HEADLONG HALL
by
THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK
CHAPTER I
THE MAIL
THE ambiguous light of a December morning peeping through the windows of the Holyhead mail dispelled the soft visions of the four insides who had slept or seemed to sleep through the first seventy miles of the road with as much comfort as may be supposed consistent with the jolting of the vehicle and an occasional admonition to remember the coachman thundered through the open door accompanied by the gentle breath of Boreas into the ears of the drowsy traveller
A lively remark that the day was none of the finest having elicited a repartee of quite the contrary the various knotty points of meteorology which usually form the exordium of an English conversation were successively discussed and exhausted and the ice being thus broken the colloquy rambled to other topics in the course of which it appeared to the surprise of every one that all four though perfect strangers to each other were actually bound to the same point namely Headlong Hall the seat of the ancient and honourable family of the Headlongs of the vale of Llanberris in Caernarvonshire This name may appear at first sight not to be truly Cambrian like those of the Rices and Prices and Morgans and Owens and Williamses and Evanses and Parrys and Joneses but nevertheless the Headlongs claim to be not less genuine derivatives from the antique branch of Cadwallader than any of the last named multiramified families They claim indeed by one account superior antiquity to all of them and even to Cadwallader himself a tradition having been handed down in Headlong Hall for some few thousand years that the founder of the family was preserved in the deluge on the summit of Snowdon and took the name of Rhaiader which signifies a waterfall in consequence of his having accompanied the water in its descent or diminution till he found himself comfortably seated on the rocks of Llanberris But in later days when commercial bagmen began to scour the country the ambiguity of the sound induced his descendants to drop the suspicious denomination of Riders and translate the word into English when not being well pleased with the sound of the thing they substituted that of the quality and accordingly adopted the name Headlong the appropriate epithet of waterfall
I cannot tell how the truth may be
I say the tale as twas said to me
The present representative of this ancient and dignified house Harry Headlong Esquire was like all other Welsh squires fond of shooting hunting racing drinking and other such innocent amusements μειζονος δ’ αλλου τινος as Menander expresses it But unlike other Welsh squires he had actually suffered certain phenomena called books to find their way into his house and by dint of lounging over them after dinner on those occasions when he was compelled to take his bottle alone he became seized with a violent passion to be thought a philosopher and a man of taste and accordingly set off on an expedition to Oxford to inquire for other varieties of the same genera namely men of taste and philosophers but being assured by a learned professor that there were no such things in the University he proceeded to London where after beating up in several booksellers shops theatres exhibitionrooms and other resorts of literature and taste he formed as extensive an acquaintance with philosophers and dilettanti as his utmost ambition could desire and it now became his chief wish to have them all together in Headlong Hall arguing over his old Port and Burgundy the various knotty points which had puzzled his pericranium He had therefore sent them invitations in due form to pass their Christmas at Headlong Hall which invitations the extensive fame of his kitchen fire had induced the greater part of them to accept and four of the chosen guests had from different parts of the metropolis ensconced themselves in the four corners of the Holyhead mail
These four persons were Mr Foster11 the perfectibilian Mr Escot12 the deteriorationist Mr Jenkison13 the statuquoite and the Reverend Doctor Gaster14 who though of course neither a philosopher nor a man of taste had so won on the Squires fancy by a learned dissertation on the art of stuffing a turkey that he concluded no Christmas party would be complete without him
The conversation among these illuminati soon became animated and Mr Foster who we must observe was a thin gentleman about thirty years of age with an aquiline nose black eyes white teeth and black hair—took occasion to panegyrize the vehicle in which they were then travelling and observed what remarkable improvements had been made in the means of facilitating intercourse between distant parts of the kingdom he held forth with great energy on the subject of roads and railways canals and tunnels manufactures and machinery “In short” said he “every thing we look on attests the progress of mankind in all the arts of life and demonstrates their gradual advancement towards a state of unlimited perfection”
Mr Escot who was somewhat younger than Mr Foster but rather more pale and saturnine in his aspect here took up the thread of the discourse observing that the proposition just advanced seemed to him perfectly contrary to the true state of the case “for” said he “these improvements as you call them appear to me only so many links in the great chain of corruption which will soon fetter the whole human race in irreparable slavery and incurable wretchedness your improvements proceed in a simple ratio while the factitious wants and unnatural appetites they engender proceed in a compound one and thus one generation acquires fifty wants and fifty means of supplying them are invented which each in its turn engenders two new ones so that the next generation has a hundred the next two hundred the next four hundred till every human being becomes such a helpless compound of perverted inclinations that he is altogether at the mercy of external circumstances loses all independence and singleness of character and degenerates so rapidly from the primitive dignity of his sylvan origin that it is scarcely possible to indulge in any other expectation than that the whole species must at length be exterminated by its own infinite imbecility and vileness”
“Your opinions” said Mr Jenkison a roundfaced little gentleman of about fortyfive “seem to differ toto cœlo I have often debated the matter in my own mind pro and con and have at length arrived at this conclusion—that there is not in the human race a tendency either to moral perfectibility or deterioration but that the quantities of each are so exactly balanced by their reciprocal results that the species with respect to the sum of good and evil knowledge and ignorance happiness and misery remains exactly and perpetually in statu quo”
“Surely” said Mr Foster “you cannot maintain such a proposition in the face of evidence so luminous Look at the progress of all the arts and sciences—see chemistry botany astronomy——”
“Surely” said Mr Escot “experience deposes against you Look at the rapid growth of corruption luxury selfishness——”
“Really gentlemen” said the Reverend Doctor Gaster after clearing the husk in his throat with two or three hems “this is a very sceptical and I must say atheistical conversation and I should have thought out of respect to my cloth——”
Here the coach stopped and the coachman opening the door vociferated—“Breakfast gentlemen” a sound which so gladdened the ears of the divine that the alacrity with which he sprang from the vehicle superinduced a distortion of his ankle and he was obliged to limp into the inn between Mr Escot and Mr Jenkison the former observing that he ought to look for nothing but evil and therefore should not be surprised at this little accident the latter remarking that the comfort of a good breakfast and the pain of a sprained ankle pretty exactly balanced each other
CHAPTER II
THE SQUIRE—THE BREAKFAST
SQUIRE HEADLONG in the meanwhile was quadripartite in his locality that is to say he was superintending the operations in four scenes of action—namely the cellar the library the picturegallery and the diningroom—preparing for the reception of his philosophical and dilettanti visitors His myrmidon on this occasion was a little rednosed butler whom nature seemed to have cast in the genuine mould of an antique Silenus and who waddled about the house after his master wiping his forehead and panting for breath while the latter bounced from room to room like a cracker and was indefatigable in his requisitions for the proximity of his vinous Achates whose advice and cooperation he deemed no less necessary in the library than in the cellar Multitudes of packages had arrived by land and water from London and Liverpool and Chester and Manchester and Birmingham and various parts of the mountains books wine cheese globes mathematical instruments turkeys telescopes hams tongues microscopes quadrants sextants fiddles flutes tea sugar electrical machines figs spices airpumps sodawater chemical apparatus eggs Frenchhorns drawing books palettes oils and colours bottled ale and porter scenery for a private theatre pickles and fishsauce patent lamps and chandeliers barrels of oysters sofas chairs tables carpets beds lookingglasses pictures fruits and confections nuts oranges lemons packages of salt salmon and jars of Portugal grapes These arriving with infinite rapidity and in inexhaustible succession had been deposited at random as the convenience of the moment dictated—sofas in the cellar chandeliers in the kitchen hampers of ale in the drawingroom and fiddles and fishsauce in the library The servants unpacking all these in furious haste and flying with them from place to place according to the tumultuous directions of Squire Headlong and the little fat butler who fumed at his heels chafed and crossed and clashed and tumbled over one another up stairs and down All was bustle uproar and confusion yet nothing seemed to advance while the rage and impetuosity of the Squire continued fermenting to the highest degree of exasperation which he signified from time to time by converting some newly unpacked article such as a book a bottle a ham or a fiddle into a missile against the head of some unfortunate servant who did not seem to move in a ratio of velocity corresponding to the intensity of his masters desires
In this state of eager preparation we shall leave the happy inhabitants of Headlong Hall and return to the three philosophers and the unfortunate divine whom we left limping with a sprained ankle into the breakfastroom of the inn where his two supporters deposited him safely in a large armchair with his wounded leg comfortably stretched out on another The morning being extremely cold he contrived to be seated as near the fire as was consistent with his other object of having a perfect command of the table and its apparatus which consisted not only of the ordinary comforts of tea and toast but of a delicious supply of newlaid eggs and a magnificent round of beef against which Mr Escot immediately pointed all the artillery of his eloquence declaring the use of animal food conjointly with that of fire to be one of the principal causes of the present degeneracy of mankind “The natural and original man” said he “lived in the woods the roots and fruits of the earth supplied his simple nutriment he had few desires and no diseases But when he began to sacrifice victims on the altar of superstition to pursue the goat and the deer and by the pernicious invention of fire to pervert their flesh into food luxury disease and premature death were let loose upon the world Such is clearly the correct interpretation of the fable of Prometheus which is the symbolical portraiture of that disastrous epoch when man first applied fire to culinary purposes and thereby surrendered his liver to the vulture of disease From that period the stature of mankind has been in a state of gradual diminution and I have not the least doubt that it will continue to grow small by degrees and lamentably less till the whole race will vanish imperceptibly from the face of the earth”
“I cannot agree” said Mr Foster “in the consequences being so very disastrous I admit that in some respects the use of animal food retards though it cannot materially inhibit the perfectibility of the species But the use of fire was indispensably necessary as Æschylus and Virgil expressly assert to give being to the various arts of life which in their rapid and interminable progress will finally conduct every individual of the race to the philosophic pinnacle of pure and perfect felicity”
“In the controversy concerning animal and vegetable food” said Mr Jenkison “there is much to be said on both sides and the question being in equipoise I content myself with a mixed diet and make a point of eating whatever is placed before me provided it be good in its kind”
In this opinion his two brother philosophers practically coincided though they both ran down the theory as highly detrimental to the best interests of man
“I am really astonished” said the Reverend Doctor Gaster gracefully picking off the supernal fragments of an egg he had just cracked and clearing away a space at the top for the reception of a small piece of butter—“I am really astonished gentlemen at the very heterodox opinions I have heard you deliver since nothing can be more obvious than that all animals were created solely and exclusively for the use of man”
“Even the tiger that devours him” said Mr Escot
“Certainly” said Doctor Gaster
“How do you prove it” said Mr Escot
“It requires no proof” said Doctor Gaster “it is a point of doctrine It is written therefore it is so”
“Nothing can be more logical” said Mr Jenkison “It has been said” continued he “that the ox was expressly made to be eaten by man it may be said by a parity of reasoning that man was expressly made to be eaten by the tiger but as wild oxen exist where there are no men and men where there are no tigers it would seem that in these instances they do not properly answer the ends of their creation”
“It is a mystery” said Doctor Gaster
“Not to launch into the question of final causes” said Mr Escot helping himself at the same time to a slice of beef “concerning which I will candidly acknowledge I am as profoundly ignorant as the most dogmatical theologian possibly can be I just wish to observe that the pure and peaceful manners which Homer ascribes to the Lotophagi and which at this day characterise many nations the Hindoos for example who subsist exclusively on the fruits of the earth depose very strongly in favour of a vegetable regimen”
