Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 340, February, 1844

"Betty, put on a little red, One surely need not look a fright when dead."

We choose to be satirical, and call it vanity; but put both anecdotes into tolerably good grave Latin, and name them Portia and Lucretia, and we should have as fine a sentiment as the boasted one of the hero endeavouring to fall decently. There may be but little difference, and that only just what we, in our humours, choose to make it. I am sure you, Eusebius, will stand up for the old village crone, and the fine lady, too. But the fraternity of the brush, if they do now and then promote vanity, much more commonly gratify affection. Private portraits seem to me to be things so sacred, that they ought not to survive the immediate family or friends for whose gratification they are painted. I much like the idea of burying them at last. I will show you how estimable these things sometimes are. You remember a portrait I have—a gentleman in a dress of blue and gold—in crayon. Did I ever tell you the anecdote respecting him? If not, you shall have it, as I had from my father. If you recollect the picture, you must recollect that it is of a very handsome man. His horses took fright, the carriage was overturned, and he was killed upon the spot. The property came to my father. One day an unknown lady, in a handsome equipage, stopped at his door, and, in an interview with him, requested a portrait of this very person, not the one you have seen, but another in oil-colour, and of that the head only. My father cut it out, and gave it to her. Many, many years afterwards it was returned to him by an unknown hand, with an account of the accident that caused the death, pasted on the back; and it is now in my possession. The lady was never known. No, Eusebius, we must not deny portrait-painters, nor portrait painting. It is the line in which we excel—and that we have above all others patronized, and had great men too arise from our encouragement—Who are so rich in Vandyks as we are? And some we have had better than the world allowed them to be—Sir Peter Lely was occasionally an admirable painter—though Sir Joshua did say, "We must go beyond him now." There was Sir Joshua himself, and Gainsborough—would that either were alive to take you, Eusebius, though I were to pay for the sitting. I think too, that I should have given the preference to Gainsborough—it would have been so true. Did you ever see his portrait of Foote?—so unaffected—it must be like. I won't be invidious by naming any, where we have so many able portrait-painters—but if you have not fixed upon your man, come to me, and I will tell half-a-dozen, and we will go to them, and you shall judge for yourself—and if you like miniature, there are those who will make what is small great. What wonderful power Cooper had in this way. I recently had in my hands a wondrous and marvellous portrait of Andrew Marvell by him. The sturdy honest Andrew. This man Cooper, had such wonderful largeness of style, of execution too, even in his highest finished small oil pictures—such as in this of Andrew Marvell. We had an age, certainly, of very bad taste, and it was not extinct in the days of Sir Joshua and Gainsborough; nay, sometimes under both of these, I am sorry to say, it was even made worse. The age of shepherds and shepherdesses—in the case of Gainsborough, brought down to downright rustics. This, of making the sitters affect to be what they were not, was bad enough—and it was any thing but poetical. But it was infinitely worse in the itinerants of the day—and is very well ridiculed by Goldsmith, who lived much among painters, in his Vicar of Wakefield and family sitting for the family picture. We have happily quite got out of that folly. But we are getting into one of most unpoetical pageantry—portrait likenesses. We have not seen yet a good portrait of Wellington, and the Queen, or the Prince; and if they must send their portraits to foreign courts, let them be advised to learn, if they know not yet how, and we are told they do, to paint them themselves. Montaigne tells us, that he was present one day at Bar-le-duc, when King Francis the Second, for a memorial of Réné, King of Sicily, was presented with a picture the king had drawn of himself. Some how or other, kings and queens are apt to have too many trappings about them; and the man is often chosen to paint, who paints velvets and satins best, and faces the worst. That is the reason we have them so ill done; and even if the faces are well painted, they are overpowered by the ostentation of the dress. Now, the Venetian portrait-painters contrived to keep down the glare of all this ornament, to make it even more rich, but not obtruding. I remember seeing a portrait of our queen, where, in a large bonnet, her face looked like a small pip in the midst of an orange. It would be a good thing, too, if you could contrive to spend a week or so in company with your painter before you sit, that he may know you. Many a characteristic may he lose, for want of knowing that it is a characteristic; and may give you that in expression which does not belong to you, while he may miss "your sweet expression about your eyes." He may purse up your large and generous mouth, because you may screw it for a moment to keep some ill-timed conceit from bolting out, and, besides missing that noble feature, may give you an expression of a caution that is not yours. A painter the other day, as I am assured, in a country town, made a great mistake in a characteristic, and it was discovered by a country farmer. It was the portrait of a lawyer—an attorney, who, from humble pretensions, had made a good deal of money, and enlarged thereby his pretensions, but somehow or other not very much enlarged his respectability. To his pretensions was added that of having his portrait put up in the parlour, as large as life. There it is, very flashy and very true—one hand in his breast, the other in his small-clothes' pocket. It is market-day—the country clients are called in—opinions are passed—the family present, and all complimentary—such as, "Never saw such a likeness in the course of all my born days. As like 'un as he can stare." "Well, sure enough, there he is." But at last—there is one dissentient! "'Tain't like—not very—no, 'tain't," said a heavy middle-aged farmer, with rather a dry look, too, about his mouth, and a moist one at the corner of his eye, and who knew the attorney well. All were upon him. "Not like!—How not like? Say where is it not like?" "Why, don't you see," said the man, "he's got his hand in his breeches' pocket. It would be as like again if he had his hand in any other body's pocket." The family portrait was removed, especially as, after this, many came on purpose to see it; and so the attorney was lowered a peg, and the farmer obtained the reputation of a connoisseur.

