Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 60, No. 373, November 1846

If I were to write a diary here, it would be after the following sort: —

Monday.– Another shark! Mercy on us! What a brute! But not so big as the other.

Tuesday.– We had capital honey this morning to breakfast; eightpence per lb. – freshly expressed from the wax, and got from Granny Jolter's farm.

Wednesday.– My Times did not come by to-day's post, and I feel I don't know how.

Thursday.– The "hot crab" which we had at the parsonage, where we dined to-day, was exquisite. The way it is done is – the whole of the inside, and the claws, having been mixed together with a little rich gravy, (sometimes cream is used;) curry-paste, not curry-powder, and very fine fried crumbs of bread, is put into the shell of the crab and then salamandered. If my cook can do it on my return to town, I will give her half-a-crown.

Friday.– Nothing whatever happened; but it looked a little like rain, over the downs, about four o'clock in the afternoon.

Saturday.– A day of incidents. Ten o'clock A.M. – The coast-guard man told me, that about five o'clock this morning, as he was coming along – cliff, a young fox popped out of a thicket close at his feet, looked "quite steady-like at him for about five seconds," and then ran back into the furze.

Eleven o'clock. – Saw a Cockney "gent" on a walking tour, the first of the sort that I have seen in these parts, and he looked frightened at the solitariness of the scene. Every thing that he had on seemed new: a dandified shining hat; a kind of white pea-jacket; white trowsers; fawn-coloured, gloves; little cloth boots tipped with shining French polished leather; a very slight umbrella covered with oil-skin; and a little telescope in a leathern case, slung round his waist. He fancied, as he passed me, that he had occasion to use a gossamer white pocket-handkerchief, with a fine border to it; for he took it out of an outside breast-pocket, and unfolded it deliberately and jauntily. Whence came he, I wonder? He cannot walk four miles further, poor fellow! for evidently walking does not agree with him: yet he must, or sit down and cry in this out-of-the-way place.

Two o'clock. – Tickler caught a little crab among the rocks. It got hold of his nose, and bothered him.

Four o'clock. – As I was sitting on a tumble-down sort of gate, talking earnestly with my little boy, I heard some vehicle approaching – looked up as it turned the corner of the road, and behold – Her Gracious Majesty Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, and one or two other persons, without outriders or any sort of state whatever! She was dressed exceedingly plain, and was laughing heartily at something said to her by a well-known nobleman who walked beside the carriage. I never saw her Majesty looking to so much advantage: in high spirits, with a fine fresh colour, and her hair a little deranged by the wind. She and her little party seemed surprised at seeing any one in such an out-of-the-way place, and her Majesty and the Prince returned our obeisances with particular courtesy.

Half-past Five. – Nick Irons met me with a large viper which he had just killed, after it had flown at his dog. Is there any difference between vipers and adders?

A quarter past Six. – On arriving at home, found a hot crab, which had been sent in to us, as an addition to our dinner, from the parsonage. I lick my lips while thinking of it. I prefer the cream to the gravy.

Half-past six. – Find I have got only three bottles of port and two of sherry left!

Nine o'clock. – My four gallon cask of elderberry wine, made for me – and capitally made, too – by one of the villagers, came home. We are to put a quart of brandy in it, and "take care it don't forment." I fancy I see ourselves and the children regaling ourselves with it on the winter's evenings, in town. Altogether it has cost me twelve shillings and sixpence!

Quarter past Nine. – Children go to bed; I had the candles brought in, resolved to read the new number of the – ; but fell asleep directly, and never woke till half-past twelve o'clock, when I knew not where I was; being in darkness – and alone. Really a journal of this sort is, upon consideration, so instructive and entertaining, that I wish to know whether you would like me to keep one during my next sojourn at the seaside and publish it in Maga? I would undertake not to exceed three numbers of Maga, each Part to contain only twenty pages.

Miss Strickland v. Lord Campbell.

