Tales and Novels Volume IX Part 23

He has besides certain set phrases, which, if repeated with variations, might give the substance of what are called his speeches; some of these are common to both sides of the house, others sacred to the ministerial, or popular on the opposition benches.

To the ministerial belong--"The dignity of this house"--"The honour of this country"--"The contentment of our allies"--"Strengthening the hands of government"--"Expediency"--"Inexpediency"--"Imperious necessity"--"Bound in duty"--with a good store of _evasives_, as "Cannot at present bring forward such a measure"--"Too late"--"Too early in the session"--"His majesty's ministers cannot be responsible for"--"Cannot take it upon me to say"--"But the impression left upon my mind is"--"Cannot undertake to answer exactly that question"--"Cannot yet _make up_ my mind" (an expression borrowed from the laundress).

On the opposition side the phrases chiefly in use amongst the bores are, "The const.i.tution of this country"--"Reform in Parliament"--"The good of the people"--"Inquiry should be set on foot"--"Ministers should be answerable with their heads"--"Gentlemen should draw together"--"Independence"--and "Consistency."

Approved beginnings of speeches as follows--for a raw bore:

"Unused as I am to public speaking, Mr. Speaker, I feel myself on the present occasion called upon not to give a silent vote."

For old stagers:

"In the whole course of my parliamentary career, never did I rise with such diffidence."

In reply, the bore begins with:

"It would be presumption in me, Mr. Speaker, after the able, luminous, learned, and eloquent speech you have just heard, to attempt to throw any new light; but, &c. &c."

For a premeditated harangue of four hours or upwards he regularly commences with

"At this late hour of the night, I shall trouble the house with only a few words, Mr. Speaker."

The Speaker of the English House of Commons is a man destined to be bored. Doomed to sit in a chair all night long--night after night--month after month--year after year--being bored. No relief for him but crossing and uncrossing his legs from time to time. No respite. If he sleep, it must be with his eyes open, fixed in the direction of the haranguing bore. He is not, however, bound, _bona fide_ to hear all that is said. This, happily, was settled in the last century. "Mr. Speaker, it is your duty to hear me,--it is the undoubted privilege, Sir, of every member of this house _to be heard_," said a bore of the last century to the then Speaker of the House of Commons. "Sir," replied the Speaker, "I know that it is the undoubted right of every member of this house to speak, but I was not aware that it was his privilege to be always heard."

The courtier-bore has sometimes crept into the English parliament.--But is common on the continent: infinite varieties, as _le courtisan propre, courtisan homme d'etat_, and _le courtisan philosophe_--a curious but not a rare kind in France, of which M. de Voltaire was one of the finest specimens.

Attempts had been made to naturalize some of the varieties of the philanthropic and sentimental French and German bores in England, but without success. Some ladies had them for favourites or pets; but they were found mischievous and dangerous. Their morality was easy,--but difficult to understand; compounded of three-fourths sentiment--nine-tenths selfishness, twelve-ninths instinct, self-devotion, metaphysics, and cant. 'Twas hard to come at a common denominator. John Bull, with his four rules of vulgar arithmetic, could never make it out; altogether he never could abide these foreign bores.

Thought 'em confounded dull too--Civilly told them so, and half asleep bid them "prythee begone"--They not taking the hint, but lingering with the women, at last John wakening out-right, fell to in earnest, and routed them out of the island.

They still flourish abroad, often seen at the tables of the great. _The demi-philosophe-moderne-politico-legislativo-metaphysico-non-logico-grand philanthrope_ still scribbles, by the ream, _pieces justificatives_, _projets de loi_, and volumes of metaphysical sentiment, to be seen at the fair of Leipzig, or on ladies' tables. The greater bore, the _courtisan propre_, is still admired at little _serene_ courts, where, well-dressed and well-drilled--his back much bent with Germanic bows; not a dangerous creature--would only bore you to death.

We come next to our own _blue bores_--the most dreaded of the species,--the most abused--sometimes with reason, sometimes without.

