The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 13, No. 366, April 18, 1829

The awful flourish of drum and trumpet was sounded;—their majesties of Denmark, attended by their train of courtiers, walked on. There is a pause! All eyes are bent in eager gaze to catch the first glimpse of the new Hamlet—all hands are ready to applaud. He appears—boxes, pit, and gallery, join in the generous welcome of the unknown candidate. He revives—hastens to the foot-lights—bows—another round of applause—bows again—and again—and then falls back, to let the business of the scene proceed. He looks round, meanwhile, with the swelling consciousness that he is that moment "the observed of all observers," and tries to rally his agitated spirits; but just as he is beginning to do so, his wandering eye rests upon the ill-omened face of M'Crab, seated in the front-row of the stage-box, who is gazing at him with a grotesque smile, which awakens an overwhelming recollection of his own prediction, that he "would be horribly laughed at, if he did make Hamlet a fat little fellow," as well as a bewildering reminiscence of the manager's, that, "by –, the audience would not stand it."

It was soon evident they would not, or rather that they could not stand it. But it was not alone his new reading in what regarded the person of Hamlet, that excited astonishment. Mr. Stubbs had so many other new readings, that before he got to the end of his first speech, beginning with, "Seems, madam! nay, it is," they were satisfied of what was to follow. When, however, Mr. Stubbs stood alone upon the stage, in the full perfection of his figure, and concentrated upon himself the undivided attention of the house—when he gathered up his face into an indescribable aspect of woe—but, above all, when, placing his two hands upon his little round belly, he exclaimed, while looking sorrowfully at it,

"Oh, that this too, too solid flesh would melt,(Pat, went the right hand,)Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew,"(Pat, went the left hand,)

the effect was irresistible. One roar of laughter shook the theatre, from the back row of the shilling gallery to the first row of the pit, mingled with cries of bravo! bravo! go on, my little fellow—you shall have fair play—silence—bravo! silence!—Stubbs, meanwhile, looked as if he were really wondering what they were all laughing at; and when at length silence was partially restored, he continued his soliloquy. His delivery of the lines,

"Fye on't oh fye! 'tis an unweeded gardenThat grown to seed: things rank and gross in nature," &c.

was one of his new readings—for holding up his finger, and looking towards the audience with a severe expression of countenance, it appeared as though he were chiding their ill manners in laughing at him, when he said, "Fye on't—oh, fye!"

He was allowed to proceed, however, with such interruptions only as his own original conceptions of the part provoked from time to time; or when any thing he had to say was obviously susceptible of an application to himself. Thus, for example, in the scene with Horatio and Marcellus, after his interview with the ghost:—

"Ham. And now, good friends,As you are friends, scholars, and soldiers,Give me one poor request.Hor. What is it, my lord? We will.Ham. Never make known what you have seen to-night."

"Let him, if he likes," exclaimed a voice from the pit—"he'll never see such a sight again."—Then, in his instructions to the players, his delivery of them was accompanied by something like the following running commentary:

"Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, (that is impossible!) trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it, as many of our players do, (laughter,) I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. * * * Oh, it offends me to the soul, to hear a robustious, periwig-pated fellow (like yourself) tear a passion to tatters, &c.—I would have such a fellow whipped (give it him, he deserves it) for o'erdoing Termagant. * * * Oh, there be players that I have seen play, (no, we see him,) and heard others praise, and that highly, (oh! oh! oh!) not to speak it profanely, that, having neither the accent of Christians, (ha! ha! ha!) nor the gait of Christian, Pagan, nor man, have so strutted (bravo! little 'un!) and bellowed, (hit him again!) that I have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men, (who made you?) and not made them well, (no, you are a bad fit,) they imitated humanity so abominably." (Roars of laughter.)

It was thus Mr. Henry Augustus Constantine Stubbs enacted Hamlet; and it was not till the end of the fourth act that he suffered a single observation to escape him, which indicated he thought any thing was amiss. Then, indeed, while sitting in the green-room, and as if the idea had just struck him, he said to Mr. Peaess, "Do you know, I begin to think I have some enemies in the house, for when, in the scene with Ophelia, I said, 'What should such fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven?' somebody called out, loud enough for me to hear him, 'Ay! what, indeed?' It's very odd. Did you notice it, ma'am?" he continued addressing the lady who performed Ophelia. "I can't say I did," replied the lady, biting her lips most unmercifully, to preserve her gravity of countenance.