Will his lordship favour the world with some reply to this clever and laborious lady's accusation contained in her letter to the Times? That letter is exceedingly specific and pointed in the charge of literary larceny, and committed under circumstances which every consideration of candour, gallantry, and literary character, concurs in rendering Lord Campbell's complete exculpation a matter of serious consequence to his reputation. Has he, or has he not, designedly appropriated to his own use, as the fruits of his own original research, the results of a literary fellow-labourer's meritorious and pains-taking original investigation – that fellow-labourer, too, being a lady? I sincerely hope that Lord Campbell's first literary attempt will prove not to be thus discreditably signalized. His book is yet unnoticed in Maga.

According to that good old intelligible English saying, it is this morning raining cats and dogs. There's an end, Tickler, to our intended eighteen-mile walk (thither and back) to the lighthouse, the machinery of which I was very anxious to explain to you. Bow, wow, wow, wow! indeed! I know what you mean, you little sinner! You want to be after the rabbits in yonder thickets, and you mean to intimate that you can go perfectly well by yourself, don't mind the rain, and will come safely home when you have finished your sport. Don't look so earnestly at me, and whine so piteously. By the way, do you call yourself a vermin dog? and yet every hair of your shaggy coat stood on end the other day, when I turned out for you the two pennyworth of mice —mice!– which I had bought for you from Nick Irons? What would you have done if a RAT were to meet you? Bah, you little wretch! Where's your spirit? Refined, and refined away by breeding, eh? What would you have done if you were to be allowed to go off now, and were to rout out accidentally a hedgehog, as Hermit did yesterday? You may well whine! He's five times your size, eh? But I've seen a terrier that would tackle a hedgehog, and bring him home, too – your own second cousin, Tory, poor dear dog – peace to his little ashes. Besides, to return to the rabbits – in spite of all your snuffing and smelling, and scampering, and routing about, you never turned up a rabbit yet! And even our kitten has only to rise and curve her little back, and you slink away, like an arrant coward as you are – Well! – come along, doggy! you're a good little creature, with all your faults – these black eyes of yours, with your little erect ears, look as if you had really understood all that I have been saying to you – so I really think – and yet – pour! pour! pour! – [Enter Emily.]

Emily.– Papa, Miss – says that we have said all our lessons, and will you let us have Tickler to play with?

Tickler.– Bow – wow – wow! – Bow, wow! – Bow! bow! bow! – [Running up and scampering towards her, and they go away together.]

Servant.– Brown has called with some lobsters, sir – (shows them) – two very nice ones, and a small crab – only fifteenpence the lot.

Self.– Very well – buy 'em.

Wife.– (Entering) – Lobsters and crabs again! Really one would think that you had had a surfeit of them long ago.

Servant.– Brown says, sir, he mayn't be able to get any more for some time, the wind's so high.

Wife.– Oh, buy them, of course! Every thing is bought that comes here! That's eleven crabs this week!

Self.– What have you got there, my Xantippe?

Wife.– I wish you would drop that odious name.

Self.– What have you there, my Angel?

Wife.– No, that won't do either.

Self.– Well, Fanny, then – what have you got there?

Wife.– Why, 'tis the new work of Mr Dickens —Dombey & Son. What an odd name for a tale!

Self.– Why, how did you get it?

Wife.– Mrs – (at the parsonage) has just got a packet of books from town, and has lent us this, as it is a wet day, till the evening, and they have got lots to read at present.

Self.– I am very much obliged to them.

Wife.– So am I, for I want to read it first; manners, if you please.

Self.– Come, come, Fanny, I really want it; I've a good deal of curiosity.

Wife.– So have I, too!

Self.– Well, at any rate, let me look at the plates.

Wife.– Certainly; and suppose, by the way, as I've no letter to write – suppose I sit down with you, and read it to you! 'Twill save your eyes, and I'm all alone in the other room.