This species was formerly rare in Britain--indeed all over the world.--Little known from the days of Aspasia and Corinna to those of Madame Dacier and Mrs. Montague. Mr. Jerningham's blue worsted stockings, as all the world knows, appearing at Mrs. Montague's _conversaziones_, had the honour or the dishonour of giving the name of blue stockings to all the race; and never did race increase more rapidly than they have done from that time to this. There might be fear that all the daughters of the land should turn blue.--But as yet John Bull--thank Heaven! retains his good old privilege of "choose a wife and have a wife."

The common female blue is indeed intolerable as a wife--opinionative and opinionated; and her opinion always is that her husband is wrong. John certainly has a rooted aversion to this whole cla.s.s. There is the deep blue and the light; the _light_ blues not esteemed--not admitted at Almacks. The deep-dyed in the nine times dyed blue--is that with which no man dares contend. The _blue chatterer_ is seen and heard every where; it no man will attempt to silence by throwing the handkerchief.

The next species--the _mock blue_--is scarcely worth noticing; gone to ladies' maids, dress-makers, milliners, &c., found of late behind counters, and in the oddest places. _The blue mocking bird_ (it must be noted, though nearly allied to the last sort) is found in high as well as in low company; it is a provoking creature. The only way to silence it, and to prevent it from plaguing all neighbours and pa.s.sengers, is never to mind it, or to look as if you minded it; when it stares at you, stare and pa.s.s on.

_The conversazione blue_, or _bureau d'esprit blue_. It is remarkable that in order to designate this order we are obliged to borrow from two foreign languages.--a proof that it is not natural to England; but numbers of this order have been seen of late years, chiefly in London and Bath, during the season. The _bureau d'esprit_, or _conversazione blue_, is a most hard-working creature--the servant of the servants of the public.--If a dinner-giving blue (and none others succeed well or long), Champagne and ice and the best of fish are indispensable. She may then be at home once a week in the evening, with a chance of having her house fuller than it can hold, of all the would-be wits and three or four of the leaders of London. Very thankful she must be for the honour of their company. She had need to have all the superlatives, in and out of the English language, at her tongue's end; and when she has exhausted these, then she must invent new. She must have tones of admiration, and looks of ecstasy, for every occasion. At reading parties,--especially at her own house, she must cry--"charming!"--"delightful!" "quite original!" in the right places even in her sleep.--Awake or asleep she must read every thing that comes out that has a name, or she must talk as if she had--at her peril--to the authors themselves,--the irritable race!--She must know more especially every article in the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews; and at her peril too, must talk of these so as not to commit herself, so as to please the reviewer abusing, and the author abused; she must keep the peace between rival wits;--she must swallow her own vanity--many fail in this last attempt--choke publicly, and give it up.

I am sorry that so much has been said about the blues; sorry I mean that such a hue and cry has been raised against them all, good, bad, and indifferent. John Bull would have settled it best in his quiet way by just letting them alone, leaving the disagreeable ones to die off in single blessedness. But people got about John, and made him set up one of his "_No popery_" cries; and when becomes to that pitch be loses his senses and his common sense completely. "_No blues!_" "Down with the blues!"--now what good has all that done? only made the matter ten times worse. In consequence of this universal hubbub a new order of things has arisen.

_The blue bore disguised, or the renegade blue_. These may be detected by their extraordinary fear of being taken for _blues_. Hold up the picture, or even the sign of a blue bore before them, and they immediately write under it, "'Tis none of me." They spend their lives hiding their talent under a bushel; all the time in a desperate fright lest you should see it. A poor simple man does not know what to do about it, or what to say or think in their company, so as to behave himself rightly, and not to affront them. Solomon himself would be put to it, to make some of these auth.o.r.esses unknown, avow or give up their own progeny. Their affectation is beyond the affectation of woman, and it makes all men sick.

Others without affectation are only arrant cowards. They are afraid to stand exposed on their painful pre-eminence. Some from pure good-nature make themselves ridiculous; imagining that they are nine feet high at the least, shrink and distort themselves continually in condescension to our inferiority; or lest we should be blasted with excess of light, come into company shading their farthing candle--burning blue, pale, and faint.

It should be noticed that the _bore condescending_ is peculiarly obnoxious to the proud man.

