The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 565, September 8, 1832

We must now return to Merton. His solitary walks on the opposite side of the street had not even, from the first, escaped the scrutinizing eyes of Mr. Hookey. No: he saw in the tall, pale, elegant, dark-haired student the victim of deep sensibility. From seeing him, he wondered, from wondering he loved him, from loving he adored him: he knew at once he was no common man. Having perused Byron's Manfred, he conceived him to be such another as that strange character; or he might be a second Lara; or, more, he might be, nay he was, a glorious genius, full of high imaginings. Little do we know what bright thoughts passed through the mind of the enthusiastic Hookey. He cursed his profession, which debarred him from the fellowship of such a man: he cursed his nose, which stood between him and the object of his adoration.

Day after day had Mr. Hookey noticed the accomplished, the highly-gifted Merton; but it was only upon this particular morning that the recognition was mutual. Merton, on turning his eyes by chance from the ground, looked to the opposite side of the street, and there beheld a nose. He then turned his eyes to the earth in his usual meditative mood; but, reflecting that a nose without an owner was rather a singular phenomenon, he looked a second time, and there, behind the nose, he saw a man; it was Mr. Hookey himself.

This was the first time that the melancholy and intellectual student reciprocated upon Hookey the attention which Hookey had hitherto bestowed exclusively upon him. No more was the barber's "sweetness wasted upon the desert air," but fell on one who knew how to appreciate it to its fullest extent. Merton stood stock-still, and gazed upon him with mute admiration. He was positively fascinated. The nose operated upon him like the head of Medusa, and almost turned him to stone. And Mr. Hookey was fascinated too. Merton also had become Medusafied, and exercised a petrifactive influence upon the barber. He was nailed fast to the threshold of his own door, and gazed upon his fancied personification of Lara and Manfred with an indomitable and resistless perseverance, which utterly confounded himself; while Merton, nailed alike fast to the opposite footpath, stood staring at his antagonist, or rather at his nasal protuberance. This impressive scene continued for several minutes, when Merton, regaining the power of locomotion, slowly approached the barber, his arms all the while crossed, and his eyes intently fixed upon the nose. Nine slow and awful steps brought him face to face with Hookey. The barber's eyes were fixed intently upon his—his eyes upon the barber's nose. The scene was extremely dreadful; and Mr. Hookey, after vainly trying to keep his ground, retreated into the shop, still facing Merton, who kept advancing upon him as he receded. Back, step by step, went Hookey; forward, step by step, came Merton; each all the while eyeing the other with equal astonishment. The barber continued retreating, the other following him,—first through the shop, then through the kitchen, then through the parlour—the three apartments leading into one another. At last he got to the remotest corner of the parlour, and could get no farther. Here he paused, and Merton paused also. Still they gazed on each other,—the barber in the corner overpowered with amazement, and the student standing before him hardly less surprised. At last Merton broke silence in the following awful words,—"GRACIOUS HEAVENS WHAT A NOSE!" So saying, he retreated as slowly as he entered, leaving Mr. Hookey utterly stupified and bewildered. The sentence went like iron into the barber's soul; he felt it in all its bitterness.

It is almost unnecessary to say what an effect this scene had upon the highly-susceptible temperament of Merton. From that moment peace fled his mind. He went instantly home; but instead of devoting himself, as before, to those studies in which he delighted, and in which he was wont so highly to excel, he immured himself in his chamber, giving way to gloomy abstraction, and agonizing his spirit with painful and most distressing fancies. The great power of his imagination caused him, in a peculiar manner, to suffer from the remembrance of what he had witnessed; and, accordingly, his waking as well as his sleeping hours were haunted with visions of noses,—noses of stupendous size, which arose, like ocean islands, amid the gloomy tabernacle of his brain, and filled him with utter despair. At last, from bad to worse, he became the mere shadow of his former self, the wreck of what he was, and a picture of fallen and shattered genius. To drive away the hideous phantasmagorias that tortured him, as with the stings of demons, he had recourse to gin, and soon became a confirmed drunkard: the next stage was lunacy; and he was confined for fourteen months in Saint Luke's Hospital for the insane.