Self.– Very well. [Madame shuts the door; seats herself on the miniature sofa; I poke the fire; and she begins.] Being called away soon afterwards on some domestic exigency, she leaves me – and I read for myself. You said that you should like to know my opinion of Mr Dickens' new story, and I read it with interest, and some care. 'Tis exactly what I had expected; containing clear evidence of original genius, disfigured by many most serious, and now plainly incurable, blemishes. The first thing striking me, on perusing this new performance, is, that its author writes, as it were, from amidst a thick theatrical mist. Cursed be the hour – should say a sincere admirer of Mr Dickens' genius – that he ever set foot within a theatre, or became intimate with theatrical people. You fancy that every scene, incident, and character, is conceived with a view to its telling– from the stage. This suggestion seems to me to afford a key to most of the prominent faults and deficiencies of Mr Dickens as an imaginative writer; the lamentable absence of that simplicity and sobriety which invest the writings, for instance, of Goldsmith with immortal freshness and beauty. With what truthful tenderness does such a writer depict nature! – how different is his treatment from the spasmodic, straining, extravagant, vulgarizing efforts of the play-wright! The one is delicate and exquisite limning; the other, gross daubing: – the one faithfully represents; the other monstrously caricatures. This is the case with Mr Dickens; and it is intolerably provoking that it should be so; for he has the penetrating eye and accurate pencil, which – properly disciplined and trained – might have produced pictures worthy to stand beside those of the greatest masters. As it is, you might imagine his sketches to be the result of the combined simultaneous efforts of two artists – one the delicate limner, the other the vulgar dauber and scene-painter above spoken of. He has invention and skill enough to produce an interesting character; and place him in a situation favourable for developing his eccentricities, his failings, his excellences – in a word, his peculiarities. Well; he prepares his reader's mind – sets before you an interesting, a moving, a mirth-stirring occasion, when – bah! – all is ruined; the spasmodic straining after effect becomes instantly and painfully visible; and the personage before you is made to talk to the level of a theatrical audience, especially pit and gallery – and in unison with "gingerbeer, apples, oranges, and sodawater" associations and recollections. Let me give two striking instances, occurring at the very opening of "Dombey and Son." The first is the colloquy at pp. 3, 4; the other at p. 9. The former presents you Dr Parker Peps, a fashionable accoucheur, and the humble admiring family medical man – the occasion being a momentary absence of both from the clamber of a lady dying in childbed, Mrs Dombey; and can any one of correct taste or feeling bear in mind that occasion, and fail of being revolted by the drivel put into the mouth of the consulting accoucheur? – who, when telling Mr Dombey of the mortal peril in which his wife overhead is lying – apologises to him for speaking of her as "Her Grace the Duchess!" "Lady Cankaby," "The Countess of Dombey:" his obsequious companion accounting for such lapses on the score of his "West End practice." Is this nature? Is it actual life? Any thing approaching to either? If not, what is it meant for? Why, to tickle a Christmas audience at one of the minor playhouses! The other (these are only two out of many) is the character of Mr Chick, an old fool, who has a habit of whistling and humming droll tunes on the most solemn occasions, interrupting and interlarding conversation with "Right tol loor-rul," "A cobbler there was," "Rumpti-iddity bow, wow, wow!" is it not certain that Mr Dickens here had his eye on Tilbury or Bedford enacting the part? And for no other purpose whatever is this precious character introduced than to hit off this very original peculiarity! From the same theatrical habit of mind, it happens that Mr Dickens cannot carry on his stories in an even, straightforward course, but presents us with a series of "scenes!" – utterly marring the effect and annihilating the truthfulness and reality