Читать книгу: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 554, June 30, 1832», страница 3
I often met the late Monsieur Etienne Dumont, of Geneva, the friend and commentator of old Jeremy Bentham, at Romilly's house in London, in 1789. He was a man of astonishing talents, sagacity, acuteness, and clearness of head. What part he had in the brilliant effusions of Mirabeau, and in the French Revolution, may be seen by his posthumous work, just published at Paris, entitled Souvenirs de Mirabeau. He was a short, thick man, of coarse features, blear eyed, and slovenly in his dress; but of mild manners, hospitable, an excellent story-teller, and much beloved. I think he had been at one time librarian to old Lord Lansdowne. He died at Milan, in 1829, aged about 70. The French cannot contain their rage at the exposure that he was the spirit who moved their brilliant Mirabeau.
I was once talking to Anna Maria Porter about him, when she expressed her astonishment at the admiration I bestowed on him! She said, "I thought you was a Whig, and an aristocrat! how can you commend a revolutionary radical?" I answered, "You mistake his character, he is not a radical in the sense you mean! he considers Tom Paine's Rights of Man to be mischievous nonsense!" I could not convince her: but I made my peace with her by praising, with the utmost sincerity, her beautiful novel, The Recluse of Norway. I found her full of good sense, and with much command of language. She will forgive me for saying she had not the personal beauty of her gentle sister Jane. She paid many compliments to the imaginative vivants of the green island; for she perceived by my tones that I was an Irishman, though I am not sure, that she knew even my name; for the company was numerous, and of all countries. It was an evening assembly, in which the rooms were so full, that one could hardly move. Tommy Moore was there, and though he is a very little man, he was the great lion of the evening: all the young ladies were dying to see the bard whose verses they had chanted so often with thrilling bosoms, and tears running down their cheeks. They were not quite satisfied when they saw a diminutive man, not reaching five feet, with a curly natural brown scratch, handing about an ugly old dowager or two, who fondly leaned upon his arms, even though they discovered them to be ladies of high titles.
Rogers came in late, and went away early, looking sallower and more indifferent than usual. He paid a few bows and compliments to two or three noble peeresses, and then retired.
The Rev. Thomas Frognel Dibdin was there. He was very facetious and quaint: when he found himself by my side, he instantly started off, crying to me; "Brobdignagian; We Lilliputians must not stand by you! You would make a soldier for the King of Prussia! Look at that tall lady there, that Miss de V–; why do you not take her for a wife?" E– G–n heard what he said, and looked fierce at us both! I expected another Bluviad! Perhaps the ingenious bibliographer does not recollect the conversation; but he may be assured it took place. And I entreat also Anna Maria Porter to tax her memory, and recall the very interesting and sensible conversation I had with her. I told her some anecdotes of her brother, Sir Robert, whom I met on our travels, which pleased her. Jane would not talk much that night; something heavy seemed to have seized her spirits. Let Jane recollect how she once related to me the curious history and character of Percival Stockdale! It happened at the house of a friend in London, whom I shall not point out with too much particularity. Dibdin endeavoured to excite the envy of some of us litterateurs, that we were not, like him, members of the Roxburgh, which had dukes, and earls, and chancellors of the exchequer, and judges, and the great Magician of the North into the bargain!—Metropolitan.
TO A CHILD IN PRAYER
Fold thy little hands in prayer,
Bow down at thy Maker's knee;
Now thy sunny face is fair,
Shining through thy golden hair,
Thine eyes are passion-free;
And pleasant thoughts like garlands bind thee
Unto thy home, yet Grief may find thee—
Then pray, Child, pray!
Now thy young heart like a bird
Singeth in its summer nest,
No evil thought, no unkind word.
No bitter, angry voice hath stirr'd
The beauty of its rest.
But winter cometh, and decay
Wasteth thy verdant home away—
Then pray, Child, pray!
Thy Spirit is a House of Glee,
And Gladness harpeth at the door,
While ever with a merry shout
Hope, the May-Queen, danceth out,
Her lips with music running o'er!
But Time those strings of Joy will sever.
And Hope will not dance on for ever;
Then pray, Child, pray!