The fate of the barber was equally deplorable. The awful words pronounced by Merton may be considered his death-knell. They rang ever after in his ears; and, in a few weeks, his head was turned, his shop shut up, and himself sent to Bedlam. "Gracious heavens, what a nose!" This dreadful sentence—more dreadful than the hand-writing on the wall to Belshazzar,—haunted him by day and by night. Reason was dethroned, and "moody madness, laughing wild," was the result. Such are the frightful consequences of extreme susceptibility, against which the youth of both sexes ought to be constantly on their guard.

The worst remains to be told. These unhappy men were liberated from confinement about the same time, and both returned to Oxford. They seemed to have recovered their reasoning faculties, but the result showed that this was very far from being the case; for, happening to meet on the banks of the Cherwell, they attacked each other with such fury, that, like Brutus and Aruns, they were both killed on the spot,—the barber having been burked in the encounter, and the student having died of a wound which he received in the throat by his antagonist's razor.—Fraser's Magazine.

THE LAST OF THE FAMILY

I bid thee welcome to my father's halls,But fled for ever is their wonted mirth,Death hath been busy in these fated walls,Casting dark shadows o'er our house and hearth,The brave—the beauteous from their home have past,And I remain of that loved band the last.Thou wilt not now my gallant brothers greet,Hiding amidst the glades with hound and horn,Nor my fair sisters, warbling ditties sweet,While gathering wild flowers in the dewy morn;Evening will come, but will not bring again,The song—the tale—the dance—the festal train.I can but bid thee to my lonely room,Where in fond dreams I pass my blighted youth.Musing on vanished loveliness and bloom,Man's dauntless courage, woman's changeless truth,And scenes of joyous glee, or tranquil rest,Shared with the early-lost—the bright—the blest.Yet chide me not—mine is no impious grief,Meekly I pray for Heaven's supporting grace.And soon, I feel, his hand will give relief,And the last sad survivor of her raceQuit this lone mansion for the home above.Where dwell her happy family of love!Metropolitan.

CONVERSATIONS WITH LORD BYRON

By the Countess of Blessington

It is difficult to judge when Lord Byron is serious or not. He has a habit of mystifying, that might impose upon many; but that can be detected by examining his physiognomy; for a sort of mock gravity, now and then broken by a malicious smile, betrays when he is speaking for effect, and not giving utterance to his real sentiments. If he sees that he is detected, he appears angry for a moment, and then laughingly admits, that it amuses him to hoax people, as he calls it, and that when each person, at some future day, will give their different statements of him, they will be so contradictory, that all will be doubted,—an idea that gratifies him exceedingly! The mobility of his nature is extraordinary, and makes him inconsistent in his actions as well as in his conversation.

Byron spoke to-day in terms of high commendation of Hope's "Anastasius;" said that he wept bitterly over many pages of it, and for two reasons, first, that he had not written it, and secondly, that Hope had; for that it was necessary to like a man excessively to pardon his writing such a book—a book, as he said, excelling all recent productions, as much in wit and talent, as in true pathos. He added, that he would have given his two most approved poems to have been the author of "Anastasius."

From "Anastasius" he wandered to the works of Mr. Galt, praised the "Annals of the Parish" very highly, as also "the Entail," which we had lent him, and some scenes of which he said had affected him very much. "The characters in Mr. Galt's novels have an identity," added Byron, "that reminds me of Wilkie's pictures."

As a woman, I felt proud of the homage he paid to the genius of Mrs. Hemans, and as a passionate admirer of her poetry, I felt flattered, at finding that Lord Byron fully sympathized with my admiration. He has, or at least expresses a strong dislike to the Lake school of poets, never mentions them except in ridicule, and he and I nearly quarrelled to-day because I defended poor Keats.