of the whole; e. g. the jarring interruption of this story at a touching and interesting moment – at the moment of the two doctors and Mr Dombey's return to poor Mrs Dombey's death-bed, when the reader feels that they are almost instantly to witness her death, by the introduction of two tiresome twaddlers, reproductions of old stock characters of the author, Mrs Chick and Miss Tox, whose descriptions and utterly irrelevant conversation detain us for nearly three pages. At length these motley "stagers" – if I may be allowed the word – are grouped round the poor lady's death-bed; and let me here say, that in my opinion the character and situation of poor Mrs Dombey are both exquisitely conceived, and appeal to the deepest sympathies of the heart; but, alas! the perverse, provoking, incorrigible writer will not let us enjoy "the luxury of grief;" but while we are bending over her death-bed, our attention is called off to a remarkably interesting and appropriate circumstance – two watches of two of the doctors "seem in the silence to be running a race!" * * "they seem to be racing faster!!" * * "The race, in the ensuing pause, was fierce and furious. The watches seemed to jostle, and to trip each other up!!!" and a moment or two afterwards the lady expires, under very moving circumstances, touched with perfect delicacy and truthfulness. Would the intrusion of a sow into a lovely flower-garden be more shocking or disgusting to the beholder? Again, in the first page, we are presented to Mr Dombey, gazing with unutterable feelings at his newly-born son, "forty-eight minutes of age;" and Mr Dickens tastefully suggests the comparison of the little creature, which is "somewhat crushed and spotty in his general effect!!" whose mother is at that moment in dying agonies in that very room, to "a muffin, which it was essential to toast brown while it was very new!!" And a few lines forward, the posture of the innocent unconscious little being suggests the brutal idea of a prize-fighter– his "little fists, curled up and clenched, seemed, in his feeble way, to be SQUARING AT EXISTENCE for having come upon him so unexpectedly!!!" Was ever any thing more monstrous? To find a gentleman of Mr Dickens' great genius, and experience in literary composition, sinning in this way, is provoking beyond all measure. The above abominations to be perpetrated by him, who at page seventeen can present us with so exquisite a touch as the following: – He is describing the blank appearance of the dismantled house, immediately after the funeral of the poor, neglected, and heart-broken lady. "The dead and buried lady was awful, in a picture frame of ghastly bandages. Every gust of wind that rose, brought eddying round the corner, from the neighbouring mews, some fragments of the straw that had been strewn before the house when she was ill; mildewed remains of which were still cleaving to the neighbourhood, and these being always drawn by some invisible attraction to the threshold of the dirty house to let opposite, addressed a dismal eloquence to Mr Dombey's window." The thirty-two pages of this first number contain very many provocatives to unfavourable criticism. They bristle all over with mannerisms – abound with grotesque, unseemly, extravagant comparisons and personation, (one of Mr Dickens' chiefly besetting sins) – many of the scenes contain truth and humour, smothered and lost by prolixity, incident and character diluted by a tedious and excessive minuteness of description; and it is to be feared that several of the characters will bear a painfully strong resemblance to some of their predecessors in Mr Dickens' other stories. Mr Dickens may feel angry at my plainness; and, in return, I must express my fears that he is not aware of the extent of injury which has been inflicted upon him by clique-homage– the flattery of fluent, incompetent admirers – the misconstrued silence of critics of experienced taste and refinement. Does Mr Dickens really consider the light in which his writings, containing such faults as those above adverted to, must be viewed by the upper and thinking classes of society – persons of cultivated taste, of refinement, of piercing critical capacity, who disdain to enter the little, babbling, vulgar, narrow-minded circles miscalled "literary?"