“It may be said on the contrary” said Mr Foster “that animal food acts on the mind as manure does on flowers forcing them into a degree of expansion they would not otherwise have attained If we can imagine a philosophical auricula falling into a train of theoretical meditation on its original and natural nutriment till it should work itself up into a profound abomination of bullocks blood sugarbakers scum and other unnatural ingredients of that rich composition of soil which had brought it to perfection21 and insist on being planted in common earth it would have all the advantage of natural theory on its side that the most strenuous advocate of the vegetable system could desire but it would soon discover the practical error of its retrograde experiment by its lamentable inferiority in strength and beauty to all the auriculas around it I am afraid in some instances at least this analogy holds true with respect to mind No one will make a comparison in point of mental power between the Hindoos and the ancient Greeks”
“The anatomy of the human stomach” said Mr Escot “and the formation of the teeth clearly place man in the class of frugivorous animals”
“Many anatomists” said Mr Foster “are of a different opinion and agree in discerning the characteristics of the carnivorous classes”
“I am no anatomist” said Mr Jenkison “and cannot decide where doctors disagree in the meantime I conclude that man is omnivorous and on that conclusion I act”
“Your conclusion is truly orthodox” said the Reverend Doctor Gaster “indeed the loaves and fishes are typical of a mixed diet and the practice of the Church in all ages shows——”
“That it never loses sight of the loaves and fishes” said Mr Escot
“It never loses sight of any point of sound doctrine” said the reverend doctor
The coachman now informed them their time was elapsed nor could all the pathetic remonstrances of the reverend divine who declared he had not half breakfasted succeed in gaining one minute from the inexorable Jehu
“You will allow” said Mr Foster as soon as they were again in motion “that the wild man of the woods could not transport himself over two hundred miles of forest with as much facility as one of these vehicles transports you and me through the heart of this cultivated country”
“I am certain” said Mr Escot “that a wild man can travel an immense distance without fatigue but what is the advantage of locomotion The wild man is happy in one spot and there he remains the civilised man is wretched in every place he happens to be in and then congratulates himself on being accommodated with a machine that will whirl him to another where he will be just as miserable as ever”
We shall now leave the mailcoach to find its way to Capel Cerig the nearest point of the Holyhead road to the dwelling of Squire Headlong
CHAPTER III
THE ARRIVALS
IN the midst of that scene of confusion thrice confounded in which we left the inhabitants of Headlong Hall arrived the lovely Caprioletta Headlong the Squires sister whom he had sent for from the residence of her maiden aunt at Caernarvon to do the honours of his house beaming like light on chaos to arrange disorder and harmonise discord The tempestuous spirit of her brother became instantaneously as smooth as the surface of the lake of Llanberris and the little fat butler “plessed Cot and St Tafit and the peautiful tamsel” for being permitted to move about the house in his natural pace In less than twentyfour hours after her arrival everything was disposed in its proper station and the Squire began to be all impatience for the appearance of his promised guests
The first visitor with whom he had the felicity of shaking hands was Marmaduke Milestone Esquire who arrived with a portfolio under his arm Mr Milestone31 was a picturesque landscape gardener of the first celebrity who was not without hopes of persuading Squire Headlong to put his romantic pleasuregrounds under a process of improvement promising himself a signal triumph for his incomparable art in the difficult and therefore glorious achievement of polishing and trimming the rocks of Llanberris
Next arrived a postchaise from the inn at Capel Cerig containing the Reverend Doctor Gaster It appeared that when the mailcoach deposited its valuable cargo early on the second morning at the inn at Capel Cerig there was only one postchaise to be had it was therefore determined that the reverend Doctor and the luggage should proceed in the chaise and that the three philosophers should walk When the reverend gentleman first seated himself in the chaise the windows were down all round but he allowed it to drive off under the idea that he could easily pull them up This task however he had considerable difficulty in accomplishing and when he had succeeded it availed him little for the frames and glasses had long since discontinued their ancient familiarity He had however no alternative but to proceed and to comfort himself as he went with some choice quotations from the book of Job The road led along the edges of tremendous chasms with torrents dashing in the bottom so that if his teeth had not chattered with cold they would have done so with fear The Squire shook him heartily by the hand and congratulated him on his safe arrival at Headlong Hall The Doctor returned the squeeze and assured him that the congratulation was by no means misapplied
Next came the three philosophers highly delighted with their walk and full of rapturous exclamations on the sublime beauties of the scenery
The Doctor shrugged up his shoulders and confessed he preferred the scenery of Putney and Kew where a man could go comfortably to sleep in his chaise without being in momentary terror of being hurled headlong down a precipice
Mr Milestone observed that there were great capabilities in the scenery but it wanted shaving and polishing If he could but have it under his care for a single twelvemonth he assured them no one would be able to know it again
Mr Jenkison thought the scenery was just what it ought to be and required no alteration
Mr Foster thought it could be improved but doubted if that effect would be produced by the system of Mr Milestone
Mr Escot did not think that any human being could improve it but had no doubt of its having changed very considerably for the worse since the days when the now barren rocks were covered with the immense forest of Snowdon which must have contained a very fine race of wild men not less than ten feet high
The next arrival was that of Mr Cranium and his lovely daughter Miss Cephalis Cranium who flew to the arms of her dear friend Caprioletta with all that warmth of friendship which young ladies usually assume towards each other in the presence of young gentlemen32
Miss Cephalis blushed like a carnation at the sight of Mr Escot and Mr Escot glowed like a cornpoppy at the sight of Miss Cephalis It was at least obvious to all observers that he could imagine the possibility of one change for the better even in this terrestrial theatre of universal deterioration
Mr Craniums eyes wandered from Mr Escot to his daughter and from his daughter to Mr Escot and his complexion in the course of the scrutiny underwent several variations from the dark red of the peony to the deep blue of the convolvulus
Mr Escot had formerly been the received lover of Miss Cephalis till he incurred the indignation of her father by laughing at a very profound craniological dissertation which the old gentleman delivered nor had Mr Escot yet discovered the means of mollifying his wrath
Mr Cranium carried in his own hands a bag the contents of which were too precious to be intrusted to any one but himself and earnestly entreated to be shown to the chamber appropriated for his reception that he might deposit his treasure in safety The little butler was accordingly summoned to conduct him to his cubiculum
Next arrived a postchaise carrying four insides whose extreme thinness enabled them to travel thus economically without experiencing the slightest inconvenience These four personages were two very profound critics Mr Gall and Mr Treacle who followed the trade of reviewers but occasionally indulged themselves in the composition of bad poetry and two very multitudinous versifiers Mr Nightshade and Mr Mac Laurel who followed the trade of poetry but occasionally indulged themselves in the composition of bad criticism Mr Nightshade and Mr Mac Laurel were the two senior lieutenants of a very formidable corps of critics of whom Timothy Treacle Esquire was captain and Geoffrey Gall Esquire generalissimo
The last arrivals were Mr Cornelius Chromatic the most profound and scientific of all amateurs of the fiddle with his two blooming daughters Miss Tenorina and Miss Graziosa Sir Patrick OPrism a dilettante painter of high renown and his maiden aunt Miss Philomela Poppyseed an indefatigable compounder of novels written for the express purpose of supporting every species of superstition and prejudice and Mr Panscope the chemical botanical geological astronomical mathematical metaphysical meteorological anatomical physiological galvanistical musical pictorial bibliographical critical philosopher who had run through the whole circle of the sciences and understood them all equally well
Mr Milestone was impatient to take a walk round the grounds that he might examine how far the system of clumping and levelling could be carried advantageously into effect The ladies retired to enjoy each others society in the first happy moments of meeting the Reverend Doctor Gaster sat by the library fire in profound meditation over a volume of the “Almanach des Gourmands” Mr Panscope sat in the opposite corner with a volume of Rees Cyclopædia Mr Cranium was busy upstairs Mr Chromatic retreated to the musicroom where he fiddled through a book of solos before the ringing of the first dinner bell The remainder of the party supported Mr Milestones proposition and accordingly Squire Headlong and Mr Milestone leading the van they commenced their perambulation
CHAPTER IV
THE GROUNDS
“I PERCEIVE” said Mr Milestone after they had walked a few paces “these grounds have never been touched by the finger of taste”
“The place is quite a wilderness” said Squire Headlong “for during the latter part of my fathers life while I was finishing my education he troubled himself about nothing but the cellar and suffered everything else to go to rack and ruin A mere wilderness as you see even now in December but in summer a complete nursery of briers a forest of thistles a plantation of nettles without any live stock but goats that have eaten up all the bark of the trees Here you see is the pedestal of a statue with only half a leg and four toes remaining there were many here once When I was a boy I used to sit every day on the shoulders of Hercules what became of him I have never been able to ascertain Neptune has been lying these seven years in the dusthole Atlas had his head knocked off to fit him for propping a shed and only the day before yesterday we fished Bacchus out of the horsepond”
“My dear sir” said Mr Milestone “accord me your permission to wave the wand of enchantment over your grounds The rocks shall be blown up the trees shall be cut down the wilderness and all its goats shall vanish like mist Pagodas and Chinese bridges gravel walks and shrubberies bowlinggreens canals and clumps of larch shall rise upon its ruins One age sir has brought to light the treasures of ancient learning a second has penetrated into the depths of metaphysics a third has brought to perfection the science of astronomy but it was reserved for the exclusive genius of the present times to invent the noble art of picturesque gardening which has given as it were a new tint to the complexion of nature and a new outline to the physiognomy of the universe”
“Give me leave” said Sir Patrick OPrism “to take an exception to that same Your system of levelling and trimming and clipping and docking and clumping and polishing and cropping and shaving destroys all the beautiful intricacies of natural luxuriance and all the graduated harmonies of light and shade melting into one another as you see them on that rock over yonder I never saw one of your improved places as you call them and which are nothing but big bowlinggreens like sheets of green paper with a parcel of round clumps scattered over them like so many spots of ink flicked at random out of a pen41 and a solitary animal here and there looking as if it were lost that I did not think it was for all the world like Hounslow Heath thinly sprinkled over with bushes and highwaymen”
“Sir” said Mr Milestone “you will have the goodness to make a distinction between the picturesque and the beautiful”
“Will I” said Sir Patrick “och but I wont For what is beautiful That what pleases the eye And what pleases the eye Tints variously broken and blended Now tints variously broken and blended constitute the picturesque”
“Allow me” said Mr Gall “I distinguish the picturesque and the beautiful and I add to them in the laying out of grounds a third and distinct character which I call unexpectedness”
“Pray sir” said Mr Milestone “by what name do you distinguish this character when a person walks round the grounds for the second time”42
Mr Gall bit his lips and inwardly vowed to revenge himself on Milestone by cutting up his next publication
A long controversy now ensued concerning the picturesque and the beautiful highly edifying to Squire Headlong
The three philosophers stopped as they wound round a projecting point of rock to contemplate a little boat which was gliding over the tranquil surface of the lake below
“The blessings of civilisation” said Mr Foster “extend themselves to the meanest individuals of the community That boatman singing as he sails along is I have no doubt a very happy and comparatively to the men of his class some centuries back a very enlightened and intelligent man”
“As a partisan of the system of the moral perfectibility of the human race” said Mr Escot—who was always for considering things on a large scale and whose thoughts immediately wandered from the lake to the ocean from the little boat to a ship of the line—“you will probably be able to point out to me the degree of improvement that you suppose to have taken place in the character of a sailor from the days when Jason sailed through the Cyanean Symplegades or Noah moored his ark on the summit of Ararat”
“If you talk to me” said Mr Foster “of mythological personages of course I cannot meet you on fair grounds”
“We will begin if you please then” said Mr Escot “no further back than the battle of Salamis and I will ask you if you think the mariners of England are in any one respect morally or intellectually superior to those who then preserved the liberties of Greece under the direction of Themistocles”