Besides the _bore condescending_, who, whether good-natured or ill-natured, is a most provoking animal--there is the bore _facetious_, an insufferable creature, always laughing, but with whom you can never laugh. And there is another exotic variety--the _vive la bagatelle bore_ of the ape kind--who imitate men of genius. Having early been taught that there is nothing more delightful than the unbending of a great mind, they set about continually to unbend the bow in company.

Of the spring and fall, the ebb and tide of genius, we have heard much from Milton, Dryden, and others. At ebb time--a time which must come to all, pretty or rich, treasures are discovered upon some sh.o.r.es; or golden sands are seen when the waters run low. In others bare rocks, slime, or reptiles. May I never be at low tide with a bore! Despising the Bagatelle, there is the serious regular conversation bore, who listens to himself, talks from notes, and is witty by rule. All rules for conversation were no doubt invented by bores, and if followed would make all men and women bores, either in straining to be witty, or striving to be easy. There is no more certain method, even for him who may possess the talent in the highest degree, to lose the power of conversing, than by talking to support his character. One eye to your reputation, one on the company, would never do, were it with the best of eyes. Few people are of Descartes' mind, that squinting is pretty. It has been said, that pleasure never comes, if you send her a formal card of invitation; to a _conversazione_ certainly never; whatever she might to a dinner-party. Ease cannot stay, wit flies away, and humour grows dull, if people try for them.

Well-bred persons, abhorring the pedantry of the blues, are usually _anti-blues_, or _ultra-antis_. But though there exists in a certain circle a natural honest aversion to every thing like wit or learning, is it absolutely certain that if taking thought won't do it, taking none will do? They are determined, they declare, to have easy conversation, or none.

But let the ease be high-bred and silent as possible--let it be the repose of the Transcendental--the death-like silence of the Exclusive in the perfumed atmosphere of the Exquisite; then begins the danger of going to sleep--desperate danger. In these high circles are to be found, _apparently_, the most sleepy of all animated beings. _Apparently_, I say, because, on close observation, it will usually be found that, like the spider, who, from fear, counterfeits death, these, from pride, counterfeit sleep. They will sometimes pretend to be asleep for hours together, when any person or persons are near whom they do not choose to notice. They lie stretched on sofas, rolled up in shawls most part of the day, quite empty. At certain hours of the night, found congregated, sitting up dressed, on beds of roses, back to back, with eyes scarce open. They are observed to give sign of animation only on the approach of a blue--their antipathy. They then look at each other, and shrink.

That the _sham-sleeping bore_ is a delicate creature, I shall not dispute, but they are intolerably tiresome. For my own part, I would rather give up the honour and the elegance, and go to the antipodes at once, and live with their antagonists, the _lion-hunters_--yea, the _lion-loving_ bores.

Their antipodes, did I say? that was going too far: even the most exaggerated ultra-anti-blues, upon occasion, forget themselves strangely, and have been seen to join the common herd in running after lions. But they differ from the _blue-lion-loving-bore_ proper, by never treating the lion as if he were one of themselves. They follow and feed and fall down and wors.h.i.+p the lion of the season; still, unless he be a n.o.bleman, which but rarely occurs, he is never treated as a gentleman _quite_; there is always a difference made, better understood than described. I have heard lions of my acquaintance complain of showing themselves off to these _ultra-antis_, and have asked why they let themselves be made lions, if they disliked it so much, as no lion can well be led about, I should have conceived, quite against his will? I never could obtain any answer, but that indeed they could not help it; they were very sorry, but indeed they could not help being lions. And the polite lion-loving bore always echoed this, and addressed them with some such speech as the following:--"My dearest, sir, madam, or miss (as the case may be), I know, that of all things you detest being made a lion, and that you can't bear to be wors.h.i.+pped; yet, my dear sir, madam, or miss, you must let me kneel down and wors.h.i.+p you, and then you must stand on your hind legs a little for me, only for one minute, my dear sir, and I really would not ask you to do it, only you are _such_ a lion."

But I have not yet regularly described the genus and species of which I am treating. The great lion-hunting bore, and the little lion-loving bore, male and female of both kinds; the male as eager as the female to fasten on the lion, and as expert in making the most of him, alive or dead, as seen in the finest example extant, Bozzy and Piozzi, fairly pitted; but the male beat the female hollow.