On looking out from the balcony this morning, I observed Byron's countenance change, and an expression of deep sadness steal over it. After a few minutes silence he pointed out to me a boat anchored to the right, as the one in which his friend Shelley went down, and he said the sight of it made him ill.—"You should have known Shelley (said Byron) to feel how much I must regret him. He was the most gentle, most amiable, and least worldly-minded person I ever met; full of delicacy, disinterested beyond all other men, and possessing a degree of genius, joined to a simplicity, as rare as it is admirable. He had formed to himself a beau ideal of all that is fine, high-minded, and noble, and he acted up to this ideal even to the very letter. He had a most brilliant imagination but a total want of worldly-wisdom. I have seen nothing like him, and never shall again, I am certain. I never can forget the night that his poor wife rushed into my room at Pisa, with a face pale as marble, and terror impressed on her brow, demanding, with all the tragic impetuosity of grief and alarm, where was her husband! Vain were all our efforts to calm her; a desperate sort of courage seemed to give her energy to confront the horrible truth that awaited her; it was the courage of despair; I have seen nothing in tragedy on the stage so powerful, or so affecting, as her appearance, and it often presents itself to my memory. I knew nothing then of the catastrophe, but the vividness of her terror communicated itself to me, and I feared the worst, which fears, were alas! too soon fearfully realized."

Byron talked to-day of Leigh Hunt, regretted his ever having embarked in the "Liberal," and said that it had drawn a nest of hornets on him, but expressed a very good opinion of the talents and principle of Mr. Hunt, though, as he said, "our tastes are so opposite, that we are totally unsuited to each other. He admires the Lakers, I abhor them; in short, we are more formed to be friends at a distance, than near." I can perceive that he wishes Mr. Hunt and his family away. It appears to me that Byron is a person who, without reflection, would form engagements which, when condemned by his friends or advisers, he would gladly get out of without considering the means, or at least, without reflecting on the humiliation such a desertion must inflict on the persons he had associated with him. He gives me the idea of a man, who, feeling himself in such a dilemma, would become cold and ungracious to the parties with whom he so stood, before he had mental courage sufficient to abandon them. I may be wrong, but the whole of his manner of talking of Mr. Hunt gives me this impression, though he has not said what might be called an unkind word of him.

Much as Byron has braved public opinion it is evident he has a great deference for those who stand high in it, and that he is shy in attaching himself publicly to persons who have even, however undeservedly, fallen under its censure. His expressed contempt and defiance of the world, reminds me of the bravadoes of children, who, afraid of darkness, make a noise to give themselves courage to support what they dread. It is very evident that he is partial to aristocratic friends, he dwells with complacency on the advantages of rank and station, and has more than once boasted that people of family are always to be recognised by a certain air, and the smallness and delicacy of their hands.

New Books

THE PRIVATE CORRESPONDENCE OF A WOMAN OF FASHION

[This work is, to our thinking, what it professes to be, an actual correspondence, and from the pen of a lady who, as her motto states—"writes of countries and their societies as she finds them, and as they strike her imagination." There is much good sense in her letters, and less aristocratic affectation than might be expected. The subjects are of the most miscellaneous description. Her pen is what the small critics call eminently graphic: in short, the work is one of the pleasantest of the season. To be more explicit, it consists of letters written between June, 1814, and December, 1816; dated from South Lancing, (near Worthing), Rouen, Paris, and Brussels; and the writer's domicile, Hampton Court. The most interesting portion of the work is the gossip it contains on the state of things in the French capital, on the return of Napoleon, in 1815, and in Brussels, before and after the battle of Waterloo. Nevertheless, as the whole is indiscribably discursive, so must be our quotations.]

Arundel Castle.—Arundel Castle did not gratify my expectations although the coup d'oeil, taking the structure en masse, is imposing, and it has an advantageous position on the banks of the river Arun. The Castle has undergone modern alterations in bad taste; the details are of that description of the ornamental gothic, which appear to me to throw severe criticism on the abilities of the architect; and, as a family residence, its interior is neither grand nor comfortable. From its commanding site and vicinity to the Roman villa, it was probably a Roman station previous to its becoming a Saxon residence. The walls and Norman gateway are fine. The massive keep, ponderous in stability, has the characteristic marks of the twelfth century, and is a noble ruin. It is called King Alfred's Keep; and with what hallowed feelings of reverence must a locale ever be approached which bears the name of that illustrious monarch! The present occupants are an assemblage of German owls, of varied species; they look analagous with the venerable ruin.