“I will venture to assert” said Mr Foster “that considered merely as sailors which is the only fair mode of judging them they are as far superior to the Athenians as the structure of our ships is superior to that of theirs Would not one English seventyfour think you have been sufficient to have sunk burned and put to flight all the Persian and Grecian vessels in that memorable bay Contemplate the progress of naval architecture and the slow but immense succession of concatenated intelligence by which it has gradually attained its present stage of perfectibility In this as in all other branches of art and science every generation possesses all the knowledge of the preceding and adds to it its own discoveries in a progression to which there seems no limit The skill requisite to direct these immense machines is proportionate to their magnitude and complicated mechanism and therefore the English sailor considered merely as a sailor is vastly superior to the ancient Greek”
“You make a distinction of course” said Mr Escot “between scientific and moral perfectibility”
“I conceive” said Mr Foster “that men are virtuous in proportion as they are enlightened and that as every generation increases in knowledge it also increases in virtue”
“I wish it were so” said Mr Escot “but to me the very reverse appears to be the fact The progress of knowledge is not general it is confined to a chosen few of every age How far these are better than their neighbours we may examine by and bye The mass of mankind is composed of beasts of burden mere clods and tools of their superiors By enlarging and complicating your machines you degrade not exalt the human animals you employ to direct them When the boatswain of a seventyfour pipes all hands to the main tack and flourishes his ropes end over the shoulders of the poor fellows who are tugging at the ropes do you perceive so dignified so gratifying a picture as Ulysses exhorting his dear friends his ΕΡΙΗΡΕΣ ’ΕΤΑΙΡΟΙ to ply their oars with energy You will say Ulysses was a fabulous character But the economy of his vessel is drawn from nature Every man on board has a character and a will of his own He talks to them argues with them convinces them and they obey him because they love him and know the reason of his orders Now as I have said before all singleness of character is lost We divide men into herds like cattle an individual man if you strip him of all that is extraneous to himself is the most wretched and contemptible creature on the face of the earth The sciences advance True A few years of study puts a modern mathematician in possession of more than Newton knew and leaves him at leisure to add new discoveries of his own Agreed But does this make him a Newton Does it put him in possession of that range of intellect that grasp of mind from which the discoveries of Newton sprang It is mental power that I look for if you can demonstrate the increase of that I will give up the field Energy—independence—individuality—disinterested virtue—active benevolence—selfoblivion—universal philanthropy—these are the qualities I desire to find and of which I contend that every succeeding age produces fewer examples I repeat it there is scarcely such a thing to be found as a single individual man a few classes compose the whole frame of society and when you know one of a class you know the whole of it Give me the wild man of the woods the original unthinking unscientific unlogical savage in him there is at least some good but in a civilised sophisticated coldblooded mechanical calculating slave of Mammon and the world there is none—absolutely none Sir if I fall into a river an unsophisticated man will jump in and bring me out but a philosopher will look on with the utmost calmness and consider me in the light of a projectile and making a calculation of the degree of force with which I have impinged the surface the resistance of the fluid the velocity of the current and the depth of the water in that particular place he will ascertain with the greatest nicety in what part of the mud at the bottom I may probably be found at any given distance of time from the moment of my first immersion”
Mr Foster was preparing to reply when the first dinnerbell rang and he immediately commenced a precipitate return towards the house followed by his two companions who both admitted that he was now leading the way to at least a temporary period of physical amelioration “but alas” added Mr Escot after a moments reflection “Epulæ NOCUERE repostæ43”
CHAPTER V
THE DINNER
THE sun was now terminating his diurnal course and the lights were glittering on the festal board When the ladies had retired and the Burgundy had taken two or three tours of the table the following conversation took place—
Squire Headlong Push about the bottle Mr Escot it stands with you No heeltaps As to skylight libertyhall
Mr Mac Laurel Really Squire Headlong this is the vara nectar itsel Ye hae saretainly discovered the tarrestrial paradise but it flows wi a better leecor than milk an honey
The Reverend Doctor Gaster Hem Mr Mac Laurel there is a degree of profaneness in that observation which I should not have looked for in so staunch a supporter of church and state Milk and honey was the pure food of the antediluvian patriarchs who knew not the use of the grape happily for them—Tossing off a bumper of Burgundy
Mr Escot Happy indeed The first inhabitants of the world knew not the use either of wine or animal food it is therefore by no means incredible that they lived to the age of several centuries free from war and commerce and arbitrary government and every other species of desolating wickedness But man was then a very different animal to what he now is he had not the faculty of speech he was not encumbered with clothes he lived in the open air his first step out of which as Hamlet truly observes is into his grave51 His first dwellings of course were the hollows of trees and rocks In process of time he began to build thence grew villages thence grew cities Luxury oppression poverty misery and disease kept pace with the progress of his pretended improvements till from a free strong healthy peaceful animal he has become a weak distempered cruel carnivorous slave
The Reverend Doctor Gaster Your doctrine is orthodox in so far as you assert that the original man was not encumbered with clothes and that he lived in the open air but as to the faculty of speech that it is certain he had for the authority of Moses——
Mr Escot Of course sir I do not presume to dissent from the very exalted authority of that most enlightened astronomer and profound cosmogonist who had moreover the advantage of being inspired but when I indulge myself with a ramble in the fields of speculation and attempt to deduce what is probable and rational from the sources of analysis experience and comparison I confess I am too often apt to lose sight of the doctrines of that great fountain of theological and geological philosophy
Squire Headlong Push about the bottle
Mr Foster Do you suppose the mere animal life of a wild man living on acorns and sleeping on the ground comparable in felicity to that of a Newton ranging through unlimited space and penetrating into the arcana of universal motion—to that of a Locke unravelling the labyrinth of mind—to that of a Lavoisier detecting the minutest combinations of matter and reducing all nature to its elements—to that of a Shakespeare piercing and developing the springs of passion—or of a Milton identifying himself as it were with the beings of an invisible world
Mr Escot You suppose extreme cases but on the score of happiness what comparison can you make between the tranquil being of the wild man of the woods and the wretched and turbulent existence of Milton the victim of persecution poverty blindness and neglect The records of literature demonstrate that Happiness and Intelligence are seldom sisters Even if it were otherwise it would prove nothing The many are always sacrificed to the few Where one man advances hundreds retrograde and the balance is always in favour of universal deterioration
Mr Foster Virtue is independent of external circumstances The exalted understanding looks into the truth of things and in its own peaceful contemplations rises superior to the world No philosopher would resign his mental acquisitions for the purchase of any terrestrial good
Mr Escot In other words no man whatever would resign his identity which is nothing more than the consciousness of his perceptions as the price of any acquisition But every man without exception would willingly effect a very material change in his relative situation to other individuals Unluckily for the rest of your argument the understanding of literary people is for the most part exalted as you express it not so much by the love of truth and virtue as by arrogance and selfsufficiency and there is perhaps less disinterestedness less liberality less general benevolence and more envy hatred and uncharitableness among them than among any other description of men
The eye of Mr Escot as he pronounced these words rested very innocently and unintentionally on Mr Gall
Mr Gall You allude sir I presume to my review
Mr Escot Pardon me sir You will be convinced it is impossible I can allude to your review when I assure you that I have never read a single page of it
Mr Gall Mr Treacle Mr Nightshade and Mr Mac Laurel Never read our review
Mr Escot Never I look on periodical criticism in general to be a species of shop where panegyric and defamation are sold wholesale retail and for exportation I am not inclined to be a purchaser of these commodities or to encourage a trade which I consider pregnant with mischief
Mr Mac Laurel I can readily conceive sir ye woud na wullingly encoorage ony dealer in panegeeric but frae the manner in which ye speak o the first creetics an scholars o the age I shoud think ye woud hae a leetle mair predilaction for deefamation
Mr Escot I have no predilection sir for defamation I make a point of speaking the truth on all occasions and it seldom happens that the truth can be spoken without some stricken deer pronouncing it a libel
Mr Nightshade You are perhaps sir an enemy to literature in general
Mr Escot If I were sir I should be a better friend to periodical critics
Squire Headlong Buz
Mr Treacle May I simply take the liberty to inquire into the basis of your objection
Mr Escot I conceive that periodical criticism disseminates superficial knowledge and its perpetual adjunct vanity that it checks in the youthful mind the habit of thinking for itself that it delivers partial opinions and thereby misleads the judgment that it is never conducted with a view to the general interests of literature but to serve the interested ends of individuals and the miserable purposes of party
Mr Mac Laurel Ye ken sir a mon mun leeve
Mr Escot While he can live honourably naturally justly certainly no longer
Mr Mac Laurel Every mon sir leeves according to his ain notions of honour an justice there is a wee defference amang the learned wi respact to the defineetion o the terms
Mr Escot I believe it is generally admitted that one of the ingredients of justice is disinterestedness
Mr Mac Laurel It is na admetted sir amang the pheelosophers of Edinbroo that there is ony sic thing as desenterestedness in the warld or that a mon can care for onything sae much as his ain sel for ye mun observe sir every mon has his ain parteecular feelings of what is gude an beautifu an consentaneous to his ain indiveedual nature an desires to see every thing aboot him in that parteecular state which is maist conformable to his ain notions o the moral an poleetical fetness o things Twa men sir shall purchase a piece o grund atween em and ae mon shall cover his half wi a park——
Mr Milestone Beautifully laid out in lawns and clumps with a belt of trees at the circumference and an artificial lake in the centre
Mr Mac Laurel Exactly sir an shall keep it a for his ain sel an the other mon shall divide his half into leetle farms of twa or three acres——
Mr Escot Like those of the Roman republic and build a cottage on each of them and cover his land with a simple innocent and smiling population who shall owe not only their happiness but their existence to his benevolence
Mr Mac Laurel Exactly sir an ye will ca the first mon selfish an the second desenterested but the pheelosophical truth is semply this that the ane is pleased wi looking at trees an the other wi seeing people happy an comfortable It is aunly a matter of indiveedual feeling A paisant saves a mons life for the same reason that a hero or a footpad cuts his thrapple an a pheelosopher delevers a mon frae a preson for the same reason that a tailor or a prime meenester puts him into it because it is conformable to his ain parteecular feelings o the moral an poleetical fetness o things
Squire Headlong Wake the Reverend Doctor Doctor the bottle stands with you
The Reverend Doctor Gaster It is an error of which I am seldom guilty
Mr Mac Laurel Noo ye ken sir every mon is the centre of his ain system an endaivours as much as possible to adapt every thing aroond him to his ain parteecular views
Mr Escot Thus sir I presume it suits the particular views of a poet at one time to take the part of the people against their oppressors and at another to take the part of the oppressors against the people
Mr Mac Laurel Ye mun alloo sir that poetry is a sort of ware or commodity that is brought into the public market wi a other descreptions of merchandise an that a mon is pairfectly justified in getting the best price he can for his article Noo there are three reasons for taking the part o the people the first is when general leeberty an public happiness are conformable to your ain parteecular feelings o the moral an poleetical fetness o things the second is when they happen to be as it were in a state of exceetabeelity an ye think ye can get a gude price for your commodity by flingin in a leetle seasoning o pheelanthropy an republican speerit the third is when ye think ye can bully the menestry into gieing ye a place or a pansion to haud your din an in that case ye point an attack against them within the pale o the law an if they tak nae heed o ye ye open a stronger fire an the less heed they tak the mair ye bawl an the mair factious ye grow always within the pale o the law till they send a plenipotentiary to treat wi ye for yoursel an then the mair popular ye happen to be the better price ye fetch
Squire Headlong Off with your heeltaps
Mr Cranium I perfectly agree with Mr Mac Laurel in his definition of selflove and disinterestedness every mans actions are determined by his peculiar views and those views are determined by the organisation of his skull A man in whom the organ of benevolence is not developed cannot be benevolent he in whom it is so cannot be otherwise The organ of selflove is prodigiously developed in the greater number of subjects that have fallen under my observation
Mr Escot Much less I presume among savage than civilised men who constant only to the love of self and consistent only in their aim to deceive are always actuated by the hope of personal advantage or by the dread of personal punishment52
Mr Cranium Very probably
