The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 1

43

This was written for The Edinburgh Literary Gazette, of which sixty-one numbers appear to have been issued in 1829-30. The paper is now so scarce, that the American publishers of De Quincey's works photographed their 'copy' from that contained in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. There is a file in the British Museum. I have not been able to authenticate any other contribution from the pen of De Quincey. This letter deserves attention in various ways, but particularly for the passage on Elleray—Christopher North's home on the banks of Windermere. Mrs. Gordon in the life of her Father, Professor Wilson, remarks:—'For a description of this beautiful spot I gladly avail myself of the striking picture by Mr. De Quincey.'—H.

44

The usual colloquial corruption of Magdalen in Ox. is Maudlin; but amongst the very lie dupeuple, it is called Mallens.

45

I coin this word parvanimity as an adequate antithesis to magnanimity; for the word pusillanimity has received from usage such a confined determination to one single idea, viz. the defect of spirit and courage, that it is wholly unfitted to tie the antipode to the complex idea of magnanimity.

46

[In July, 1820.]

47

Everywhere in the world, except in Scotland, by moral philosophy is meant the philosophy of the will, as opposed to the philosophy of the intellect; in Scotland only the word moral is used, by the strongest abuse, as a comprehensive designation of whatsoever is not physical; so that in the cycle of knowledge, undertaken by the Edinburgh Professor of Moral Philosophy, are included logic, metaphysics, ethics, psychology, anthropology,—and, in one word, almost all human knowledge, with the exception of physics and mathematics.

48

The Northmen in Cumberland and Westmoreland. By Robert Ferguson. Carlisle: Steel & Brother. London: Longmans & Co.

49

Writing at the moment in Scotland, where Christmas is as little heard of, or popularly understood or regarded, as the Mahometan festival of Beyram or the fast of Ramadan, I ought to explain that, as Christmas Day, by adjournment from Lady Day—namely, March 25—falls uniformly on December 25, it happens necessarily that Twelfth Day (the adoration of the Magi at Bethlehem), which is the ceremonial close of Christmas, falls upon the 5th day of January; seven days in the old, five in the new, year.

50

'And mighty Fairfield, with its chimeOf echoes, still was keeping time.'Wordsworth—The Waggoner.

51

It might seem odd to many people that a child able to run alone should not have been already weaned, a process of early misery that, in modern improved practice, takes place amongst opulent families at the age of six months; and, secondly, it might seem equally odd that, until weaned, any infant could be truly described as 'rosy.' I wish, however, always to be punctiliously accurate; and I can assure my readers that, generally speaking, the wives of labouring men (for more reasons than one) suckle their infants for three years, to the great indignation of medical practitioners, who denounce the practice as six times too long. Secondly, although unweaned infants are ordinarily pale, yet, amongst those approaching their eighteenth or twentieth month, there are often found children as rosy as any one can meet with.

52

I mean that they included the progressive or outward-bound course, and equally the regressive or homeward-bound course, within the compass of this one word διαυλος. We in England have a phrase which conventionally has been made to supply the want of such an idea, but unfortunately with a limitation to the service of the Post-office. It is the phrase course of post. When a Newcastle man is asked, 'What is the course of post between you and Liverpool?' he understands, and by a legal decision it has been settled that he is under an obligation to understand—What is the diaulos, what is the flux and reflux—the to and the fro—the systole and diastole of the respiration—between you and Liverpool. What is the number of hours and minutes required for the transit of a letter from Newcastle to Liverpool, but coupled with the return transit of the answer? This forward and backward movement constitutes the diaulos: less than this will not satisfy the law as the complex process understood by the course of post. Less than this is only the half section of a diaulos.

53

History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. By James Anthony Froude, M.A., late Fellow of Exeter College, Oxford. Vols. I. and II. London: Parker & Son, West Strand. 1856.

54

'Ne forte' is a case of what is learnedly called aposiopesis or reticentia; that is, where (for the sake of effect) some emphatic words are left to be guessed at: as Virgil's Quos ego——(Whom if I catch, I'll–)

55

'Camisas:' i. e. chemises; but at one time the word camisa was taken indifferently for shirt or chemise. And hence arose the term camisado for a night-attack, in which the assailants recognised each other in the dark by their white shirt-sleeves, sometimes further distinguished by a tight cincture of broad black riband. The last literal camisado, that I remember, was a nautical one—a cutting-out enterprise somewhere about 1807-8.