The common lion-hunting bore is too well known to need particular description; but some notice of their habitudes may not be useless for avoidance. The whole cla.s.s male subsists by fetching and carrying bays, grasping at notes and sc.r.a.ps, if any great name be to them; run wild after verses in MS.; fond of autographs. The females carry alb.u.ms; some learn _bon mots_ by rote, and repeat them like parrots; others do not know a good thing when they meet with it, unless they are told the name of the cook. Some relish them really, but eat till they burst; others, after cramming to stupidity, would cram you from their pouch, as the monkey served Gulliver on the house-top. The whole tribe are foul feeders, at best love trash and fatten upon sc.r.a.ps; the worst absolutely rake the kennels, and prey on garbage. They stick with amazing tenacity, almost resembling canine fidelity and grat.i.tude, to the remains of the dead lion. But in fact, their love is like that of the ghowl; worse than ghowls, they sell all which they do not destroy; every sc.r.a.p of the dead lion may turn to account. It is wonderful what curious saleable articles they make of the parings of his claws, and hairs of his mane. The bear has been said to live at need by sucking his own paws. The bore lives by sucking the paws of the lion, on which he thrives apace, and, in some instances, has grown to an amazing size. The dead paws are as good for his purpose as the living, and better--there being no fear of the claws.

How he escapes those claws when the lion is alive, is the wonder. The winged lion, however, is above touching these creatures; and the real gentleman lion of the true blood, in whose nature there is nothing of the bear, will never let his paws be touched by a bore. His hair stands on end at the approach or distant sight of any of the kind, lesser or greater; but very difficult he often finds it to avoid them. Any other may, more easily than a lion, _s.h.i.+rk a bore_. It is often attempted, but seldom or never successfully. He hides in his den, but _not at home_ will not always do. The lion is too civil to shut the door in the bore's very face, though he mightily wishes to do so. It is pleasant sport to see a great bore and lion opposed to each other; how he stands or sits upon his guard; how cunningly the bore tries to fasten upon him, and how the lion tries to shake him off!--if the bore persists beyond endurance, the lion roars, and he flies; or the lion springs, and he dies.

A more extraordinary circ.u.mstance than any I have yet noted, respecting the natural history of lions and bores, remains to be told; that the lion himself, the _greater_ kind as well as the lesser of him, are apt, sooner or later, to turn into bores; but the metamorphosis, though the same in the result, takes place in different circ.u.mstances, and from quite different causes: with the lesser lion and lioness often from being shown, or showing themselves too frequently; with the greater, from very fear of being like the animal he detests.

I once knew a gentleman, not a bore quite, but a very clever man, one of great sensibility and excessive sensitiveness, who could never sit still a quarter of an hour together, never converse with you comfortably, or finish a good story, but evermore broke off in the middle with "I am _boring_ you"--"I must run away or I shall be a bore." It ended in his becoming that which he most feared to be.

There are a few rare exceptions to all that has been said of the caprices or _weaknesses_ of lions. The greatest of lions known or unknown, the most agreeable as well as the n.o.blest of creatures, is quite free from these infirmities. He neither affects to show himself, nor lies sullen in his den. I have somewhere seen his picture sketched; I should guess by himself at some moment I when the lion turned painter.

"I pique myself upon being one of the best conditioned animals that ever was shown, since the time of him who was in vain I defied by the knight of the woful figure; for I get up at the first touch of the pole, rouse myself, shake my mane, lick my chops, turn round, lie down, and go to sleep again." It was bad policy in me to let the words "_go to sleep_"

sound upon the reader's ear, for I have not yet quite done; I have one more cla.s.s, and though last not least; were I to adopt that enigmatical style which made the fortune of the oracle of Apollo, I might add--and though least, greatest. But this, the oracular sublime, has now gone to the gipsies and the conjurors, and I must write plain English, if I can.