Mr Escot You have of course found very copious specimens of the organs of hypocrisy destruction and avarice
Mr Cranium Secretiveness destructiveness and covetiveness You may add if you please that of constructiveness
Mr Escot Meaning I presume the organ of building which I contend to be not a natural organ of the featherless biped
Mr Cranium Pardon me it is here—As he said these words he produced a skull from his pocket and placed it on the table to the great surprise of the company—This was the skull of Sir Christopher Wren You observe this protuberance—The skull was handed round the table
Mr Escot I contend that the original unsophisticated man was by no means constructive He lived in the open air under a tree
The Reverend Doctor Gaster The tree of life Unquestionably Till he had tasted the forbidden fruit
Mr Jenkison At which period probably the organ of constructiveness was added to his anatomy as a punishment for his transgression
Mr Escot There could not have been a more severe one since the propensity which has led him to building cities has proved the greatest curse of his existence
Squire Headlong taking the skull Memento mori Come a bumper of Burgundy
Mr Nightshade A very classical application Squire Headlong The Romans were in the practice of adhibiting skulls at their banquets and sometimes little skeletons of silver as a silent admonition to the guests to enjoy life while it lasted
The Reverend Doctor Gaster Sound doctrine Mr Nightshade
Mr Escot I question its soundness The use of vinous spirit has a tremendous influence in the deterioration of the human race
Mr Foster I fear indeed it operates as a considerable check to the progress of the species towards moral and intellectual perfection Yet many great men have been of opinion that it exalts the imagination fires the genius accelerates the flow of ideas and imparts to dispositions naturally cold and deliberative that enthusiastic sublimation which is the source of greatness and energy
Mr Nightshade Laudibus arguitur vini vinosus Homerus53
Mr Jenkison I conceive the use of wine to be always pernicious in excess but often useful in moderation it certainly kills some but it saves the lives of others I find that an occasional glass taken with judgment and caution has a very salutary effect in maintaining that equilibrium of the system which it is always my aim to preserve and this calm and temperate use of wine was no doubt what Homer meant to inculcate when he said Παρ δε δεπας οινοιο πιειν ‘οτε ϑυμος ανωγοι54
Squire Headlong Good Pass the bottle Un morne silence Sir Christopher does not seem to have raised our spirits Chromatic favour us with a specimen of your vocal powers Something in point
Mr Chromatic without further preface immediately struck up the following
SONG
In his last binn Sir Peter lies
Who knew not what it was to frown
Death took him mellow by surprise
And in his cellar stopped him down
Through all our land we could not boast
A knight more gay more prompt than he
To rise and fill a bumper toast
And pass it round with THREE TIMES THREE
None better knew the feast to sway
Or keep Mirths boat in better trim
For Nature had but little clay
Like that of which she moulded him
The meanest guest that graced his board
Was there the freest of the free
His bumper toast when Peter poured
And passed it round with THREE TIMES THREE
He kept at true good humours mark
The social flow of pleasures tide
He never made a brow look dark
Nor caused a tear but when he died
No sorrow round his tomb should dwell
More pleased his gay old ghost would be
For funeral song and passing bell
To hear no sound but THREE TIMES THREE
Hammering of knuckles and glasses and shouts of bravo
Mr Panscope Suddenly emerging from a deep reverie I have heard with the most profound attention every thing which the gentleman on the other side of the table has thought proper to advance on the subject of human deterioration and I must take the liberty to remark that it augurs a very considerable degree of presumption in any individual to set himself up against the authority of so many great men as may be marshalled in metaphysical phalanx under the opposite banners of the controversy such as Aristotle Plato the scholiast on Aristophanes St Chrysostom St Jerome St Athanasius Orpheus Pindar Simonides Gronovius Hemsterhusius Longinus Sir Isaac Newton Thomas Paine Doctor Paley the King of Prussia the King of Poland Cicero Monsieur Gautier Hippocrates Machiavelli Milton Colley Cibber Bojardo Gregory Nazianzenus Locke DAlembert Boccaccio Daniel Defoe Erasmus Doctor Smollett Zimmermann Solomon Confucius Zoroaster and ThomasaKempis
Mr Escot I presume sir you are one of those who value an authority more than a reason
Mr Panscope The authority sir of all these great men whose works as well as the whole of the Encyclopædia Britannica the entire series of the Monthly Review the complete set of the Variorum Classics and the Memoirs of the Academy of Inscriptions I have read through from beginning to end deposes with irrefragable refutation against your ratiocinative speculations wherein you seem desirous by the futile process of analytical dialectics to subvert the pyramidal structure of synthetically deduced opinions which have withstood the secular revolutions of physiological disquisition and which I maintain to be transcendentally selfevident categorically certain and syllogistically demonstrable
Squire Headlong Bravo Pass the bottle The very best speech that ever was made
Mr Escot It has only the slight disadvantage of being unintelligible
Mr Panscope I am not obliged sir as Dr Johnson observed on a similar occasion to furnish you with an understanding
Mr Escot I fear sir you would have some difficulty in furnishing me with such an article from your own stock
Mr Panscope Sdeath sir do you question my understanding
Mr Escot I only question sir where I expect a reply which from things that have no existence I am not visionary enough to anticipate
Mr Panscope I beg leave to observe sir that my language was perfectly perspicuous and etymologically correct and I conceive I have demonstrated what I shall now take the liberty to say in plain terms that all your opinions are extremely absurd
Mr Escot I should be sorry sir to advance any opinion that you would not think absurd
Mr Panscope Death and fury sir——
Mr Escot Say no more sir That apology is quite sufficient
Mr Panscope Apology sir
Mr Escot Even so sir You have lost your temper which I consider equivalent to a confession that you have the worst of the argument
Mr Panscope Lightning and devils sir——
Squire Headlong No civil war—Temperance in the name of Bacchus—A glee a glee Music has charms to bend the knotted oak Sir Patrick youll join
Sir Patrick OPrism Troth with all my heart for by my soul Im bothered completely
Squire Headlong Agreed then you and I and Chromatic Bumpers Come strike up
Squire Headlong Mr Chromatic and Sir Patrick OPrism each holding a bumper immediately vociferated the following
GLEE
A heeltap a heeltap I never could bear it
So fill me a bumper a bumper of claret
Let the bottle pass freely dont shirk it nor spare it
For a heeltap a heeltap I never could bear it
No skylight no twilight while Bacchus rules oer us
No thinking no shrinking all drinking in chorus
Let us moisten our clay since tis thirsty and porous
No thinking no shrinking all drinking in chorus
GRAND CHORUS
By Squire Headlong Mr Chromatic Sir Patrick OPrism Mr Panscope Mr Jenkison Mr Gall Mr Treacle Mr Nightshade Mr Mac Laurel Mr Cranium Mr Milestone and the Reverend Dr Gaster
A heeltap a heeltap I never could bear it
So fill me a bumper a bumper of claret
Let the bottle pass freely dont shirk it nor spare it
For a heeltap a heeltap I never could bear it
‘ΟΜΑΔΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΔΟΥΠΟΣ ΟΡΩΡΕΙ’
The little butler now waddled in with a summons from the ladies to tea and coffee The squire was unwilling to leave his Burgundy Mr Escot strenuously urged the necessity of immediate adjournment observing that the longer they continued drinking the worse they should be Mr Foster seconded the motion declaring the transition from the bottle to female society to be an indisputable amelioration of the state of the sensitive man Mr Jenkison allowed the squire and his two brother philosophers to settle the point between them concluding that he was just as well in one place as another The question of adjournment was then put and carried by a large majority
CHAPTER VI
THE EVENING
MR PANSCOPE highly irritated by the cool contempt with which Mr Escot had treated him sate sipping his coffee and meditating revenge He was not long in discovering the passion of his antagonist for the beautiful Cephalis for whom he had himself a species of predilection and it was also obvious to him that there was some lurking anger in the mind of her father unfavourable to the hopes of his rival The stimulus of revenge superadded to that of preconceived inclination determined him after due deliberation to cut out Mr Escot in the young ladys favour The practicability of this design he did not trouble himself to investigate for the havoc he had made in the hearts of some silly girls who were extremely vulnerable to flattery and who not understanding a word he said considered him a prodigious clever man had impressed him with an unhesitating idea of his own irresistibility He had not only the requisites already specified for fascinating female vanity he could likewise fiddle with tolerable dexterity though by no means so quick as Mr Chromatic for our readers are of course aware that rapidity of execution not delicacy of expression constitutes the scientific perfection of modern music and could warble a fashionable loveditty with considerable affectation of feeling besides this he was always extremely well dressed and was heirapparent to an estate of ten thousand ayear The influence which the latter consideration might have on the minds of the majority of his female acquaintance whose morals had been formed by the novels of such writers as Miss Philomela Poppyseed did not once enter into his calculation of his own personal attractions Relying therefore on past success he determined to appeal to his fortune and already in imagination considered himself sole lord and master of the affections of the beautiful Cephalis
Mr Escot and Mr Foster were the only two of the party who had entered the library to which the ladies had retired and which was interior to the musicroom in a state of perfect sobriety Mr Escot had placed himself next to the beautiful Cephalis Mr Cranium had laid aside much of the terror of his frown the short craniological conversation which had passed between him and Mr Escot had softened his heart in his favour and the copious libations of Burgundy in which he had indulged had smoothed his brow into unusual serenity
Mr Foster placed himself near the lovely Caprioletta whose artless and innocent conversation had already made an impression on his susceptible spirit
The Reverend Doctor Gaster seated himself in the corner of a sofa near Miss Philomela Poppyseed Miss Philomela detailed to him the plan of a very moral and aristocratical novel she was preparing for the press and continued holding forth with her eyes half shut till a longdrawn nasal tone from the reverend divine compelled her suddenly to open them in all the indignation of surprise The cessation of the hum of her voice awakened the reverend gentleman who lifting up first one eyelid then the other articulated or rather murmured “Admirably planned indeed”
“I have not quite finished sir” said Miss Philomela bridling “Will you have the goodness to inform me where I left off”
The doctor hummed a while and at length answered “I think you had just laid it down as a position that a thousand ayear is an indispensable ingredient in the passion of love and that no man who is not so far gifted by nature can reasonably presume to feel that passion himself or be correctly the object of it with a welleducated female”
“That sir” said Miss Philomela highly incensed “is the fundamental principle which I lay down in the first chapter and which the whole four volumes of which I detailed to you the outline are intended to set in a strong practical light”
“Bless me” said the doctor “what a nap I must have had”
Miss Philomela flung away to the side of her dear friends Gall and Treacle under whose fostering patronage she had been puffed into an extensive reputation much to the advantage of the young ladies of the age whom she taught to consider themselves as a sort of commodity to be put up at public auction and knocked down to the highest bidder Mr Nightshade and Mr Mac Laurel joined the trio and it was secretly resolved that Miss Philomela should furnish them with a portion of her manuscripts and that Messieurs Gall Co should devote the following morning to cutting and drying a critique on a work calculated to prove so extensively beneficial that Mr Gall protested he really envied the writer
While this amiable and enlightened quintetto were busily employed in flattering one another Mr Cranium retired to complete the preparations he had begun in the morning for a lecture with which he intended on some future evening to favour the company Sir Patrick OPrism walked out into the grounds to study the effect of moonlight on the snowclad mountains Mr Foster and Mr Escot continued to make love and Mr Panscope to digest his plan of attack on the heart of Miss Cephalis Mr Jenkison sate by the fire reading Much Ado about Nothing the Reverend Doctor Gaster was still enjoying the benefit of Miss Philomelas opiate and serenading the company from his solitary corner Mr Chromatic was reading music and occasionally humming a note and Mr Milestone had produced his portfolio for the edification and amusement of Miss Tenorina Miss Graziosa and Squire Headlong to whom he was pointing out the various beauties of his plan for Lord Littlebrains park
Mr Milestone This you perceive is the natural state of one part of the grounds Here is a wood never yet touched by the finger of taste thick intricate and gloomy Here is a little stream dashing from stone to stone and overshadowed with these untrimmed boughs
Miss Tenorina The sweet romantic spot How beautifully the birds must sing there on a summer evening
Miss Graziosa Dear sister how can you endure the horrid thicket
Mr Milestone You are right Miss Graziosa your taste is correct—perfectly en règle Now here is the same place corrected—trimmed—polished—decorated—adorned Here sweeps a plantation in that beautiful regular curve there winds a gravel walk here are parts of the old wood left in these majestic circular clumps disposed at equal distances with wonderful symmetry there are some single shrubs scattered in elegant profusion here a Portugal laurel there a juniper here a laurustinus there a spruce fir here a larch there a lilac here a rhododendron there an arbutus The stream you see is become a canal the banks are perfectly smooth and green sloping to the waters edge and there is Lord Littlebrain rowing in an elegant boat