56

Anglo-Indian authorities seem to spell this word in four different ways.—H.

57

'A sight to dream of, not to tell.'—Coleridge.

58

Twenty-three and twenty-eight thousand of these two orders we have in our Bengal army.

59

'Loodiana:'—The very last station in Bengal, on going westwards to the Indus. In Runjeet Singh's time this was for many years the station at which we lodged our Affghan pensioner, the Shah Soojah—too happy, had he never left his Loodiana lodgings.

60

For the sake of readers totally unacquainted with the subject, it may be as well to make an explanation or two. The East India regiments generally run to pretty high numbers—1000 or 1200. The high commissioned officers, as the captain, lieutenant, &c., are always British; but the non-commissioned officers are always native Hindoos—that is, sepoys. For instance, the naïk, or corporal; the havildar, or serjeant:—even of the commissioned officers, the lowest are unavoidably native, on account of the native private. Note that sepoy, as colloquially it is called, but sipahee, as in books it is often written, does not mean Hindoo or Hindoo soldier, but is simply the Hindoo word for soldier.

61

'The laurelled majesty,' &c.:—A flying reference to a grand expression—majestas laurea frontis—which occurs in a Latin supplement to the Pharsalia by May, an English poet, contemporary with the latter days of Shakspere.

62

This truth, for the sake of making it more impressive, I threw long ago into this antithetic form; and I will not scruple, out of any fear that I may be reproached with repeating myself, to place it once again on record:—'Not that only is strictly a paradox, which, being false, is popularly regarded as true;' but that also, and in a prodigiously greater extent, which, being true, is popularly regarded as false.

63

Here observe there were 2300 admirable British troops, and about 700 men of the mutineers, who might then have been attacked at a great advantage, whilst dispersed on errands of devastation. Contrast with these proportions the heroic exertions of the noble Havelock—fighting battle after battle, with perhaps never more than 1700 or 1800 British troops; and having scarcely a gun but what he captured from the enemy. And what were the numbers of his enemy? Five thousand in the earlier actions, and 10,000 to 12,000 in the last.

64

Mr. D. B. Jones comes forward to defend the commandant of Meerut. How? The last sentence only of his letter has any sort of reference to the public accusation; and this sentence replies, but not with any mode of argument (sound or unsound), to a charge perfectly irrelevant, if it had ever existed—namely, an imaginary charge against the little army assembled on May 10 at Meerut. The short and summary answer is, that no such imaginary charge, pure and absolute moonshine, was ever advanced against the gallant force at Meerut.

Secondly, if it had, such a charge could have no bearing whatever upon that charge, loudly preferred against the commander of that district.

Thirdly, the charge has been (I presume) settled as regards its truth, and any grounds of disputation, this way or that, by the Governor-General. The newspapers have told us, and have not been contradicted, that Lord Canning has dismissed this functionary for 'supineness.'

65

'To hang them:'—But with a constant notification that, after hanging, the criminals would be decapitated: otherwise the threat loses its sting. It seems to be a superstition universal amongst Southern Asiatics, unless possibly amongst the Malay race, that to suffer any dismemberment of the body operates disastrously upon the fate in the unseen world. And hence, no doubt, it has arisen that the gallows is not viewed in the light of a degrading punishment. Immunity from mutilation compensates any ignominy which might else attend it. Accordingly, we see in China that the innumerable victims of the present rebellion, captured in the vast province of Quantung by the cruel Yeh, were all beheaded by the sword in the blood-reeking privacies of Canton. And two centuries back, when the native dynasty was overthrown by the last Tartar invasion, the reigning emperor (having unlimited freedom of choice) ended his career by a halter: retiring to his orchard, he hanged both himself and his daughter.

66

This case was entirely misapprehended by a journalist who happened to extract the passage. He understood me to mean that this particular mode of disrespect to their British officers had operated as a cause of evil; whereas I alleged it simply as an evidence and exponent of evil habits criminally tolerated amongst the very lowest orders of our mercenary troops.

67

And imperfectly as the offer was advertised, it seems to have had considerable effect. Apparently it has extinguished the Nena's power to show himself, and to move about with freedom. He is now distrustful and jealous—often no doubt with very little reason.

68

This was published in facsimile from the Original MS. in The Archivist and Autograph Review, edited by S. Davey, F.R.S.L.—June, 1888. [H.]