This was the only remark made by the inimitable Mr. Stubbs during the whole evening, and he went through the fifth act with unabated self-confidence. His dying scene was honoured with thunders of applause, and loud cries of encore. Stubbs raised his head, and looking at Horatio, who was bending over him, inquired, "Do you think they mean it?"

"Lie still, for God's sake!" exclaimed Horatio, and the curtain slowly descended amid deafening roars of laughter, and shouts of hurrah! hurrah!

The next morning, at breakfast, Stubbs found all the daily papers on his table, pursuant to his directions. He took up one, and read, in large letters—"THEATRE. FIRST AND LAST APPEARANCE OF MR. HENRY AUGUSTUS CONSTANTINE STUBBS IN HAMLET."

He read no more. The paper dropped from his hands; and Mr. Stubbs remained nothing but a GENTLEMAN all the rest of his life—Blackwood's Mag.

LINES WRITTEN AT WARWICK CASTLE. 6

BY CHARLES BADHAM, M.D. F.R.SProfessor of Medicine in the University of GlasgowI.I leave thee, Warwick, and thy precincts grey,Amidst a thousand winters still the same,Ere tempests rend thy last sad leaves away,And from thy bowers the native rock reclaim;Crisp dews now glitter on the joyless field,The gun's red disk now sheds no parting rays,And through thy trophied hall the burnished shieldDisperses wide the swiftly mounting blaze.II.Thy pious paladins from Jordan's shore,And all thy steel-clad barons are at rest;Thy turrets sound to warder's tread no more;Beneath their brow the dove hath hung her nest;High on thy beams the harmless falchion shines;No stormy trumpet wakes thy deep repose;Past are the days that, on the serried linesAround thy walls, saw the portcullis close.III.The bitter feud was quell'd, the culverinNo longer flash'd, us blighting mischief round,But many an age was on those ivies green,Ere Taste's calm eye had scann'd the gifted ground;Bade the fair path o'er glade or woodland stray,Bade Avon's swans through new Rialtos glide,Forced through the rock its deeply channell'd way,And threw, to Arts of peace, the portals wide.IV.But most to Her, whose light and daring handCan swiftly follow Fancy's wildest dream!All times and nations in whose presence stand,All that creation owns, her boundless theme!And with her came the maid of Attic stole,Untaught of dazzling schools the gauds to prize,Who breathes in purest forms her calm control,Heroic strength, and grace that never dies!V.Ye that have linger'd o'er each form divine,Beneath the vault of Rome's unsullied sky,Or where Bologna's cloister'd walls enshrineHer martyr Saint—her mystic Rosary—Of Arragon the hapless daughter view!Scan, for ye may, that fine enamel near!Such Catherine was, thus Leonardo drew—Discern ye not the "Jove of painters" here?VI.Discern ye not the mighty master's powerIn yon devoted Saint's uplifted eye?That clouds the brow and bids already lourO'er the First Charles the shades of sorrows nigh?That now on furrow'd front of Rembrandt gleams,Now breathes the rose of life and beauty there,In the soft eye of Henrietta dreams,And fills with fire the glance of Gondomar?VII.Here to Salvator's solemn pencil true,Huge oaks swing rudely in the mountain blast;Here grave Poussin on gloomy canvass threwThe lights that steal from clouds of tempest past;And see! from Canaletti's glassy wave,Like Eastern mosques, patrician Venice rise;Or marble moles that rippling waters lave,Where Claude's warm sunsets tinge Italian skies!VIII.Nor let the critic frown such themes arraign,Here sleep the mellow lyre's enchanting keys;Here the wrought table's darkly polish'd plain,Proffers light lore to much-enduring ease;Enamelled clocks here strike the silver bell;Here Persia spreads the web of many dies;Around, on silken couch, soft cushions swell,That Stambol's viziers proud might not despise.IX.The golden lamp here sheds its pearly light,Within the cedar'd panels, dusky pale;No mirror'd walls the wandering glance invite,No gauzy curtains drop the misty veil.And there the vista leads of lessening doors,And there the summer sunset's golden gleamAlong the line of darkling portrait pours,And warms the polish'd oak or ponderous beam.X.Hark! from the depths beneath that proud saloonThe water's moan comes fitful and subdued,Where in mild glory yon triumphant moonSmiles on the arch that nobly spans the flood—And here have kings and hoary statesmen gazed,When spring with garlands deck'd the vale below,Or when the waning year had lightly razedThe banks where Avon's lingering fountains flow.XI.And did no minstrel greet the courtly throng?Did no fair flower of English lovelinessOn timid lute sustain some artless song,Her meek brow bound with smooth unbraided tress?For Music knew not yet the stately guise,Content with simplest notes to touch the soul,Not from her choirs as when loud anthems rise,Or when she bids orchestral thunders roll!XII.Here too the deep and fervent orisonHath matron whisper'd for her absent lord,Peril'd in civil wars, that shook the throne,When every hand in England, clench'd the sword:—And here, as tales and chronicles agree,If tales and chronicles be deem'd sincere,Fair Warwick's heiress smiled at many a pleaOf puissant Thane, or Norman cavalier.XIII.Or dost thou sigh for theme of classic loreMidst arms and moats, and battlements and towers?Behold the Vase! that, erst on Anio's shore,Hath found a splendid home in Warwick's bowers:To British meads ere yet the Saxon came,The pomp of senates swept its pedestal,And kings of many an Oriental nameHave seen its shadow, and are perish'd all!XIV.Haply it stood on that illustrious groundWhere circling columns once, in sculptur'd pride,With fine volute or wreath'd acanthus crown'd,Rear'd some light roof by Anio's plunging tide;There, in the brightness of the votive faneTo rural or to vintage gods addrest,Those vine clad symbols of Pan's peaceful reignAmidst dark pines their sacred seats possess'd.XV.Or, did it break with soft and silvery showerThe silence of some marble solitude,Where Adrian, at the fire fly's glittering hour,Of rumour'd worlds to come the doubts review'd?Go mark his tomb!—in that sepulchral moleScowls the fell bandit:—from its towering heightOld Tiber's flood reflects the girandole,Midst bells, and shouts, and rockets' arrowy flight!XVI.Warwick, farewell! Long may thy fortunes stand,And sires of sires hold rule within thy walls,Thy streaming banners to the breeze expand,And the heart's griefs pass lightly o'er thy halls!May happier bards, on Avon's sedgy shore,Sustain on nobler lyre thy poet's vow,And all thy future lords (what can they more?)Wear the green laurels of thy fame, as now!