Squire Headlong Magical faith
Mr Milestone Here is another part of the grounds in its natural state Here is a large rock with the mountainash rooted in its fissures overgrown as you see with ivy and moss and from this part of it bursts a little fountain that runs bubbling down its rugged sides
Miss Tenorina O how beautiful How I should love the melody of that miniature cascade
Mr Milestone Beautiful Miss Tenorina Hideous Base common and popular Such a thing as you may see anywhere in wild and mountainous districts Now observe the metamorphosis Here is the same rock cut into the shape of a giant In one hand he holds a horn through which that little fountain is thrown to a prodigious elevation In the other is a ponderous stone so exactly balanced as to be apparently ready to fall on the head of any person who may happen to be beneath61 and there is Lord Littlebrain walking under it
Squire Headlong Miraculous by Mahomet
Mr Milestone This is the summit of a hill covered as you perceive with wood and with those mossy stones scattered at random under the trees
Miss Tenorina What a delightful spot to read in on a summers day The air must be so pure and the wind must sound so divinely in the tops of those old pines
Mr Milestone Bad taste Miss Tenorina Bad taste I assure you Here is the spot improved The trees are cut down the stones are cleared away this is an octagonal pavilion exactly on the centre of the summit and there you see Lord Littlebrain on the top of the pavilion enjoying the prospect with a telescope
Squire Headlong Glorious egad
Mr Milestone Here is a rugged mountainous road leading through impervious shades the ass and the four goats characterise a wild uncultured scene Here as you perceive it is totally changed into a beautiful gravelroad gracefully curving through a belt of limes and there is Lord Littlebrain driving fourinhand
Squire Headlong Egregious by Jupiter
Mr Milestone Here is Littlebrain Castle a Gothic mossgrown structure half bosomed in trees Near the casement of that turret is an owl peeping from the ivy
Squire Headlong And devilish wise he looks
Mr Milestone Here is the new house without a tree near it standing in the midst of an undulating lawn a white polished angular building reflected to a nicety in this waveless lake and there you see Lord Littlebrain looking out of the window
Squire Headlong And devilish wise he looks too You shall cut me a giant before you go
Mr Milestone Good Ill order down my little corps of pioneers
During this conversation a hot dispute had arisen between Messieurs Gall and Nightshade the latter pertinaciously insisting on having his new poem reviewed by Treacle who he knew would extol it most loftily and not by Gall whose sarcastic commendation he held in superlative horror The remonstrances of Squire Headlong silenced the disputants but did not mollify the inflexible Gall nor appease the irritated Nightshade who secretly resolved that on his return to London he would beat his drum in Grub Street form a mastigophoric corps of his own and hoist the standard of determined opposition against this critical Napoleon
Sir Patrick OPrism now entered and after some rapturous exclamations on the effect of the mountainmoonlight entreated that one of the young ladies would favour him with a song Miss Tenorina and Miss Graziosa now enchanted the company with some very scientific compositions which as usual excited admiration and astonishment in every one without a single particle of genuine pleasure The beautiful Cephalis being then summoned to take her station at the harp sang with feeling and simplicity the following air—
LOVE AND OPPORTUNITY
Oh who art thou so swiftly flying
My name is Love the child replied
Swifter I pass than southwinds sighing
Or streams through summer vales that glide
And who art thou his flight pursuing
Tis cold Neglect whom now you see
The little god you there are viewing
Will die if once hes touched by me
Oh who art thou so fast proceeding
Neer glancing back thine eyes of flame
Marked but by few through earth Im speeding
And Opportunitys my name
What form is that which scowls beside thee
Repentance is the form you see
Learn then the fate may yet betide thee
She seizes them who seize not me62
The little butler now appeared with a summons to supper shortly after which the party dispersed for the night
CHAPTER VII
THE WALK
IT was an old custom in Headlong Hall to have breakfast ready at eight and continue it till two that the various guests might rise at their own hour breakfast when they came down and employ the morning as they thought proper the squire only expecting that they should punctually assemble at dinner During the whole of this period the little butler stood sentinel at a sidetable near the fire copiously furnished with all the apparatus of tea coffee chocolate milk cream eggs rolls toast muffins bread butter potted beef cold fowl and partridge ham tongue and anchovy The Reverend Doctor Gaster found himself rather queasy in the morning therefore preferred breakfasting in bed on a mug of buttered ale and an anchovy toast The three philosophers made their appearance at eight and enjoyed les prémices des dépouilles Mr Foster proposed that as it was a fine frosty morning and they were all good pedestrians they should take a walk to Tremadoc to see the improvements carrying on in that vicinity This being readily acceded to they began their walk
After their departure appeared Squire Headlong and Mr Milestone who agreed over their muffin and partridge to walk together to a ruined tower within the precincts of the squires grounds which Mr Milestone thought he could improve
The other guests dropped in by ones and twos and made their respective arrangements for the morning Mr Panscope took a little ramble with Mr Cranium in the course of which the former professed a great enthusiasm for the science of craniology and a great deal of love for the beautiful Cephalis adding a few words about his expectations the old gentleman was unable to withstand this triple battery and it was accordingly determined—after the manner of the heroic age in which it was deemed superfluous to consult the opinions and feelings of the lady as to the manner in which she should be disposed of—that the lovely Miss Cranium should be made the happy bride of the accomplished Mr Panscope We shall leave them for the present to settle preliminaries while we accompany the three philosophers in their walk to Tremadoc
The vale contracted as they advanced and when they had passed the termination of the lake their road wound along a narrow and romantic pass through the middle of which an impetuous torrent dashed over vast fragments of stone The pass was bordered on both sides by perpendicular rocks broken into the wildest forms of fantastic magnificence
“These are indeed” said Mr Escot “confracti mundi rudera71 yet they must be feeble images of the valleys of the Andes where the philosophic eye may contemplate in their utmost extent the effects of that tremendous convulsion which destroyed the perpendicularity of the poles and inundated this globe with that torrent of physical evil from which the greater torrent of moral evil has issued that will continue to roll on with an expansive power and an accelerated impetus till the whole human race shall be swept away in its vortex”
“The precession of the equinoxes” said Mr Foster “will gradually ameliorate the physical state of our planet till the ecliptic shall again coincide with the equator and the equal diffusion of light and heat over the whole surface of the earth typify the equal and happy existence of man who will then have attained the final step of pure and perfect intelligence”
“It is by no means clear” said Mr Jenkison “that the axis of the earth was ever perpendicular to the plane of its orbit or that it ever will be so Explosion and convulsion are necessary to the maintenance of either hypothesis for La Place has demonstrated that the precession of the equinoxes is only a secular equation of a very long period which of course proves nothing either on one side or the other”
They now emerged by a winding ascent from the vale of Llanberris and after some little time arrived at Bedd Gelert Proceeding through the sublimely romantic pass of Aberglaslynn their road led along the edge of Traeth Mawr a vast arm of the sea which they then beheld in all the magnificence of the flowing tide Another five miles brought them to the embankment which has since been completed and which by connecting the two counties of Meirionnydd and Caernarvon excludes the sea from an extensive tract The embankment which was carried on at the same time from both the opposite coasts was then very nearly meeting in the centre They walked to the extremity of that part of it which was thrown out from the Caernarvonshire shore The tide was now ebbing it had filled the vast basin within forming a lake about five miles in length and more than one in breadth As they looked upwards with their backs to the open sea they beheld a scene which no other in this country can parallel and which the admirers of the magnificence of nature will ever remember with regret whatever consolation may be derived from the probable utility of the works which have excluded the waters from their ancient receptacle Vast rocks and precipices intersected with little torrents formed the barrier on the left on the right the triple summit of Moëlwyn reared its majestic boundary in the depth was that sea of mountains the wild and stormy outline of the Snowdonian chain with the giant Wyddfa towering in the midst The mountainframe remains unchanged unchangeable but the liquid mirror it enclosed is gone
The tide ebbed with rapidity the waters within retained by the embankment poured through its two points an impetuous cataract curling and boiling in innumerable eddies and making a tumultuous melody admirably in unison with the surrounding scene The three philosophers looked on in silence and at length unwillingly turned away and proceeded to the little town of Tremadoc which is built on land recovered in a similar manner from the sea After inspecting the manufactories and refreshing themselves at the inn on a cold saddle of mutton and a bottle of sherry they retraced their steps towards Headlong Hall commenting as they went on the various objects they had seen
Mr Escot I regret that time did not allow us to see the caves on the seashore There is one of which the depth is said to be unknown There is a tradition in the country that an adventurous fiddler once resolved to explore it that he entered and never returned but that the subterranean sound of a fiddle was heard at a farmhouse seven miles inland It is therefore concluded that he lost his way in the labyrinth of caverns supposed to exist under the rocky soil of this part of the country
Mr Jenkison A supposition that must always remain in force unless a second fiddler equally adventurous and more successful should return with an accurate report of the true state of the fact
Mr Foster What think you of the little colony we have just been inspecting a city as it were in its cradle
Mr Escot With all the weakness of infancy and all the vices of maturer age I confess the sight of those manufactories which have suddenly sprung up like fungous excrescences in the bosom of these wild and desolate scenes impressed me with as much horror and amazement as the sudden appearance of the stocking manufactory struck into the mind of Rousseau when in a lonely valley of the Alps he had just congratulated himself on finding a spot where man had never been
Mr Foster The manufacturing system is not yet purified from some evils which necessarily attend it but which I conceive are greatly overbalanced by their concomitant advantages Contemplate the vast sum of human industry to which this system so essentially contributes seas covered with vessels ports resounding with life profound researches scientific inventions complicated mechanism canals carried over deep valleys and through the bosoms of hills employment and existence thus given to innumerable families and the multiplied comforts and conveniences of life diffused over the whole community
Mr Escot You present to me a complicated picture of artificial life and require me to admire it Seas covered with vessels every one of which contains two or three tyrants and from fifty to a thousand slaves ignorant gross perverted and active only in mischief Ports resounding with life in other words with noise and drunkenness the mingled din of avarice intemperance and prostitution Profound researches scientific inventions to what end To contract the sum of human wants to teach the art of living on a little to disseminate independence liberty and health No to multiply factitious desires to stimulate depraved appetites to invent unnatural wants to heap up incense on the shrine of luxury and accumulate expedients of selfish and ruinous profusion Complicated machinery behold its blessings Twenty years ago at the door of every cottage sate the good woman with her spinningwheel the children if not more profitably employed than in gathering heath and sticks at least laid in a stock of health and strength to sustain the labours of maturer years Where is the spinningwheel now and every simple and insulated occupation of the industrious cottager Wherever this boasted machinery is established the children of the poor are deathdoomed from their cradles Look for one moment at midnight into a cottonmill amidst the smell of oil the smoke of lamps the rattling of wheels the dizzy and complicated motions of diabolical mechanism contemplate the little human machines that keep play with the revolutions of the iron work robbed at that hour of their natural rest as of air and exercise by day observe their pale and ghastly features more ghastly in that baleful and malignant light and tell me if you do not fancy yourself on the threshold of Virgils hell where
Continuo auditæ voces vagitus et ingens
Infantumque animæ flentes in limine primo
Quos dulcis vitæ exsortes et ab ubere raptos
Abstulit atra dies et FUNERE MERSIT ACERBO
As Mr Escot said this a little rosycheeked girl with a basket of heath on her head came tripping down the side of one of the rocks on the left The force of contrast struck even on the phlegmatic spirit of Mr Jenkison and he almost inclined for a moment to the doctrine of deterioration Mr Escot continued