But it is high time, Eusebius, that I should dismiss you and portrait-painting, or you will think your thus sitting to me worse than sitting for your picture; which picture, if it be of my Eusebius as I know him and love him, will ever be a living speaking likeness, but if it be one but of outward feature and resemblance, it will soon pass off to make up the accumulation of dead lumber—while do you, Eusebius, as you are, vive valeque.

MY FRIEND

Wouldst thou be friend of mine?— Thou must be quick and bold When the right is to be done, And the truth is to be told; Wearing no friend-like smile When thine heart is hot within, Making no truce with fraud or guile, No compromise with sin. Open of eye and speech, Open of heart and hand, Holding thine own but as in trust For thy great brother-band. Patient and stout to bear, Yet bearing not for ever; Gentle to rule, and slow to bind, Like lightning to deliver! True to thy fatherland, True to thine own true love; True to thine altar and thy creed, And thy good God above. But with no bigot scorn For faith sincere as thine, Though less of form attend the prayer, Or more of pomp the shrine; Remembering Him who spake The word that cannot lie, "Where two or three in my name meet There in the midst am I!" I bar thee not from faults— God wot, it were in vain! Inalienable heritage Since that primeval slain! The wisest have been fools— The surest stumbled sore: Strive thou to stand—or fall'n arise, I ask thee not for more! This do, and thou shalt knit Closely my heart to thine; Next the dear love of God above, Such Friend on earth, be mine! O.O.

LONDON, January 1844.

THE LAND OF SLAVES

"Le printemps—le printemps!"—Berenger. 'Twas a sunny holiday, Scene, Killarney—time, last May; In the fields the rustic throng, Every linnet in full song, Not a cloud to threaten rain, As I walk'd with lovely Jane. While we wander'd round the bay, Came the gayest of the gay, Pouring from a painted barge, Anchor'd by the flowery marge; Sporting round its cliffs and caves:— Ireland is the land of slaves! Next we met an infant group, Never was a happier troop; Dancing o'er the primrose plain. "Joyous infancy!" said Jane; "Free from care as winds and waves." —"No, my darling, these are slaves!" On we walk'd—a garden shade Show'd us matron, man, and maid, Laughing, talking, all coquetting, "Here," said Jane, "I see no fretting: Mammon makes but fools or knaves." —"No, my darling, these are slaves!" On we walk'd—we saw a dome, Fill'd with furious dupes of Rome, Ranting of the sword and chain. "Let us run away," said Jane: "How that horrid rebel raves!" —"No, my darling, these are slaves!" As we ran, a monster-crowd Stopp'd us, uttering vengeance loud; Giving nobles to the halter, Cursing England's throne and altar, Brandishing their pikes and staves. "Love," said Jane, "are all these slaves?"

[Greek: Aion]

THE PRIEST'S BURIAL

He is dead!—he died of a broken heart, Of a frighten'd soul, and a frenzied brain: He died—of playing a desperate part For folly; which others play'd for gain. Yet o'er his turf the rebels rave! Be silent, wretches!—spare the grave! He is dead!—bewilder'd, betray'd, beguiled; Swept on by faction's fiery blast. In its blood-stain'd track, a fool, a child! His doom is fix'd—his lot is cast. Yet scowls by his bier earth's blackest knave. Be silent, wretches!—spare the grave! They dress'd the cold clay in mimic state, And the peasants came crowding round; And many a vow of revenge and hate In that hour on their souls was bound— Oh! ruthless creed, that never forgave! Be silent, wretches!—spare the grave! They bore him along by the village road, And they yell'd at the village spire! And they laid him at rest in his long abode, In a storm of revenge and ire; And round him their furious banners wave. Be silent, wretches!—spare the grave! Then o'er him the bigot chant was sung, And was said the bigot prayer, And wild hearts with many a thought were stung, That left its venom there, To madden in many a midnight cave. Be silent, wretches!—spare the grave! All is done; he is buried—the crowd depart, He is laid in his kindred clay, There, freed from the torture that ate his heart, He rests, till the last great day. O THOU! who alone canst defend and save, Wake Ireland wise from this lowly grave.