NOTES

One of the towers of Warwick Castle is complimented with the name of Guy's Tower; certain ponderous armour and utensils preserved in the lodge are also attributed to Guy; nobody, in short, thinks of Guy without Warwick, or of Warwick without Guy; "Arms and the Man" ought to have been emblazoned on the castle banner; and why should I hesitate to say, that one of the most amiable of children perpetuates the heroic name within its walls? Had this renowned adventurer been ambitious of patriarchal honours, his descendants might have extended the ancestral renown, and have furnished many a ballad of those good old times; but when the Saxon Ulysses had returned from his pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and made an end of Colbrand and the Dun Cow, his fancy was to take alms in disguise from his own fair lady, at his own castle gate, and then retire (tous les goúts sont respectables) to a certain hole or cave called Guy's Cliff, where he amused himself (in the intervals of rheumatism) for the rest of his natural life in counting his beads and ruminating on his sins, which, as he was a great traveller and a hero, might have been considerable.

STANZA III

The following interesting passage is copied from a book of ordinary occurrence, in which it is cited without stating the authority. It is more than doubtful if any other nobleman in the kingdom, at that time or since, has projected or executed so much on his own property as the late Earl of Warwick:—

"I purchased a magnificent collection of pictures by Vandyke, Rubens, &c. The marbles are not equalled, perhaps, in the kingdom. I made a noble approach to the castle through a solid rock, built a porter's lodge, and founded a library full of books, some valuable and scarce, all well chosen. I made an armoury, and built walls round the court and pleasure gardens. I built a noble green-house, and filled it with beautiful plants. I placed in it a vase, considered the finest remain of Grecian art, for its size and beauty. I made a noble lake, from 3 to 600 feet broad, and a mile long. I planted trees, now worth 100,000l., besides 100 acres of ash. I built a stone bridge of 105 feet in span, every stone from 2,000 to 3,800 lbs in weight. The weight of the first tier on the centre was estimated at 1,000 tons. I gave the bridge to the town with no toll on it. I will not enumerate a great many other things done by me. Let Warwick Castle speak for itself."