Mr Escot Nor is the lot of the parents more enviable Sedentary victims of unhealthy toil they have neither the corporeal energy of the savage nor the mental acquisitions of the civilised man Mind indeed they have none and scarcely animal life They are mere automata component parts of the enormous machines which administer to the pampered appetites of the few who consider themselves the most valuable portion of a state because they consume in indolence the fruits of the earth and contribute nothing to the benefit of the community
Mr Jenkison That these are evils cannot be denied but they have their counterbalancing advantages That a man should pass the day in a furnace and the night in a cellar is bad for the individual but good for others who enjoy the benefit of his labour
Mr Escot By what right do they so
Mr Jenkison By the right of all property and all possession le droit du plus fort
Mr Escot Do you justify that principle
Mr Jenkison I neither justify nor condemn it It is practically recognised in all societies and though it is certainly the source of enormous evil I conceive it is also the source of abundant good or it would not have so many supporters
Mr Escot That is by no means a consequence Do we not every day see men supporting the most enormous evils which they know to be so with respect to others and which in reality are so with respect to themselves though an erroneous view of their own miserable selfinterest induces them to think otherwise
Mr Jenkison Good and evil exist only as they are perceived I cannot therefore understand how that which a man perceives to be good can be in reality an evil to him indeed the word reality only signifies strong belief
Mr Escot The views of such a man I contend are false If he could be made to see the truth——
Mr Jenkison He sees his own truth Truth is that which a man troweth Where there is no man there is no truth Thus the truth of one is not the truth of another72
Mr Foster I am aware of the etymology but I contend that there is an universal and immutable truth deducible from the nature of things
Mr Jenkison By whom deducible Philosophers have investigated the nature of things for centuries yet no two of them will agree in trowing the same conclusion
Mr Foster The progress of philosophical investigation and the rapidly increasing accuracy of human knowledge approximate by degrees the diversities of opinion so that in process of time moral science will be susceptible of mathematical demonstration and clear and indisputable principles being universally recognised the coincidence of deduction will necessarily follow
Mr Escot Possibly when the inroads of luxury and disease shall have exterminated nine hundred and ninetynine thousand nine hundred and ninetynine of every million of the human race the remaining fractional units may congregate into one point and come to something like the same conclusion
Mr Jenkison I doubt it much I conceive if only we three were survivors of the whole system of terrestrial being we should never agree in our decisions as to the cause of the calamity
Mr Escot Be that as it may I think you must at least assent to the following positions that the many are sacrificed to the few that ninetynine in a hundred are occupied in a perpetual struggle for the preservation of a perilous and precarious existence while the remaining one wallows in all the redundancies of luxury that can be wrung from their labours and privations that luxury and liberty are incompatible and that every new want you invent for civilised man is a new instrument of torture for him who cannot indulge it
They had now regained the shores of the lake when the conversation was suddenly interrupted by a tremendous explosion followed by a violent splashing of water and various sounds of tumult and confusion which induced them to quicken their pace towards the spot whence they proceeded
CHAPTER VIII
THE TOWER
IN all the thoughts words and actions of Squire Headlong there was a remarkable alacrity of progression which almost annihilated the interval between conception and execution He was utterly regardless of obstacles and seemed to have expunged their very name from his vocabulary His designs were never nipped in their infancy by the contemplation of those trivial difficulties which often turn awry the current of enterprise and though the rapidity of his movements was sometimes arrested by a more formidable barrier either naturally existing in the pursuit he had undertaken or created by his own impetuosity he seldom failed to succeed either in knocking it down or cutting his way through it He had little idea of gradation he saw no interval between the first step and the last but pounced upon his object with the impetus of a mountain cataract This rapidity of movement indeed subjected him to some disasters which cooler spirits would have escaped He was an excellent sportsman and almost always killed his game but now and then he killed his dog81 Rocks streams hedges gates and ditches were objects of no account in his estimation though a dislocated shoulder several severe bruises and two or three narrow escapes for his neck might have been expected to teach him a certain degree of caution in effecting his transitions He was so singularly alert in climbing precipices and traversing torrents that when he went out on a shooting party he was very soon left to continue his sport alone for he was sure to dash up or down some nearly perpendicular path where no one else had either ability or inclination to follow He had a pleasure boat on the lake which he steered with amazing dexterity but as he always indulged himself in the utmost possible latitude of sail he was occasionally upset by a sudden gust and was indebted to his skill in the art of swimming for the opportunity of tempering with a copious libation of wine the unnatural frigidity introduced into his stomach by the extraordinary intrusion of water an element which he had religiously determined should never pass his lips but of which on these occasions he was sometimes compelled to swallow no inconsiderable quantity This circumstance alone of the various disasters that befell him occasioned him any permanent affliction and he accordingly noted the day in his pocketbook as a dies nefastus with this simple abstract and brief chronicle of the calamity Mem Swallowed two or three pints of water without any notice whatever of the concomitant circumstances These days of which there were several were set apart in Headlong Hall for the purpose of anniversary expiation and as often as the day returned on which the squire had swallowed water he not only made a point of swallowing a treble allowance of wine himself but imposed a heavy mulct on every one of his servants who should be detected in a state of sobriety after sunset but their conduct on these occasions was so uniformly exemplary that no instance of the infliction of the penalty appears on record
The squire and Mr Milestone as we have already said had set out immediately after breakfast to examine the capabilities of the scenery The object that most attracted Mr Milestones admiration was a ruined tower on a projecting point of rock almost totally overgrown with ivy This ivy Mr Milestone observed required trimming and clearing in various parts a little pointing and polishing was also necessary for the dilapidated walls and the whole effect would be materially increased by a plantation of spruce fir interspersed with cypress and juniper the present rugged and broken ascent from the land side being first converted into a beautiful slope which might be easily effected by blowing up a part of the rock with gunpowder laying on a quantity of fine mould and covering the whole with an elegant stratum of turf
Squire Headlong caught with avidity at this suggestion and as he had always a store of gunpowder in the house for the accommodation of himself and his shooting visitors and for the supply of a small battery of cannon which he kept for his private amusement he insisted on commencing operations immediately Accordingly he bounded back to the house and very speedily returned accompanied by the little butler and half a dozen servants and labourers with pickaxes and gunpowder a hanging stove and a poker together with a basket of cold meat and two or three bottles of Madeira for the Squire thought with many others that a copious supply of provision is a very necessary ingredient in all rural amusements
Mr Milestone superintended the proceedings The rock was excavated the powder introduced the apertures strongly blockaded with fragments of stone a long train was laid to a spot which Mr Milestone fixed on as sufficiently remote from the possibility of harm the Squire seized the poker and after flourishing it in the air with a degree of dexterity which induced the rest of the party to leave him in solitary possession of an extensive circumference applied the end of it to the train and the rapidly communicated ignition ran hissing along the surface of the soil
At this critical moment Mr Cranium and Mr Panscope appeared at the top of the tower which unseeing and unseen they had ascended on the opposite side to that where the Squire and Mr Milestone were conducting their operations Their sudden appearance a little dismayed the Squire who however comforted himself with the reflection that the tower was perfectly safe or at least was intended to be so and that his friends were in no probable danger but of a knock on the head from a flying fragment of stone
The succession of these thoughts in the mind of the Squire was commensurate in rapidity to the progress of the ignition which having reached its extremity the explosion took place and the shattered rock was hurled into the air in the midst of fire and smoke
Mr Milestone had properly calculated the force of the explosion for the tower remained untouched but the Squire in his consolatory reflections had omitted the consideration of the influence of sudden fear which had so violent an effect on Mr Cranium who was just commencing a speech concerning the very fine prospect from the top of the tower that cutting short the thread of his observations he bounded under the elastic influence of terror several feet into the air His ascent being unluckily a little out of the perpendicular he descended with a proportionate curve from the apex of his projection and alighted not on the wall of the tower but in an ivybush by its side which giving way beneath him transferred him to a tuft of hazel at its base which after upholding him an instant consigned him to the boughs of an ash that had rooted itself in a fissure about half way down the rock which finally transmitted him to the waters below
Squire Headlong anxiously watched the tower as the smoke which at first enveloped it rolled away but when this shadowy curtain was withdrawn and Mr Panscope was discovered solus in a tragical attitude his apprehensions became boundless and he concluded that the unlucky collision of a flying fragment of rock had indeed emancipated the spirit of the craniologist from its terrestrial bondage
Mr Escot had considerably outstripped his companions and arrived at the scene of the disaster just as Mr Cranium being utterly destitute of natatorial skill was in imminent danger of final submersion The deteriorationist who had cultivated this valuable art with great success immediately plunged in to his assistance and brought him alive and in safety to a shelving part of the shore Their landing was hailed with a viewholla from the delighted Squire who shaking them both heartily by the hand and making ten thousand lame apologies to Mr Cranium concluded by asking in a pathetic tone How much water he had swallowed and without waiting for his answer filled a large tumbler with Madeira and insisted on his tossing it off which was no sooner said than done Mr Jenkison and Mr Foster now made their appearance Mr Panscope descended the tower which he vowed never again to approach within a quarter of a mile The tumbler of Madeira was replenished and handed round to recruit the spirits of the party which now began to move towards Headlong Hall the Squire capering for joy in the van and the little fat butler waddling in the rear
The Squire took care that Mr Cranium should be seated next to him at dinner and plied him so hard with Madeira to prevent him as he said from taking cold that long before the ladies sent in their summons to coffee every organ in his brain was in a complete state of revolution and the Squire was under the necessity of ringing for three or four servants to carry him to bed observing with a smile of great satisfaction that he was in a very excellent way for escaping any ill consequences that might have resulted from his accident
The beautiful Cephalis being thus freed from his surveillance was enabled during the course of the evening to develop to his preserver the full extent of her gratitude
CHAPTER IX
THE SEXTON
MR ESCOT passed a sleepless night the ordinary effect of love according to some amatory poets who seem to have composed their whining ditties for the benevolent purpose of bestowing on others that gentle slumber of which they so pathetically lament the privation The deteriorationist entered into a profound moral soliloquy in which he first examined whether a philosopher ought to be in love Having decided this point affirmatively against Plato and Lucretius he next examined whether that passion ought to have the effect of keeping a philosopher awake Having decided this negatively he resolved to go to sleep immediately not being able to accomplish this to his satisfaction he tossed and tumbled like Achilles or Orlando first on one side then on the other repeated to himself several hundred lines of poetry counted a thousand began again and counted another thousand in vain the beautiful Cephalis was the predominant image in all his soliloquies in all his repetitions even in the numerical process from which he sought relief he did but associate the idea of number with that of his dear tormentor till she appeared to his minds eye in a thousand similitudes distinct not different These thousand images indeed were but one and yet the one was a thousand a sort of unimultiplex phantasma which will be very intelligible to some understandings
