, it stretches as far as the Baikal lake--and what did he answer? he made a French pun, and said '_Je ne sais pas, Dobiggin_'--now, if it can be shown by any statute that I, who am perfectly competent to answer any question I propose, am first to be put off with a quibble by way of reply; and secondly, to be required to work for a man who does not know as much as I do myself, merely because he is a duke, why, I'll do it; but if not, I will resist in a constitutional manner such illiberal oppression, and such ridiculous control, even though I am transported to Scotland for it. Now, Lady Maria, go on with the tree."