STANZA X

There is a feeling of respect inspired by ancient buildings of importance. Such a castle as Warwick, which has lodged a succession of generations of the most opposite characters—at one time the "dulcis et quieti animi vir, et qui, cougruo suis moribus studio, vitam egit et clausit;" at another by the assassin of Piers de Gaveston, the king's favourite, "whose head he cut off upon Blacklow Hill, and gave the friars preachers the charge of his body, inasmuch as he had called the said earl the Black Dog of Arderne"—is not to be approached as one visits a handsome stone house of Palladian architecture!—such a house we know can never have been the scene either of council or conspiracy; within such walls there can never have been "latens odium inter regem et proceres, et præsecipuè inter comitem de Warwick et adhærentes ejusdem."

As to the river and its swans. I have learned from the bard to whom it has been long since consecrated, (although he may not have had the right of fishing in it when alive,) that "discretion is the better part of valour."

If I were to describe the walks, I should only say that they were contrived, as all walks ought to be, to let in the sun or to shut him out by turns. Here you rejoice in the fulness of his meridian strength, and here in the shadows of various depth and intensity, which a well disposed and happily contrasted sylvan population knows how to effect. The senatorial oak, the spreading sycamore, the beautiful plane, (which I never see without recollecting the channel of the Asopus and the woody sides of Oeta,) the aristocratic pine running up in solitary stateliness till it equal the castle turrets—all these, and many more, are admirably intermingled and contrasted, in plantations which establish, as every thing in and about the castle does, the consummate taste of the late earl, although it must be admitted he had the finest subjects to work upon, from the happy disposition of the ground. I shall never forget the first time I walked over them; a pheasant occasionally shifting his quarters at my intrusion, and making his noisy way through an ether so clear, so pure, so motionless, that the broad leaves subsided, rather than fell to the ground, without the least disturbance; the tall grey chimneys just breathing their smoke upon the blue element, which they scarcely stained; every green thing was beginning to wear the colour of decay, and many a tint of yellow, deepening into orange, made me sensible that "there be tongues in trees," if not "good in every thing." But Montaigne says nothing is useless, not even inutility itself.

STANZA XIII

This superb work of antiquity must indeed be seen, to be sufficiently estimated: the great failure of that branch of the fine arts which is employed to represent all the rest, is in the inadequate idea of size which it must necessarily give where the objects to be represented are large.

The marble vases now extant are, of course, comparatively few in number, and this is, perhaps, excepting the Medicean, the finest of them all. The best representations of it are those in Piranesi, three in number. One great, and conspicuous beauty of this vase consists in the elegantly formed handles, and in the artful insertion of the extreme branches of the vine-stems which compose them, into its margin, where they throw off a rich embroidery of leaves and fruit. A lion's skin, with the head and claws attached, form a sort of drapery, and the introduction of the thyrsus, the lituus, and three bacchanalian masks on each side, complete the embellishments. The capacity of this vase is 103 gallons, its diameter 9 feet, its pedestal of course modern. It was discovered in 1770, in the draining of a mephitic lake within the enclosure of the Villa Adriana, called Laga di Pantanello. Lord Warwick had reason to be proud of his vase, which had this peculiarity, that, whereas almost every other object of art in the kingdom has been catalogued and sold over and over again, this vase passed (after a sufficiently long parenthesis of time) immediately from the gardens of Adrian to his own!

Blackwood's Magazine.

Manners & Customs of all Nations

HEAVING

(For the Mirror.)

They have a ludicrous custom in Staffordshire, at Easter, which they call heaving. The males claim Easter Monday, and the females Tuesday, and on this day a group of the latter assemble, and every male they meet with they seize, and one of them salutes him with a kiss, after which they all lay hold of him and heave him up as high as they can, for this they require some donation, which, if refused, they will seize his hat, handkerchief, or any thing they can lay hold of. This lasts till twelve o'clock. Sometimes old women collect together, and then woe be to the person who does not present them with a trifle, and thus stop their proceedings; for if not, their snuffy beaks might come in contact with their prisoners' lips. They often collect 10 or 12s. and spend it in carousing at night.

W.H.