He arose with the first peep of day and sallied forth to enjoy the balmy breeze of morning which any but a lover might have thought too cool for it was an intense frost the sun had not risen and the wind was rather fresh from northeast and by north But a lover who like Ladurlad in the Curse of Kehama always has or at least is supposed to have “a fire in his heart and a fire in his brain” feels a wintry breeze from NE and by N steal over his cheek like the south over a bank of violets therefore on walked the philosopher with his coat unbuttoned and his hat in his hand careless of whither he went till he found himself near the enclosure of a little mountain chapel Passing through the wicket and stepping over two or three graves he stood on a rustic tombstone and peeped through the chapel window examining the interior with as much curiosity as if he had “forgotten what the inside of a church was made of” which it is rather to be feared was the case Before him and beneath him were the font the altar and the grave which gave rise to a train of moral reflections on the three great epochs in the course of the featherless biped—birth marriage and death The middle stage of the process arrested his attention and his imagination placed before him several figures which he thought with the addition of his own would make a very picturesque group the beautiful Cephalis “arrayed in her bridal apparel of white” her friend Caprioletta officiating as bridemaid Mr Cranium giving her away and last not least the Reverend Doctor Gaster intoning the marriage ceremony with the regular orthodox allowance of nasal recitative Whilst he was feasting his eyes on this imaginary picture the demon of mistrust insinuated himself into the storehouse of his conceptions and removing his figure from the group substituted that of Mr Panscope which gave such a violent shock to his feelings that he suddenly exclaimed with an extraordinary elevation of voice Οιμοι κακοδαιμων και τρις κακοδαιμων και τετρακις και πεντακις και δωδεκακις και μυριακις91 to the great terror of the sexton who was just entering the churchyard and not knowing from whence the voice proceeded pensa que fut un diableteau The sight of the philosopher dispelled his apprehensions when growing suddenly valiant he immediately addressed him—
“Cot pless your honour I should nt have thought of meeting any pody here at this time of the morning except look you it was the tevil—who to pe sure toes not often come upon consecrated cround—put for all that I think I have seen him now and then in former tays when old Nanny Llwyd of Llynisa was living—Cot teliver us a terriple old witch to pe sure she was—I tid nt much like tigging her crave—put I prought two cocks with me—the tevil hates cocks—and tied them py the leg on two tombstones—and I tug and the cocks crowed and the tevil kept at a tistance To pe sure now if I had nt peen very prave py nature—as I ought to pe truly—for my father was Owen ApLlwyd ApGryffydd ApShenkin ApWilliams ApThomas ApMorgan ApParry ApEvan ApRhys a coot preacher and a lover of cwrw92—I should have thought just now pefore I saw your honour that the foice I heard was the tevils calling Nanny Llwyd—Cot pless us to pe sure she should have been puried in the middle of the river where the tevil cant come as your honour fery well knows”
“I am perfectly aware of it” said Mr Escot
“True true” continued the sexton “put to pe sure Owen Thomas of MorfaBach will have it that one summer evening—when he went over to Cwm Cynfael in Meirionnydd apout some cattles he wanted to puy—he saw a strange figure—pless us—with five horns—Cot save us sitting on Hugh Llwyds pulpit which your honour fery well knows is a pig rock in the middle of the river——”
“Of course he was mistaken” said Mr Escot
“To pe sure he was” said the sexton “For there is no toubt put the tevil when Owen Thomas saw him must have peen sitting on a piece of rock in a straight line from him on the other side of the river where he used to sit look you for a whole summers tay while Hugh Llwyd was on his pulpit and there they used to talk across the water for Hugh Llwyd please your honour never raised the tevil except when he was safe in the middle of the river which proves that Owen Thomas in his fright did nt pay proper attention to the exact spot where the tevil was”
The sexton concluded his speech with an approving smile at his own sagacity in so luminously expounding the nature of Owen Thomass mistake
“I perceive” said Mr Escot “you have a very deep insight into things and can therefore perhaps facilitate the resolution of a question concerning which though I have little doubt on the subject I am desirous of obtaining the most extensive and accurate information”
The sexton scratched his head the language of Mr Escot not being to his apprehension quite so luminous as his own
“You have been sexton here” continued Mr Escot in the language of Hamlet “man and boy forty years”
The sexton turned pale The period Mr Escot named was so nearly the true one that he began to suspect the personage before him of being rather too familiar with Hugh Llwyds sable visitor Recovering himself a little he said “Why thereapouts sure enough”
“During this period you have of course dug up many bones of the people of ancient times”
“Pones Cot pless you yes pones as old as the orlt”
“Perhaps you can show me a few”
The sexton grinned horribly a ghastly smile “Will you take your Pible oath you tont want them to raise the tevil with”
“Willingly” said Mr Escot smiling “I have an abstruse reason for the inquiry”
“Why if you have an obtuse reason” said the sexton who thought this a good opportunity to show that he could pronounce hard words as well as other people “if you have an obtuse reason that alters the case”
So saying he lead the way to the bonehouse from which he began to throw out various bones and skulls of more than common dimensions and amongst them a skull of very extraordinary magnitude which he swore by St David was the skull of Cadwallader
“How do you know this to be his skull” said Mr Escot
“He was the piggest man that ever lived and he was puried here and this is the piggest skull I ever found you see now——”
“Nothing can be more logical” said Mr Escot “My good friend will you allow me to take this skull away with me”
“St Winifred pless us” exclaimed the sexton “would you have me haunted py his chost for taking his plessed pones out of consecrated cround Would you have him come in the tead of the night and fly away with the roof of my house Would you have all the crop of my carden come to nothing for look you his epitaph says
“He that my pones shall ill pestow
Leek in his cround shall never crow”
“You will ill bestow them” said Mr Escot “in confounding them with those of the sons of little men the degenerate dwarfs of later generations you will well bestow them in giving them to me for I will have this illustrious skull bound with a silver rim and filled with mantling wine with this inscription NUNC TANDEM signifying that that pernicious liquor has at length found its proper receptacle for when the wine is in the brain is out”
Saying these words he put a dollar into the hands of the sexton who instantly stood spellbound by the talismanic influence of the coin while Mr Escot walked off in triumph with the skull of Cadwallader
CHAPTER X
THE SKULL
WHEN Mr Escot entered the breakfastroom he found the majority of the party assembled and the little butler very active at his station Several of the ladies shrieked at the sight of the skull and Miss Tenorina starting up in great haste and terror caused the subversion of a cup of chocolate which a servant was handing to the Reverend Doctor Gaster into the nape of the neck of Sir Patrick OPrism Sir Patrick rising impetuously to clap an extinguisher as he expressed himself on the farthing rushlight of the rascals life pushed over the chair of Marmaduke Milestone Esquire who catching for support at the first thing that came in his way which happened unluckily to be the corner of the tablecloth drew it instantaneously with him to the floor involving plates cups and saucers in one promiscuous ruin But as the principal matériel of the breakfast apparatus was on the little butlers sidetable the confusion occasioned by this accident was happily greater than the damage Miss Tenorina was so agitated that she was obliged to retire Miss Graziosa accompanied her through pure sisterly affection and sympathy not without a lingering look at Sir Patrick who likewise retired to change his coat but was very expeditious in returning to resume his attack on the cold partridge The broken cups were cleared away the cloth relaid and the array of the table restored with wonderful celerity
Mr Escot was a little surprised at the scene of confusion which signalised his entrance but perfectly unconscious that it originated with the skull of Cadwallader he advanced to seat himself at the table by the side of the beautiful Cephalis first placing the skull in a corner out of the reach of Mr Cranium who sate eyeing it with lively curiosity and after several efforts to restrain his impatience exclaimed “You seem to have found a rarity”
“A rarity indeed” said Mr Escot cracking an egg as he spoke “no less than the genuine and indubitable skull of Cadwallader”
“The skull of Cadwallader” vociferated Mr Cranium “O treasure of treasures”
Mr Escot then detailed by what means he had become possessed of it which gave birth to various remarks from the other individuals of the party after which rising from table and taking the skull again in his hand
“This skull” said he “is the skull of a hero παλαι κατατεϑνειωτος101 and sufficiently demonstrates a point concerning which I never myself entertained a doubt that the human race is undergoing a gradual process of diminution in length breadth and thickness Observe this skull Even the skull of our reverend friend which is the largest and thickest in the company is not more than half its size The frame this skull belonged to could scarcely have been less than nine feet high Such is the lamentable progress of degeneracy and decay In the course of ages a boot of the present generation would form an ample chateau for a large family of our remote posterity The mind too participates in the contraction of the body Poets and philosophers of all ages and nations have lamented this too visible process of physical and moral deterioration ‘The sons of little men’ says Ossian ‘Οιοι νυν βροτοι εισιν’ says Homer ‘such men as live in these degenerate days’ ‘All things’ says Virgil ‘have a retrocessive tendency and grow worse and worse by the inevitable doom of fate’102 ‘We live in the ninth age’ says Juvenal ‘an age worse than the age of iron nature has no metal sufficiently pernicious to give a denomination to its wickedness’103 ‘Our fathers’ says Horace ‘worse than our grandfathers have given birth to us their more vicious progeny who in our turn shall become the parents of a still viler generation’104 You all know the fable of the buried Pict who bit off the end of a pickaxe with which sacrilegious hands were breaking open his grave and called out with a voice like subterranean thunder I perceive the degeneracy of your race by the smallness of your little finger videlicet the pickaxe This to be sure is a fiction but it shows the prevalent opinion the feeling the conviction of absolute universal irremediable deterioration”
“I should be sorry” said Mr Foster “that such an opinion should become universal independently of my conviction of its fallacy Its general admission would tend in a great measure to produce the very evils it appears to lament What could be its effect but to check the ardour of investigation to extinguish the zeal of philanthropy to freeze the current of enterprising hope to bury in the torpor of scepticism and in the stagnation of despair every better faculty of the human mind which will necessarily become retrograde in ceasing to be progressive”
“I am inclined to think on the contrary” said Mr Escot “that the deterioration of man is accelerated by his blindness—in many respects wilful blindness—to the truth of the fact itself and to the causes which produce it that there is no hope whatever of ameliorating his condition but in a total and radical change of the whole scheme of human life and that the advocates of his indefinite perfectibility are in reality the greatest enemies to the practical possibility of their own system by so strenuously labouring to impress on his attention that he is going on in a good way while he is really in a deplorably bad one”
“I admit” said Mr Foster “there are many things that may and therefore will be changed for the better”
“Not on the present system” said Mr Escot “in which every change is for the worse”
“In matters of taste I am sure it is” said Mr Gall “there is in fact no such thing as good taste left in the world”
“Oh Mr Gall” said Miss Philomela Poppyseed “I thought my novel——”
“My paintings” said Sir Patrick OPrism——
“My ode” said Mr Mac Laurel——
“My ballad” said Mr Nightshade——
“My plan for Lord Littlebrains park” said Marmaduke Milestone Esquire——
“My essay” said Mr Treacle——
“My sonata” said Mr Chromatic——
“My claret” said Squire Headlong——
“My lectures” said Mr Cranium——
“Vanity of vanities” said the Reverend Doctor Gaster turning down an empty eggshell “all is vanity and vexation of spirit”
CHAPTER XI
THE ANNIVERSARY
AMONG the dies albâ cretâ notandos which the beau monde of the Cambrian mountains was in the habit of remembering with the greatest pleasure and anticipating with the most lively satisfaction was the Christmas ball which the ancient family of the Headlongs had been accustomed to give from time immemorial Tradition attributed the honour of its foundation to Headlong ApHeadlong ApBreakneck ApHeadlong ApCataract ApPistyll ApRhaidr111 ApHeadlong who lived about the time of the Trojan war Certain it is at least that a grand chorus was always sung after supper in honour of this illustrious ancestor of the squire This ball was indeed an æra in the lives of all the beauty and fashion of Caernarvon Meirionnydd and Anglesea and like the Greek Olympiads and the Roman consulates served as the main pillar of memory round which all the events of the year were suspended and entwined Thus in recalling to mind any circumstance imperfectly recollected the principal point to be ascertained was whether it had occurred in the year of the first second third or fourth ball of Headlong ApBreakneck or Headlong ApTorrent or Headlong ApHurricane and this being satisfactorily established the remainder followed of course in the natural order of its ancient association
This eventful anniversary being arrived every chariot coach barouche and barouchette landau and landaulet chaise curricle buggy whiskey and tilbury of the three counties was in motion not a horse was left idle within five miles of any gentlemans seat from the highmettled hunter to the heathcropping galloway The ferrymen of the Menai were at their stations before daybreak taking a double allowance of rum and cwrw to strengthen them for the fatigues of the day The ivied towers of Caernarvon the romantic woods of Tanybwlch the heathy hills of Kernioggau the sandy shores of Tremadoc the mountain recesses of BeddGelert and the lonely lakes of CapelCerig reechoed to the voices of the delighted ostlers and postillions who reaped on this happy day their wintry harvest Landlords and landladies waiters chambermaids and tollgate keepers roused themselves from the torpidity which the last solitary tourist flying with the yellow leaves on the wings of the autumnal wind had left them to enjoy till the returning spring the bustle of August was renewed on all the mountain roads and in the meanwhile Squire Headlong and his little fat butler carried most energetically into effect the lessons of the savant in the Court of Quintessence qui par engin mirificque jectoit les maisons par les fenestres112