[Greek: Aion.]

PRUDENCE

"Bide your time."—Rebel Song. Bide your time—bide your time! Patience is the true sublime. Heroes, bottle up your tears; Wait for ten, or ten score, years. Shrink from blows, but rage in rhyme: Bide your time—bide your time! Bide your time—bide your time! Snakes are safest in their slime. Sages look before they leap; Heroes, to your hovels creep. Christmas loves pantomime: Bide your time—bide your time! Bide your time—bide your time! "Shoulder arms"—but never prime. Keep your skins from Saxon lead; Plunder paupers for your bread. Popish begging is no crime: Bide your time—bide your time!

[Greek: Aion.]

FREE TRADE AND PROTECTION

Whoever has travelled in the highlands of Scotland, or the mountains of Wales, must have observed the remarkable difference which exists between artificial plantations, and the natural woods of the country. Planted all at once, the former grow up of uniform height, and all their trees present nearly the same form and symmetry. Sown at different periods, with centuries between their growth, the latter exhibit every variety of age and form, from the decaying patriarchs of the forest, which have survived the blasts of some hundred years, to the infant sapling, which is only beginning to shoot under the shelter of a projecting rock or stem. Nor is the difference less remarkable in the room which is severally afforded for growth, in the artificial plantations and in the wilds of nature. The larches or firs, in the stiff and angular enclosure, are always crowded together; and if not thinned by the care of the woodsman, will inevitably choke each other, or shoot up thin and unhealthy, in consequence of their close proximity to each other, and the dense mass of foliage which overshadows the upper part of the wood. But no such danger need be apprehended In the natural forest. No woodman is called to thin its denizens. No forester's eye is required to tell which should be left, and which cut away, in the vast array. In the ceaseless warfare of the weaker with the stronger, the feeble plants are entirely destroyed. In vain the infant sapling attempts to contend with the old oak, the branches of which overshadow its growth—it is speedily crushed in the struggle. Nor are the means of removing the useless remains less effectual. The hand of nature insensibly clears the waste of its incumbrances; the weakness of time brings them to the ground when their allotted period is expired; and youth, as in the generations of men, springs beside the decay of age, and finds ample room for its expansion over the fallen remains of its paternal stems.

The difference between the artificial plantation and the natural wood, illustrates the distinction between the imaginary communities which the political economist expects to see grow up, in conformity with his theories, and acting in obedience to his dictates, and the nations of flesh and blood which exist around us, of which we form a part, and which are immediately affected by ill-judged or inapplicable measures of commercial regulation. Nations were planted by the hand of nature; they were not sown, nor their place allotted by human foresight. They exist often close to each other, and under apparently the same physical circumstances, under every possible variety of character, age, and period of growth. The difference even between those ruled by the same government, and inhabited apparently by the same race, is prodigious. Who could suppose that the Dutchman, methodical, calculating, persevering, was next neighbour to the fiery, war-like, and impetuous Frenchman? Or that the southern and western Irish, vehement, impassioned, and volatile, came from the same stock which pervades the whole west of Britain? England, for centuries the abode of industry, effort, and opulence, is subject to the same government, and situated in the same latitude as Ireland, where indolence is almost universal, wealth rare, and manufactures in general unknown. Russia, ignorant, united, and ever victorious, adjoins Poland, weak, distracted, and ever vanquished; and Prussia has risen with unheard-of rapidity in national strength, and every branch of industry, at the very time when Spain was fast relapsing into slavery and barbarism.

Familiar as these truths are to all they seem to have been, in an unaccountable manner, forgotten by our modern political economists; and the oblivion of them is the principal cause of the remarkable failure which has attended the application to practice of all their theories. They invariably forget the different age of nations; they overlook the essential difference between communities with different national character, or in different stages of manufacturing or commercial advancement, and fall into the fatal error of supposing that one general system is to be readily embraced by, and found applicable to, a cluster of nations existing under every possible variety of physical, social, and political circumstances. Fixing their eyes upon their own country, or rather upon the peculiar interest to which they belong in their own country, they reason as if all mankind were placed in the same circumstances, and would be benefited by the arrangements which they find advantageous. They forget that all nations were not planted at the same time, nor in the same soil; that the difference in their age, the inequality in their growth, the variety in their texture, is as great as in the trees of the forest, the seeds of which have been scattered by the hand of nature; that the incessant warfare of the weaker with the stronger, exists not less in the social than the physical world; and that all systems founded on the oblivion of that continued contest, must ever be traversed by the strongest of all moral laws—the instinct of SELF-PRESERVATION.