But I have done. Mr Dickens has been magnificently patronised by the public, who – I being one of them – have a right to speak plainly to, and of a gentleman whose writings have so large a circulation at home and abroad; who has no excuse, that I am aware of, for negligence or inattention; who is bound to consider the effect of example on the minds of tens of thousands of young and inexperienced readers who may take all for gospel that he chooses to tell them – and to be very very guarded as to moral object or effect – if moral object or effect his writings have, and be not intended solely to provoke, by their amusing and farcical absurdity and extravagance, an idle and forgotten laugh. I have no personal acquaintance with Mr Dickens, and have written in an impartial spirit, paying homage to his undoubted genius, denouncing his literary faults – for his own good, and the advantage of his readers, and of the literary character of the country.

Speaking of the literary character of the country, puts me in mind of the intention which I had formed some months ago, of writing an article upon the prevalent style of literary composition. May I take this opportunity of making a few observations upon that subject? And yet I must first admit, that my own style in writing this letter is far more loose, and inexact, and slovenly, than ought to be tolerated in even such a letter as this. Herein, however, I only imitate Dr Whately, who, on arriving at that part of his "rhetoric" which deals with public speaking, starts with an admission that he himself does not possess the qualifications, the acquisition of which he proceeds to enforce upon others.

The writing of the present day has many distinguishing excellences and faults. The most conspicuous of the latter is, perhaps, a want of simplicity and steadiness of style. Force – startling energy – are too uniformly aimed at by some; others affect continual sarcasm and irony, whatever may be the nature of the occasion. One class of writers are so priggishly curt and epigrammatic as to throw over their lucubrations an uniform air of small impertinence: it would be easy to point out, I think, an incessant illustration of this "school," if one may use the word. Others uniformly affect the trenchant and tremendous, with very big words, and awful accumulations of them. Some seem to aim at a picturesque ruggedness of style – defying rule, and challenging imitation. Very many writers of all classes are so parenthetical and involved in their sentences, that by the time that they have got to the end of a sentence, both they and their readers have forgotten where they set out from, and how the plague they got where they are: looking back breathless and dismayed at a confused series of hyphens entangled among all sorts of exceptions, reservations, and qualifications. This fault, and a grievous one it is, is daily illustrated, and by writers, who, by their carelessness in this matter, do themselves incalculable injustice, rendering apparently turbid the clearest possible stream of reasoning, marring the effect of the most beautiful and apposite illustration, and irritating and confusing the reader. In my opinion, this fault of our public writers is to be traced to the influence of Lord Brougham's style. He has, and always had, a prodigious command of nervous and apposite language, always writing or speaking with a violent impetus upon him; and yet, while crashing along, his versatile and suggestive faculties hurried him incessantly from one side to the other, hither and thither – anticipating this, qualifying that, guarding against this, reserving that – extruding undesirable implications and inferences, with a sort of wild rapidity and energy – adopting ever-varying fanciful equivalent expressions – crowding, in fact, a dozen considerable sentences into one turbid monster. Yet it must be owned, that in all this he seldom misses his way; his original impetus carries him headlong on to the point at which he had aimed. Not so with his imitators. They start with an imaginary equality of force, of fulness, and variety; but forthwith rush into a strange higgle-piggledy, helter-skelter sort of imposing wordiness, equally bewildering and stupifying to their readers and themselves. No man can fall into this sort of fault who is habituated to leisurely distinctness of thought: he will conceive beforehand with deliberate purpose, and that, cæteris paribus, will induce a clear, close, and energetic expression of his thoughts, preventing misapprehension, and convincing even a strongly prejudiced opponent. Shorten your sentences, gentlemen; take one thing at a time; put every thing in its proper place; attempt not to put a quart into a pint pot; do not write in such a desperate hurry, nor attempt to hit half-a-dozen birds with one stone. Another prevalent vice is a sickening redundancy of classical quotation and allusion. Many of our newspaper writers, and among them some of the very cleverest, cannot contemplate any topic which they propose to discuss, without its suggesting, as if by a sudden, secret sort of elective affinity, previous events and occurrences of past ages. Out tumble scraps from Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Terence, Plautus, Lucretius, with their prose companions; and this, too, be it observed, almost always Roman; – it requires a certain hardihood to adopt the Greek language in modern composition. In short, one really thinks himself entitled to infer, from this extravagant amount of quotation and allusion, as well ancient as modern, that its perpetrators are very young: red-hot from their classical studies, panting to exhibit the extent of their acquisitions, the scholarly ease and precision with which they can apply the most recondite passages and allusions to the fresh occurrences of the moment. One is apt to suspect that one great motive for acquiring, extending, and retaining knowledge, is the simple desire to exhibit the possession of it. But all this is very vain and foolish. It looks stupidly ridiculous to persons of experienced judgment. An occasional and very sparing use of this sort of accessory is always desirable, often marvellously graceful and happy; an excess of it decisively indicates pedantic puerility, ostentation, and a grievous deficiency of strength and originality. It is likely, moreover, to have a very unpleasant and irritating effect, when apparent in popular compositions – in leading or other articles in newspapers, for instance – viz. on occasions where the persons addressed, or at least very many of them, do not comprehend or appreciate the allusion or quotation. A really classical turn of mind is usually accompanied by too fine and correct a taste to admit of these eccentricities and vagaries. The English language is a very fine language, my friends; and a very, very fine and rare thing it is to be able to use it with freedom, and purity, and power. Another very censurable kindred habit of many of our public writers is, the interlarding their compositions with abominable scraps of French, and even of Italian. Faugh! – is not this adding insult to injury, in dealing with the noble language of our country?