The castle contains a few curious portraits of the illustrious race of Howard, which have an interest also from the distinguished parts that family have played in English history. There is one of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, so famous for his talents in state affairs, and for his bravery in the field. He is represented standing under a noble gateway. The picture is moreover valuable as a work of art.6

Some richly-wrought chalices7 and censers, and other symbolic emblems of the Roman Catholic religion are there, but I imagine little prized by the present noble possessor; for at the age of twenty-seven, he became a convert to the Protestant faith. Whether conviction, or ambition to serve his country as a legislator were his motives, it is not for man to judge: but he is unlike his ancestor, Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, who, braving the power of Queen Elizabeth, disregarded her favour, and almost merited the title of martyr from the persecutions she heaped upon him for having abjured the Protestant worship, although educated in it by his father, the attainted Duke of Norfolk, in despite of Mary and her Spanish consort, who was likewise his sponsor.

The late Queen Caroline.—A servant entered in haste to induce me to go down to the sea-shore, and witness the embarkation of the P–ss of W–s. I immediately sallied forth, and found her r–l h–ss seated on the shingles, the adopted boy at her feet; and on her left sat, with the skirts of his coat spread under his r–l mistress, to protect her from the stones, our old ally Sir W–m G–l. The frigate had arrived off Worthing some days previous, commanded by the handsome Captain K–g; but her r–l h–ss was deterred from embarking there by a numerous assemblage of John Bulls, their wives, and babes, who were so rude and impetuous, as to terrify and induce her to take refuge on a less populous shore. The lively and merry Lady C– L–y, and the less pleasing Lady E– F—s, with two foreign women, Major S—r, and the odious S–o, composed her suite. Her r–l h–ss was habited in light green cloth, embroidered in silver, a Prussian cap of green satin, with a splendid plume of green feathers: the crown of the cap was conical, giving her an air something resembling Mother Shipton. Terror and dismay were depicted on her countenance, with all the varieties of unhappy feelings—not a smile played over her features—her voice was tremulous, and her brow contracted into one deep furrow—she was highly rouged, and her eyebrows pencilled with a broad line of black chalk—never was any person's appearance less formed to inspire interest!

Sir W–m forgot his usual indifferent manner on seeing me, and put on one of his comic expressions. In the impulse of the moment, I was on the point of addressing him, but fortunately recovered my presence d'esprit, and did not commit such a breach of etiquette, although there was such a total deficiency of r–l dignity in the group that I might almost have been excused. In half an hour the cutter put off from the frigate: Captain K—g came from W– by land, and apologized for the delay. Her r–l h–ss replied in a tremulous voice "Never mind!" A small group of persons kept a respectful distance and a profound silence. One old man blessed her and wished her a safe return—when her footman burst into tears. The ocean raged tempestuous, as if in the spirit of anger, and the boat could not reach the shore. Her r–l h–ss was obliged to enter a pony cart, and her coachman drove it with difficulty through the billows. With some exertion Captain K—g and his lieutenant dragged her unwieldy form into the barge: the P–ss went first, Lady E. F–s followed, and then the tin box: our knight went last; he came up to me, squeezed my hand affectionately, whispered a saucy adieu, and jumped into the boat. Such was the embarkation of the P–ss of W–s, and so passed away the illustrious consort of the heir apparent of these realms.

[We shall return to these amusing vols.]

EGYPTIAN PYRAMIDS AND HINDOO TEMPLES COMPARED

The most common form of the Hindoo pagodas8 is the pyramidal, of which one of the most remarkable is that of Chalembaram, on the Coromandel coast, about thirty-four geographical miles south of Pondicherry, and seven from the sea.

