Читать книгу: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 13, No. 350, January 3, 1829», страница 6

 
"Sung the Seasons and their change."
 

England can likewise boast of very great names who have been attached to this art, though they have not written on the subject. Lord Burleigh, Sir Walter Raleigh, Lord Capell, William III—for Switzer tells us, that "in the least interval of ease, gardening took up a great part of his time, in which he was not only a delighter, but likewise a great judge,"—the Earl of Essex, whom Lord William Russell said "was the worthiest, the justest, the sincerest, and the most concerned for the public, of any man he ever knew;" Lord William Russell too, who, as Switzer tells us, "made Stratton, about seven miles from Winchester, his seat, and his gardens there were some of the best that were made in those early days, such indeed as have mocked some that have been done since, and the gardens at Southampton House, in Bloomsbury Square, were also of his making." Henry, Earl of Danby, the Earl of Gainsborough, "the Maecenas of his age," the Earl of Halifax, the friend of Addison, Swift, Pope, and Steele; Lord Weymouth, of Longleate; Dr. Sherard, of Eltham; the Earl of Scarborough, an accomplished nobleman, immortalized by Pope, and by the fine pen of Chesterfield; and the Duke of Argyle, with numerous other men of rank and science, have highly assisted in elevating gardening to the station it has long since held.⁶

Beauty and health are the attributes of gardening. In illustration of the former, we remember a passage from Gervase Markham, thus: "As in the composition of a delicate woman the grace of her cheeke is the mixture of red and white, the wonder of her eye blacke and white, and the beauty of her hand blew and white, any of which is not said to be beautifull if it consist of single or simple colours; and so in walkes or alleyes, the all greene, nor the all yellow, cannot be said to be most beautifull; but the greene and yellow, (that is to say the untroade grasse, and the well-knit gravelle) being equally mixt, give the eye both lustre and delight beyond comparison." Abercrombie lived to the age of eighty, when he died by a fall down stairs in the dark. He was present at the battle of Preston Pans, which was fought close to his father's garden walls. For the last twenty years he lived chiefly on tea, using it three times a-day; his pipe was his first companion in the morning, and last at night. He never remembered to have taken a dose of physic in his life; prior to his last fatal accident, nor of having a day's illness but once."

The association of gardening with pastoral poetry, was exemplified in Shenstone's design of the Leasowes—as Mr. Whately observes—a perfect picture of his mind, simple, elegant, and amiable, and which will always suggest a doubt whether the spot inspired his verses, or whether in the scenes which he formed, he only realized the pastoral images which abound in his songs. That elegant trifler, Horace Walpole, was enthusiastically fond of gardening. One day telling his nurseryman that he would have his trees planted irregularly, he replied, "Yes, sir, I understand; you would have them hung down—somewhat poetical."

PHILO.

NOTES OF A READER

PORTRAIT OF SIR WALTER SCOTT

Appended to a fine portrait of Sir Walter Scott, in the Literary Souvenir for 1829, is the following—by Barry Cornwall:—

We can scarcely imagine a thing much more pleasant indeed, to an artist, than to be brought face to face with some famous person, and permitted to examine and scrutinize his features, with that careful and intense curiosity, that seems necessary to the perfecting a likeness. It must have been to Raffaelle, at once a relaxation from his ordinary study, and a circumstance interesting in itself, thus to look into faces so full of meaning as those of Julius and Leo—and to say, "That look—that glance, which seems so transient, will I fix for ever. Thus shall he be seen, with that exact expression (although it lasted but for an instant) five hundred years after he shall be dust and ashes!"

This was probably the feeling of Raffaelle; and it must have been with a somewhat similar pride that our excellent artist, Mr. Leslie, accomplished his portrait of Sir Walter Scott, which the reader will have already admired in this volume. It is surely a perfect work. No one, who has once seen the great author, can forget that strange and peculiar look (so full of meaning, and shrewd and cautious observation—so entirely characteristic, in short, of the mind within) which Mr. Leslie has succeeded in catching. One may gaze on it for ever, and contemplate an exhaustless subject—all that the capacious imagination has produced and is producing,—the populous, endless world of fancy.

