Читать книгу: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 529, January 14, 1832», страница 6

ASMODEUS AT LARGE

The design of this paper, in the New Monthly Magazine, is by no means novel; but the fine, cutting satire—the pleasant, lively banter on our vices and follies—which pervades every page of the article, is a set-off to the political frenzy and the literary lumber of other Magazines of the month. Each of them, it is true, has a readable paper, but one gem only contributes to a Magazine in the proportion of one swallow to a summer.

Here are three pages of the New Monthly Devil:

"A stranger, Sir, in the library," said my servant in opening the door.

"Indeed! what a short, lame gentleman?"

"No, Sir; middle-sized,—has very much the air of a lawyer or professional man."

I entered the room, and instead of the dwarf demon Le Sage described, I beheld a comely man seated at the table, with a high forehead, a sharp face, and a pair of spectacles on his nose. He was employed in reading the new novel of "The Usurer's Daughter."

"This cannot be the devil!" said I to myself; so I bowed, and asked the gentleman his business.

"Tush!" quoth my visiter; "and how did you leave the Doctor?"

"It is you, then!" said I; "you have grown greatly since you left Don Cleofas."

"Wars fatten our tribe," answered the Devil; "besides shapes are optional with me, and in England men go by appearances more than they do abroad; one is forced to look respectable and portly; the Devil himself could not cheat your countrymen with a shabby exterior. Doubtless you observe that all the swindlers, whose adventures enliven your journals, are dressed 'in the height of fashion,' and enjoy 'a mild prepossessing demeanour.' Even the Cholera does not menace 'a gentleman of the better ranks;' and no bodies are burked with a decent suit of clothes on their backs. Wealth in all countries is the highest possible morality; but you carry the doctrine to so great an excess, that you scarcely suffer the poor man to exist at all. If he take a walk in the country, there's the Vagrant Act; and if he has not a penny to hire a cellar in town, he's snapped up by a Burker, and sent off to the surgeons in a sack. It must be owned that no country affords such warnings to the spendthrift. You are one great moral against the getting rid of one's money."

On this, Asmodeus and myself had a long conversation; it ended in our dining together, (for I found him a social fellow, and fond of a broil in a quiet way,) and adjourning in excellent spirits, to the theatre.

"Certainly," said the Devil, taking a pinch of snuff, "certainly, your drama is wonderfully fine, it is worthy of a civilized nation; formerly you were contented with choosing actors among human kind, but what an improvement to go among the brute creation! think what a fine idea to have a whole play turn upon the appearance of a broken-backed lion! And so you are going to raise the drama by setting up a club; that's another exquisite notion! You hire a great house in the neighbourhood of the theatre; you call it the Garrick Club. You allow actors and patrons to mix themselves and their negus there after the play; and this you call a design for exalting the drama. Certainly you English are a droll set; your expedients are admirable."

"My good Devil, any thing that brings actors and spectators together, that creates an esprit de corps among all who cherish the drama, is not to be sneered at in that inconsiderate manner."

"I sneer! you mistake me; you have adduced a most convincing argument—esprit de corps!—good! Your clubs certainly nourish sociality greatly; those little tables, with one sulky man before one sulky chop—those hurried nods between acquaintances—that, monopoly of newspapers and easy chairs—all exhibit to perfection the cementing faculties of a club. Then, too, it certainly does an actor inestimable benefit to mix with lords and squires. Nothing more fits a man for his profession, than living with people who know nothing about it. Only think what a poor actor Kean is; you would have made him quite a different thing, if you had tied him to a tame gentlemen in the 'Garrick Club'. He would have played 'Richard' in a much higher vein, I doubt not."

"Well," said I, "the stage is your affair at present, and doubtless you do right to reject any innovation."

"Why, yes," quoth the Devil, looking round; "we have a very good female supply in this quarter. But pray how comes it that the English are so candid in sin? Among all nations there is immorality enough, Heaven knows; but you are so delightfully shameless: if a crime is committed here, you can't let it 'waste its sweetness;' you thrust it into your papers forthwith; you stick it up on your walls; you produce it at your theatres; you chat about it as an agreeable subject of conversation; and then you cry out with a blush against the open profligacy abroad! This is one of those amiable contradictions in human nature that charms me excessively. You fill your theatres with ladies of pleasure—you fill your newspapers with naughty accounts—a robbery is better to you than a feast—and a good fraud in the city will make you happy for a week; and all this while you say: 'We are the people who send vice to Coventry, and teach the world how to despise immorality.' Nay, if one man commits a murder, your newspapers kindly instruct his associates how to murder in future, by a far safer method. A wretch kills a boy for the surgeons, by holding his head under water; 'Silly dog!' cries the Morning Herald, 'why did not he clap a sponge dipped in prussic acid to the boy's mouth?'"