The whole temple, with its attached buildings covers an area of 1,332 feet by 936, (according to others 1,230 feet by 960,) and is surrounded with a brick wall9 30 feet high and 7 thick, round which there is another wall furnished with bastions. The four entrances are under as many pyramids, which, up to the top of the portal, 30 feet in height, are formed of free-stone, ornamented with sculptured figures. Above the portal, the pyramid is built of tiles or bricks, to the height of 150 feet, with a coat of cement upon it, which is covered with plates of copper, and ornaments of baked clay. On passing through the chief portico of the western propylaea, we see on the left an enormous hall with more than 1,000 pillars, which are above 36 feet high, and covered over with slabs of stone; this hall might have served as a gallery for the priests to walk about in, just like the hypostyle halls of the Egyptian temples. In the midst of these columns, and surrounded by them, is a temple called that of eternity. On the right or south side, we see the chief temple, with halls of several hundred pillars at the east and west end, also supporting a flat roof of stone. The pagoda itself rests on a basis 360 feet long and 260 broad, and rises to a surprising height. It is formed of blocks of stone 40 feet long, 4 feet wide, and 5 thick, which must have been brought, about 20010 miles, as there are no stone quarries in the neighbourhood. The temple has a peristyle round it; and thirty-six of the pillars, which are placed in six rows, and form the portico, support a roof of smooth blocks. The columns are 30 feet high, and resemble the old Ionic pillar. The whole pyramid surpasses in size St. Paul's church in London, the latter being only 47411 feet long and 207 wide. The roof of the pyramid has a copper casing covered with reliefs referring to mythical subjects; the gilding which was once on it is still visible. In the middle of the courtyard there is a great tank, surrounded with a gallery of pillars and also an enclosure round it of marble, well polished and ornamented with sculptures and arabesques. In the eastern part there is still another court surrounded with a wall, on the inside of which is a colonnade covered with large slabs of stone. Here also there is a pagoda, which is but little inferior in size to the larger one; but it contains only large dark chambers covered with sculptures, which have reference to the worship of certain deities, particularly Vishnu. The interior ornaments are in harmony with the whole; from the nave of one of the pyramids there hang, on the tops of four buttresses, festoons of chains, in length altogether 548 feet, made of stone. Each garland, consisting of twenty links, is made of one piece of stone 60 feet long; the links themselves are monstrous rings 32 inches in circumference, and polished as smooth as glass. One chain is broken, and hangs down from the pillar. In the neighbourhood of the pagodas there are usually tanks and basins lined with cement, or buildings attached for the purpose of lodging pilgrims who come from a distance. It is, however, often the case that the adjoining buildings, as well as the external ornaments in general, are in bad taste, and the work of a later age than the pagoda itself.

The pyramidical entrances of the Indian pagodas are analogous to the Egyptian propyla, while the large pillared rooms which support a flat roof of stone, are found frequently in the temples of both countries. Among the numerous divisions of the excavations of Ellora, there is an upper story of the Dasavatara, or the temple of Vishnu's incarnations, the roof of which is supported by sixty-four square based pillars, eight in each row. This chamber is about 100 feet wide, and somewhat deeper, and as to general design may be compared with the excavated chambers of Egypt, which are supported by square columns. The massy materials, the dark chambers, and the walls covered with highly wrought sculptures; and the tanks near the temples, with their enclosure of stone, and the steps for the pilgrims, are also equally characteristic of a pagoda and an Egyptian temple. To this we may add the high thick wall, of a rectangular form, carried all round the sacred spot: it is, however, principally the massy structure of these surrounding walls which forms the point of comparison, as Greek temples also had a wall enclosing the sacred ground, and the temples and churches of all countries are as a general rule separated from unhallowed ground, if not by strong walls at least by some mark which determines the extent of the sacred precincts. Yet there is a further resemblance worth noticing between some of these Hindoo pagodas and the great temple of Phtha at Memphis. The Egyptian temple had four chief entrances, or propyla, turned to the four cardinal points of the compass; which is also the case with the pagoda of Chalembaram, with another at Siringam, and probably others also. The pagoda of Chalembaram, according to Indian tradition, is one of the oldest in their country, and this opinion is confirmed by the appearance of the principal temple contained within the walls; but other parts, such as the pyramidal entrances, the highly finished sculptures, and the chain festoons, must be the work of a later date. It seems probable then that this enormous religious edifice was the growth of many ages, each adding something to enlarge and perfect the work of former days.—Lib. Ent. Knowledge.

I look upon indolence as a sort of suicide; for the man is efficiently destroyed, though the appetite of the brute may survive.—Lord Chesterfield.