Let the reader look, and be assured that there is the strange spirit that has discovered and wrought all the fine shapes that he has been accustomed to look upon with wonder—Claverhouse, and Burley, and Bothwell,—Meg Merrilies and Elspeth—the high and the low—the fierce and the fair—Cavaliers and Covenanters, and the rest—presenting an assemblage of character that is absolutely unequalled, except in the pages of Shakspeare alone. There is no other writer, be he Greek, or Goth, or Roman, who has ever astonished the world by creations so infinitely diversified. The mind of the author appears so free from egotism, so large and serene, so clear of all images of self, that it receives, as in a lucid mirror, all the varieties of nature.

ON A GIRL SLEEPING

 
Thou liv'st! yet how profoundly deep
The silence of thy tranquil sleep!
Like death it almost seems:
So all unbroke the sighs which flow
From thy calm breast of spotless snow,
Like music heard in dreams.
 
 
Thy soul is filled with gentle thought,
Unto its shrine by angels brought
From Heaven's supreme abode;
Thy dreams are not of earthly things,
But, borne upon Religion's wings,
They lift thee up to God.
 

Blackwood's Magazine.

A species of fames canina is to be met with amongst schoolboys, which affects the juveniles most when most in health. We remember a gentleman offering a wager, that a boy taken promiscuously from any of the public charity-schools, should, five minutes after his dinner, eat a pound of beef-steaks.—Brande's Jour.

THE GIPSY'S MALISON

 
Suck, baby, suck, mother's love grows by giving,
Drain the sweet founts that only thrive by wasting;
Black manhood comes, when riotous guilty living
Hands thee the cup that shall be death in tasting.
Kiss, baby, kiss, mother's lips shine by kisses,
Choke the warm breath that else would fail in blessings;
Black manhood comes, when turbulent guilty blisses
Tender thee the kiss that poisons 'mid caressings.
Hang, baby, hang, mother's love loves such forces,
Strain the fond neck that bends still to thy clinging:
Black manhood comes, when violent lawless courses
Leave thee a spectacle in rude air swinging.—
 
 
So sang a wither'd Sibyl energetical,
And bann'd the ungiving door with lips prophetical.
 

C. LAMB. Blackwood's Magazine.

EPICURES

As a mere untravelled practical Englishman, and, moreover, of the old school, Quin, no doubt, ranks high in the lists of gastronomy: but he is completely distanced by many moderns, both in love for and knowledge of the science. Among the most noted of the moderns we beg to introduce our readers to Mr. Rogerson, an enthusiast and a martyr. He, as may be presumed, was educated at that University where the rudiments of palatic science are the most thoroughly impressed on the ductile organs of youth. His father, a gentleman of Gloucestershire, sent him abroad to make the grand tour, upon which journey, says our informant, young Rogerson attended to nothing but the various modes of cookery, and methods of eating and drinking luxuriously. Before his return his father died, and he entered into the possession of a very large monied fortune, and a small landed estate. He was now able to look over his notes of epicurism, and to discover where the most exquisite dishes were to be had, and the best cooks procured. He had no other servants in his house than men cooks; his butler, footman, housekeeper, coachman, and grooms, were all cooks. He had three Italian cooks, one from Florence, another from Sienna, and a third from Viterbo, for dressing one dish, the docce piccante of Florence. He had a messenger constantly on the road between Brittany and London, to bring him the eggs of a certain sort of plover, found near St. Maloes. He has eaten a single dinner at the expense of fifty-eight pounds, though himself only sat down to it, and there were but two dishes. He counted the minutes between meals, and seemed totally absorbed in the idea, or in the action of eating, yet his stomach was very small; it was the exquisite flavour alone, that he sought. In nine years he found his table dreadfully abridged by the ruin of his fortune; and himself hastening to poverty. This made him melancholy, and brought on disease. When totally ruined, having spent near 150,000l., a friend gave him a guinea to keep him from starving; and he was found in a garret soon after roasting an ortolan with his own hands. We regret to add, that a few days afterwards, this extraordinary youth shot himself. We hope that his notes are not lost to the dining world.