Now thy Mother's Hymn abideth
Round they pillow in the night,
And gentle feet creep to thy bed,
And o'er thy quiet face is shed
The taper's darken'd light.
But that sweet Hymn shall pass away,
By thee no more those feet shall stay;
Then pray, Child, pray!
New Monthly Magazine.
SONG.
BY JAMES SHERIDAN KNOWLES
A Fair lady looks out from her lattice—but why
Do tears bedim that lady's eye?
Below stands the knight who her favour wears,
But be mounts not the turret to dry her tears;
He springs on his charger—"Farewell;—he is gone,
And the lady is left in her turret alone.
"Ply the distaff, my maids—ply the distaff—before
It is spun, he may happen to stand at the door."
There was never an eye than that lady's more bright,—
Why speeds then away her favour'd knight?
The couch which her white fingers broider'd so fair,
Were a far softer seat than the saddle of war;
What's more tempting than love? In the patriot's sight
The battle of freedom he hastens to fight;
"Ply the distaff, my maids—ply the distaff—before
It is spun, he may happen to stand at the door."
The fair lady looks out from her lattice, but now
Her eye is as bright as her fair shining brow:
And is sorrow so fleeting?—Love's tears—dry they fast?
The stronger is love, is't the less sure to last?
Whose arm sees her knight round her waist?—'Tis his own;
By the battle she wept for, her lover is won;
"Ply the distaff, my maids, ply the distaff no more;
Would you spin when already he stands at the door?"
Monthly Magazine.
LORD CORNWALLIS'S MONUMENT, IN INDIA
The annexed cut represents the mausoleum of the Marquess of Cornwallis, whose distinguished connexion with the success of British arms in India will be recollected by the reader. It stands at Ghazepoor, a large town or city, in the province of Benares, on the river Ganges, about 450 miles from Calcutta. His lordship died on the river in the year 1805, while proceeding to make the requisite arrangements for some ceded prisoners. He was, at the time, governor-general of India, having been appointed to succeed the Marquess Wellesley, in 1804. The last act of his life accords with his general activity and vigilance, for he always gave his instructions in person, and attended to the performance of them. His personal character was amiable and unassuming, and if his talents were not brilliant, his sound sense, aided by his laudable ambition and perseverance, effected much good.
The monument is built of stone, and cost a lac of rupees, or 10,000l. It is surrounded by an iron railing, and its vicinity is the favourite promenade of the gentry of Ghazepoor, which has been termed the Montpellier of India.
Bishop Heber, in his interesting Journey through India, objects to the architectural taste of the monument in these critical observations:
"During our drive this evening I had a nearer view of Lord Cornwallis's monument, which certainly does not improve on close inspection; it has been evidently a very costly building; its materials are excellent, being some of the finest free-stone I ever saw, and it is an imitation of the celebrated Sibyl's temple, of large proportions, solid masonry, and raised above the ground on a lofty and striking basement. But its pillars, instead of beautiful Corinthian well-fluted, are of the meanest Doric. They are quite too slender for their height, and for the heavy entablature and cornice which rest on them. The dome instead of springing from nearly the same level with the roof of the surrounding portico, is raised ten feet higher on a most ugly and unmeaning attic story, and the windows (which are quite useless) are the most extraordinary embrasures (for they resemble nothing else) that I ever saw, out of a fortress. Above all, the building is utterly unmeaning, it is neither a temple nor a tomb, neither has altar, statue, nor inscription. It is, in fact, a 'folly' of the same sort, but far more ambitious and costly, than that which is built at Barrackpoor, and it is vexatious to think that a very handsome church might have been built, and a handsome marble monument to Lord Cornwallis placed in its interior, for little more money than has been employed on a thing, which, if any foreigner saw it, (an event luckily not very probable) would afford subject for mockery to all who read his travels, at the expense of Anglo-Indian ideas of architecture. Ugly as it is, however, by itself, it may yet be made a good use of, by making it serve the purpose of a detached 'torre campanile' to the new church which is required for the station; to this last it would save the necessity of a steeple or cupola, and would much lessen the expense of the building."