CONVICTS IN NEW SOUTH WALES

The regular hours of work are from sun-rise to sun-set; but so few settlers get up to see that this time is kept, that a much shorter period is generally employed in labour. The expense of maintaining a convict is rather a difficult calculation: where there are many men, they are, of course, supported at much less per man than where there are but few, from being able to buy slop clothes, tea, and the other necessaries, at wholesale prices, of the importing merchant. The waste, also, made by the convicts in their meat, &c. is a serious consideration: the head and entrails of animals slaughtered for their use, and which an English labourer would be glad of, are thrown away as only fit for the dogs; nothing but the body and legs are deemed sufficiently good for these dainty characters. Taking all expenses into consideration, I think that from 25l. to 30l. per man may be estimated as the annual cost—Widowson's Present State of Van Dieman's Land.

THROWING STONES AT THE DEVIL

On arriving at Wady Muna, each nation encamped upon the spot which custom has assigned to it, at every returning Hadj. After disposing of the baggage, the hadjys hastened to the ceremony of throwing stones at the devil. It is said that, when Abraham or Ibrahim returned from the pilgrimage to Arafat, and arrived at Wady Muna, the devil Eblys presented himself before him at the entrance of the valley, to obstruct his passage; when the angel Gabriel, who accompanied the patriarch, advised him to throw stones at him, which he did, and after pelting him seven times, Eblys retired. When Abraham reached the middle of the valley, he again appeared before him, and, for the last time, at its western extremity, and was both times repulsed by the same number of stones. According to Azraky, the Pagan Arabs, in commemoration of this tradition, used to cast stones in this valley as they returned from the pilgrimage; and setup seven idols at Muna, of which there was one in each of the three spots where the devil appeared, at each of which they cast three stones. Mohammed, who made this ceremony one of the chief duties of the hadjys, increased the number of stones to seven. At the entrance of the valley, towards Mezdelfe, stands a rude stone pillar, or rather altar, between six or seven feet high, in the midst of the street, against which the first seven stones are thrown, as the place where the devil made his first stand: towards the middle of the valley is a similar pillar, and at its western end a wall of stones, which is made to serve the same purpose. The hadjys crowded in rapid succession round the first pillar, called "Djamrat el Awla;" and every one threw seven small stones successively upon it; they then passed to the second and third spots (called "Djamrat el Owsat," and "Djamrat el Sofaly," or "el Akaba," or "el Aksa,") where the same ceremony was repeated. In throwing the stones, they are to exclaim, "In the name of God; God is great (we do this) to secure ourselves from the devil and his troops." The stones used for this purpose are to be of the size of a horse-bean, or thereabouts; and the pilgrims are advised to collect them in the plain of Mezdelfe, but they may likewise take them from Muna; and many people, contrary to the law, collect those that have already been thrown.—Burckhardt's Travels.

THE GATHERER

A snapper up of unconsidered trifles.SHAKSPEARE.

THE COACHMAN

The moment he has got his seat and made his start, you are struck at once with the perfect mastership of his art. The hand just over his left thigh, the arm without constraint, steady, and with a holding command that keeps his horses like clock-work; yet to a superficial observer quite with loose reins; so firm and compact he is, that you seldom observe any shifting, only to take a shorter purchase for a run down hill; his right hand and whip are beautifully in unison; the crop, if not in a direct line with the box, over the near wheel, raised gracefully up as it were to reward the near side horse; the thong—the thong after three twists, which appears in his hand to have been placed by the maker never to be altered or improved ...... and if the off-side horse becomes slack, to see the turn of his arm to reduce a twist, or to reverse, if necessary, is exquisite: after being placed under the rib, or upon the shoulder point, up comes the arm, and with it the thong returns to the elegant position upon the crop! I say elegant! the stick, highly polished yew—rather light—not too taper—yet elastic; a thong in clean order, pliable. All done without effort—merely a turn of the wrist!

At twelve o'clock at noon, on the day before Easter, the resurrection service begins at the Quirinal Chapel at Rome; when a curtain is drawn back, which conceals a picture of our Lord: bells ring, drums are beaten, guns are fired, and joy succeeds to mourning.

ACROSTIC ON "THE MIRROR."

MIRROR! methinks your name indeed is trueIn every other point, except that you,Resplendent with the wisdom of mankind,Reflect not to the sight, but to the mind.Oh! may success then to your pains accrue,Rewarding all your merit with its due.

D.