We have said that the modern theories when applied to practice, have, in a remarkable manner, failed. In saying so, we have chiefly in view the acknowledged failure of the strenuous efforts made by England, during the last twenty years, to effect an interchange in the advantages of free trade, and the entire disappointment which has attended the long establishment, on a great scale, of the reciprocity system. To the first we shall advert in the present paper; the second will furnish ample room for reflection in another.

The abstract principles on which the doctrines of free trade are founded, are these; and we put it to the warmest advocates of those principles, whether they are not fairly stated. All nations were not intended by nature, nor are they fitted by their physical circumstances, to excel in the same branches of industry; and it is the variety in the production which they severally can bring to maturity, which at once imposes the necessity for, and occasions the profit of, commercial intercourse. Nothing, therefore, can be so unwise as to attempt, either by arbitrary regulations, to create a branch of industry in a country for which it is not intended by nature, or to retain it in that branch where it is created by forced prohibitions. Banish all restrictions, therefore, from commerce; let every nation apply itself to that particular branch of industry for which it is adapted by nature, and receive in exchange the produce of other countries, raised, in like manner, in conformity with their natural capabilities. Then will the industry of each people be turned into the channel most advantageous and lucrative to itself; each will enjoy the immense advantage of purchasing the commodities it requires at the cheapest possible rate; hopeless or absurd hot-bed attempts to force extraneous industry will cease; and, in the mutual interchange of the surplus produce of each, the foundation will be laid of an advantageous and durable commercial intercourse. England, on this principle, should not attempt to raise wine, nor France iron or cotton goods; but the calicoes and hardware of Great Britain should be exchanged for the wines and fruits of France: both nations will thus be enriched, and a vast commercial traffic grow up, which, being founded on mutual interest and attended with mutual advantage, may be expected to be durable, and to extinguish, in the end, the rivalry of their respective people, or the jealousy of their several governments.

Such is the theory of free trade; and it may be admitted it wears at first sight a seducing and agreeable aspect. Let us now enquire how far experience, the great test of truth, has verified its doctrines, or demonstrated its practicability. To illustrate this matter, we shall have recourse to no mean or doubtful authority; we shall have recourse to the statement of an enlightened but candid contemporary, whose advocating of a moderate system of free trade has excited no small anxiety in the British empire; and which report, from the information and ability it displays, has assigned to the present accomplished head of the Board of Trade.

The efforts made in Great Britain to introduce a general system of free trade, especially within the last three years, are thus enumerated in the Foreign and Colonial Review.

"England, without gaining or asking a single boon from any foreign country, has—

"1. Reduced by about one-half the duties upon foreign corn.

"2. By nearly the same amount, the duties on foreign timber.

"3. Has removed her prohibitions against the importation of cattle and other animals for food, and has fixed upon them duties, ranging on the average at about ten per cent ad valorem.

"4. Has made flesh meat admissible.

"5. Has reduced the duty on salt provisions for home consumption by one-third, and one-half; and has placed them on a footing of entire equality with the British article for the supply of the whole marine frequenting her ports.

"6. Has lowered her duties on vegetables and seeds in general to one-half, one-sixth, and even one-twelfth (in the case of that most important esculent the potatoe) of what they formerly were.

"7. Has made all great articles of manufacture, except silk, which is reserved for future negotiations, admissible at duties of ten, twelve and a half, and fifteen per cent, and only in some few instances so much as twenty per cent.

"8. Upon some minor articles of manufacture, where our people lie under heavy disadvantages in obtaining the raw material, and where their habits have been formed in their particular occupation, wholly under the shelter, and therefore upon the responsibility of the law, she has retained duties in some cases as high as thirty per cent ad valorem, but yet has reduced them to rates insignificant in comparison with those formerly charged.

"9. In her colonies, she has fixed the ordinary rules of differential duties upon foreign productions at four and seven per cent, with exceptions altogether trifling in amount, on which a higher charge has been laid for special reasons.

"10. She has withdrawn the prohibition to export machinery, except so far as regards the linen manufacture, and the spinning of the yarns employed in it.

"11. With regard to many other articles, such as butter and cheese, indeed, with regard to all articles to which the simple and essential interests of the revenue will allow the same rules to be applied—it has been declared that they are only temporarily exempted from the operations of those rules, and it is well understood, that no time will be allowed to pass, except such as is necessary, before the work is completed; and lastly,