Here we were interrupted by a slight noise in the next box, which a gentleman had just entered. He was a tall man, with a handsome face and very prepossessing manner.

"That is an Author of considerable reputation," said my Devil, "quiet, though a man of wit, and with a heart, though a man of the world. Talking of the drama, he once brought out a farce, which had the good fortune to be damned. As great expectations had been formed of it, and the author's name had transpired; the unsuccessful writer rose the next morning with a hissing sound in his ears, and that leaning towards misanthropy, which you men always experience when the world has the bad taste to mistake your merits. 'Thank Fate, however,' said the Author, 'it is damned thoroughly—it is off the stage—I cannot be hissed again—in a few days it will be forgotten—meanwhile I will take a walk in the Park.' Scarce had the gentleman got into the street, before, lo! at a butcher's shop blazed the 'very head and front of his offending.' 'Second night of its appearance, the admired Farce of –, by –, Esq.' Away posts the Author to the Manager.—'Good Heavens! Sir, my farce again! was it not thoroughly damned last night?'—'Thoroughly damned!' quoth the Manager, drily; 'we reproduce it, Sir—we reproduce it (with a knowing wink,) that the world, enraged at our audacity, may come here to damn it again.' So it is, you see! the love of money is the contempt of man: there's an aphorism for you! Let us turn to the stage. What actresses you have!—certainly you English are a gallant nation; you are wonderfully polite to come and see such horrible female performers! By the by, you observed when that young lady came on the stage, how timidly she advanced, how frightened she seemed. 'What modesty!' cry the audience; 'we must encourage her!' they clap, they shout, they pity the poor thing, they cheer her into spirits. Would you believe that the hardest thing the Manager had to do with her was to teach her that modesty. She wanted to walk on the stage like a grenadier, and it required fifteen lessons to make her be ashamed of herself. It is in these things that the stage mimics the world, rather behind the scenes than before!"

"Bless me, how Braham is improved!" cried a man with spectacles, behind me; "he acts now better than he sings!"

"Is it not strange," said Asmodeus, "how long the germ of a quality may remain latent in the human mind, and how completely you mortals are the creatures of culture? It was not till his old age that Braham took lessons in acting; some three times a week has he of late wended his way down, to the comedian of Chapel-street, to learn energy and counterfeit warmth; and the best of it is, that the spectators will have it that an actor feels all he acts; as if human nature, wicked as it is, could feel Richard the Third every other night. I remember, Mrs. Siddons had a majestic manner of extending her arm as she left the stage. 'What grace!' said the world, with tears in its eyes, 'what dignity! what a wonderful way of extending an arm! you see her whole soul is in the part!' The arm was in reality stretched impatiently out for a pinch from the snuff-box that was always in readiness behind the scenes."

It is my misfortune, Reader, to be rapidly bored. I cannot sit out a sermon, much less a play; amusement is the most tedious of human pursuits.

"You are tired of this, surely," said I to the Devil; "let us go!"

"Whither?" said Asmodeus.

"Why, 'tis a starlit night, let us ride over to Paris, and sup, as you promised, at the Rocher de Cancale."

"Volontiers."

Away—away—away—into the broad still Heavens, the stars dancing merrily above us, and the mighty heart of the City beating beneath the dusky garment of Night below.

"Let us look down," said Asmodeus; "what a wilderness of houses! shall I uncover the roofs for you, as I did for Don Cleofas; or rather, for it is an easier method, shall I touch your eyes with my salve of penetration, and enable you to see at once through the wall?"

"You might as well do so; it is pleasant to feel the power, though at present I think it superfluous; wherever I look, I can only see rogues and fools, with a stray honest man now and then, who is probably in prison."

Asmodeus touched my eyes with a green salve, which he took out of an ivory box, and all at once, my sight being directed towards a certain palace I beheld * * * *