I am come to the cra.s.s of the _infant bore_--the _infant reciting bore_; seemingly insignificant, but exceedingly tiresome, also exceedingly dangerous, as I shall show. The old of this cla.s.s we meet wherever we go--in the forum, the temple, the senate, the theatre, the drawing-room, the boudoir, the closet. The young infest our homes, pursue us to our very hearths; our household deities are in league with them; they destroy all our domestic comfort; they become public nuisances, widely destructive to our literature. Their mode of training will explain the nature of the danger. The infant reciting bore is trained much after the manner of a learned pig. Before the quadruped are placed, on certain bits of dirty greasy cards, the letters of the alphabet, or short nonsensical phrases interrogatory with their answers, such as "Who is the greatest rogue in company?" "Which lady or gentleman in company will be married first?" By the alternate use of blows and bribes of such food as pleases the pig, the animal is brought to obey certain signs from his master, and at his bidding to select any letter or phrase required from amongst those set before him, goes to his lessons, seems to read attentively, and to understand; then by a motion of his snout, or a well-timed grunt, designates the right phrase, and answers the expectations of his master and the company. The infant reciter is in similar manner trained by alternate blows and bribes, almonds and raisins, and b.u.mpers of sweet wine. But mark the difference between him and the pig. Instead of greasy letters and old cards, which are used for the learned pig, before the little human animal are cast the finest morsels from our first authors, selections from our poets, didactic, pathetic, and sublime--every creature's best, sacrificed.

These are to be slowly but surely deprived of spirit, sense, and life, by the deadly deadening power of iteration. Not only are they deprived of life, but mangled by the infant bore--not only mangled, but polluted--left in such a state that no creature of any delicacy, taste, or feeling, can bear them afterwards. And are immortal works, or works which fond man thought and called immortal, thus to perish? Thus are they doomed to destruction, by a Lilliputian race of Vandals.

The curse of Minerva be on the heads of those who train, who incite them to such sacrilegious mischief! The mischief spreads every day wide and more wide. Till of late years, there had appeared bounds to its progress. Nature seemed to have provided against the devastations of the _infant reciter_. Formerly it seemed, that only those whom she had blessed or cursed with a wonderful memory, could be worth the trouble of training, or by the successful performance of the feats desired, to pay the labour of instruction. But there has arisen in the land, men who set at nought the decrees of nature, who undertake to make artificial memories, not only equal but superior to the best natural memory, and who, at the shortest notice, engage to supply the brainless with brains.

By certain technical helps, long pa.s.sages, whole poems, may now be learnt _by heart_, as they call it, without any aid, effort, or cognizance of the understanding; and retained and recited, under the same circ.u.mstances, by any irrational, as well and better, than by any rational being, if, to recite well, mean to repeat without missing a syllable. How far our literature may in future suffer from these blighting swarms, will best be conceived by a glance at what they have already withered and blasted of the favourite productions of our most popular poets, Gray, Goldsmith, Thomson, Pope, Dryden, Milton, Shakspeare.

Pope's Man of Ross was doomed to suffer first.

"Rise, honest Muse, and sing the Man of Ross!"

Oh, dreaded words! who is there that does not wish the honest muse should rise no more? Goldsmith came next, and shared the same fate. His country curate, the most amiable of men, we heard of till he grew past endurance.

As to learning any longer from the bee to build, or of the little nautilus to sail, we gave it up long ago. "To be or not to be"--is a question we can no longer bear.

Then Alexander's Feast--the little harpies have been at that too, and it is defiled. Poor Collins' Ode to the Pa.s.sions, on and off the stage, is torn to very tatters.

The Seven Ages of Man, and "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women in it"--gone to destruction.

The quality of mercy _is_ strained, and is no longer twice blest.

We turn with disgust from "angels and ministers of grace." Adam's morning hymn has lost the freshness of its charm. The bores have got into Paradise--scaled Heaven itself! and defied all the powers of Milton's h.e.l.l. Such Belials and Molochs as we have heard!

It is absolutely shocking to perceive how immortal genius is in the power of mortal stupidity! Johnson, a champion of no mean force, stood forward in his day, and did what his single arm could do, to drive the little bores from the country church-yard.

"Could not the pretty dears repeat together?" had, however, but a momentary effect. Though he knocked down the pair that had attempted to stand before him, they got up again, or one down, another came on. To this hour they are at it.