It was the custom for the guests to assemble at dinner on the day of the ball and depart on the following morning after breakfast Sleep during this interval was out of the question the ancient harp of Cambria suspended the celebration of the noble race of Shenkin and the songs of Hoel and Cyveilioc to ring to the profaner but more lively modulation of Voulez vous danser Mademoiselle in conjunction with the symphonious scraping of fiddles the tinkling of triangles and the beating of tambourines Comus and Momus were the deities of the night and Bacchus of course was not forgotten by the male part of the assembly with them indeed a ball was invariably a scene of “tipsy dance and jollity” the servants flew about with wine and negus and the little butler was indefatigable with his corkscrew which is reported on one occasion to have grown so hot under the influence of perpetual friction that it actually set fire to the cork
The company assembled The dinner which on this occasion was a secondary object was despatched with uncommon celerity When the cloth was removed and the bottle had taken its first round Mr Cranium stood up and addressed the company
“Ladies and gentlemen” said he “the golden key of mental phænomena which has lain buried for ages in the deepest vein of the mine of physiological research is now by a happy combination of practical and speculative investigations grasped if I may so express myself firmly and inexcusably in the hands of physiognomical empiricism” The Cambrian visitors listened with profound attention not comprehending a single syllable he said but concluding he would finish his speech by proposing the health of Squire Headlong The gentlemen accordingly tossed off their heeltaps and Mr Cranium proceeded “Ardently desirous to the extent of my feeble capacity of disseminating as much as possible the inexhaustible treasures to which this golden key admits the humblest votary of philosophical truth I invite you when you have sufficiently restored replenished refreshed and exhilarated that osteosarchæmatosplanchnochondroneuromuelous or to employ a more intelligible term osseocarnisanguineoviscericartilaginonervomedullary compages or shell the body which at once envelopes and developes that mysterious and inestimable kernel the desiderative determinative ratiocinative imaginative inquisitive appetitive comparative reminiscent congeries of ideas and notions simple and compound comprised in the comprehensive denomination of mind to take a peep with me into the mechanical arcana of the anatomicometaphysical universe Being not in the least dubitative of your spontaneous compliance I proceed” added he suddenly changing his tone “to get everything ready in the library” Saying these words he vanished
The Welsh squires now imagined they had caught a glimpse of his meaning and set him down in their minds for a sort of gentleman conjuror who intended to amuse them before the ball with some tricks of legerdemain Under this impression they became very impatient to follow him as they had made up their minds not to be drunk before supper The ladies too were extremely curious to witness an exhibition which had been announced in so singular a preamble and the squire having previously insisted on every gentleman tossing off a halfpint bumper adjourned the whole party to the library where they were not a little surprised to discover Mr Cranium seated in a pensive attitude at a large table decorated with a copious variety of skulls
Some of the ladies were so much shocked at this extraordinary display that a scene of great confusion ensued Fans were very actively exercised and water was strenuously called for by some of the most officious of the gentlemen on which the little butler entered with a large allowance of liquid which bore indeed the name of water but was in reality a very powerful spirit This was the only species of water which the little butler had ever heard called for in Headlong Hall The mistake was not attended with any evil effects for the fluid was no sooner applied to the lips of the fainting fair ones than it resuscitated them with an expedition truly miraculous
Order was at length restored the audience took their seats and the craniological orator held forth in the following terms
CHAPTER XII
THE LECTURE
“PHYSIOLOGISTS have been much puzzled to account for the varieties of moral character in men as well as for the remarkable similarity of habit and disposition in all the individual animals of every other respective species A few brief sentences perspicuously worded and scientifically arranged will enumerate all the characteristics of a lion or a tiger or a wolf or a bear or a squirrel or a goat or a horse or an ass or a rat or a cat or a hog or a dog and whatever is physiologically predicted of any individual lion tiger wolf bear squirrel goat horse ass hog or dog will be found to hold true of all lions tigers wolves bears squirrels goats horses asses hogs and dogs whatsoever Now in man the very reverse of this appears to be the case for he has so few distinct and characteristic marks which hold true of all his species that philosophers in all ages have found it a task of infinite difficulty to give him a definition Hence one has defined him to be a featherless biped a definition which is equally applicable to an unfledged fowl another to be an animal which forms opinions than which nothing can be more inaccurate for a very small number of the species form opinions and the remainder take them upon trust without investigation or inquiry
“Again man has been defined to be an animal that carries a stick an attribute which undoubtedly belongs to man only but not to all men always though it uniformly characterises some of the graver and more imposing varieties such as physicians oranoutangs and lords in waiting
“We cannot define man to be a reasoning animal for we do not dispute that idiots are men to say nothing of that very numerous description of persons who consider themselves reasoning animals and are so denominated by the ironical courtesy of the world who labour nevertheless under a very gross delusion in that essential particular
“It appears to me that man may be correctly defined an animal which without any peculiar or distinguishing faculty of its own is as it were a bundle or compound of faculties of other animals by a distinct enumeration of which any individual of the species may be satisfactorily described This is manifest even in the ordinary language of conversation when in summing up for example the qualities of an accomplished courtier we say he has the vanity of a peacock the cunning of a fox the treachery of an hyæna the coldheartedness of a cat and the servility of a jackal That this is perfectly consentaneous to scientific truth will appear in the further progress of these observations
“Every particular faculty of the mind has its corresponding organ in the brain In proportion as any particular faculty or propensity acquires paramount activity in any individual these organs develope themselves and their development becomes externally obvious by corresponding lumps and bumps exuberances and protuberances on the osseous compages of the occiput and sinciput In all animals but man the same organ is equally developed in every individual of the species for instance that of migration in the swallow that of destruction in the tiger that of architecture in the beaver and that of parental affection in the bear The human brain however consists as I have said of a bundle or compound of all the faculties of all other animals and from the greater development of one or more of these in the infinite varieties of combination result all the peculiarities of individual character
“Here is the skull of a beaver and that of Sir Christopher Wren You observe in both these specimens the prodigious development of the organ of constructiveness
“Here is the skull of a bullfinch and that of an eminent fiddler You may compare the organ of music
“Here is the skull of a tiger You observe the organ of carnage Here is the skull of a fox You observe the organ of plunder Here is the skull of a peacock You observe the organ of vanity Here is the skull of an illustrious robber who after a long and triumphant process of depredation and murder was suddenly checked in his career by means of a certain quality inherent in preparations of hemp which for the sake of perspicuity I shall call suspensiveness Here is the skull of a conqueror who after overrunning several kingdoms burning a number of cities and causing the deaths of two or three millions of men women and children was entombed with all the pageantry of public lamentation and figured as the hero of several thousand odes and a round dozen of epics while the poor highwayman was twice executed—
‘At the gallows first and after in a ballad
Sung to a villainous tune’
“You observe in both these skulls the combined development of the organs of carnage plunder and vanity which I have separately pointed out in the tiger the fox and the peacock The greater enlargement of the organ of vanity in the hero is the only criterion by which I can distinguish them from each other Born with the same faculties and the same propensities these two men were formed by nature to run the same career the different combinations of external circumstances decided the differences of their destinies
“Here is the skull of a Newfoundland dog You observe the organ of benevolence and that of attachment Here is a human skull in which you may observe a very striking negation of both these organs and an equally striking development of those of destruction cunning avarice and selflove This was one of the most illustrious statesmen that ever flourished in the page of history
“Here is the skull of a turnspit which after a wretched life of dirty work was turned out of doors to die on a dunghill I have been induced to preserve it in consequence of its remarkable similarity to this which belonged to a courtly poet who having grown grey in flattering the great was cast off in the same manner to perish by the same catastrophe”
After these and several other illustrations during which the skulls were handed round for the inspection of the company Mr Cranium proceeded thus—
“It is obvious from what I have said that no man can hope for worldly honour or advancement who is not placed in such a relation to external circumstances as may be consentaneous to his peculiar cerebral organs and I would advise every parent who has the welfare of his son at heart to procure as extensive a collection as possible of the skulls of animals and before determining on the choice of a profession to compare with the utmost nicety their bumps and protuberances with those of the skull of his son If the development of the organ of destruction point out a similarity between the youth and the tiger let him be brought to some profession whether that of a butcher a soldier or a physician may be regulated by circumstances in which he may be furnished with a licence to kill as without such licence the indulgence of his natural propensity may lead to the untimely rescission of his vital thread ‘with edge of penny cord and vile reproach’ If he show an analogy with the jackal let all possible influence be used to procure him a place at court where he will infallibly thrive If his skull bear a marked resemblance to that of a magpie it cannot be doubted that he will prove an admirable lawyer and if with this advantageous conformation be combined any similitude to that of an owl very confident hopes may be formed of his becoming a judge”
A furious flourish of music was now heard from the ballroom the squire having secretly dispatched the little butler to order it to strike up by way of a hint to Mr Cranium to finish his harangue The company took the hint and adjourned tumultuously having just understood as much of the lecture as furnished them with amusement for the ensuing twelvemonth in feeling the skulls of all their acquaintance
CHAPTER XIII
THE BALL
THE ballroom was adorned with great taste and elegance under the direction of Miss Caprioletta and her friend Miss Cephalis who were themselves its most beautiful ornaments even though romantic Meirion the preeminent in loveliness sent many of its loveliest daughters to grace the festive scene Numberless were the solicitations of the dazzled swains of Cambria for the honour of the two first dances with the one or the other of these fascinating friends but little availed on this occasion the pedigree lineally traced from Caractacus or King Arthur their two philosophical lovers neither of whom could have given the least account of his greatgreatgrandfather had engaged them many days before Mr Panscope chafed and fretted like Llugwy in his bed of rocks when the object of his adoration stood up with his rival but he consoled himself with a lively damsel from the vale of Edeirnion having first compelled Miss Cephalis to promise him her hand for the fourth set
The ball was accordingly opened by Miss Caprioletta and Mr Foster which gave rise to much speculation among the Welsh gentry as to who this Mr Foster could be some of the more learned among them secretly resolving to investigate most profoundly the antiquity of the name of Foster and ascertain what right a person so denominated could have to open the most illustrious of all possible balls with the lovely Caprioletta Headlong the only sister of Harry Headlong Esquire of Headlong Hall in the Vale of Llanberris the only surviving male representative of the antediluvian family of Headlong ApRhaiader
When the first two dances were ended Mr Escot who did not choose to dance with any one but his adorable Cephalis looking round for a convenient seat discovered Mr Jenkison in a corner by the side of the Reverend Doctor Gaster who was keeping excellent time with his nose to the lively melody of the harp and fiddle Mr Escot seated himself by the side of Mr Jenkison and inquired if he took no part in the amusement of the night
Mr Jenkison No The universal cheerfulness of the company induces me to rise the trouble of such violent exercise induces me to sit still Did I see a young lady in want of a partner gallantry would incite me to offer myself as her devoted knight for half an hour but as I perceive there are enough without me that motive is null I have been weighing these points pro and con and remain in statu quo
Mr Escot I have danced contrary to my system as I have done many other things since I have been here from a motive that you will easily guess Mr Jenkison smiled I have great objections to dancing The wild and original man is a calm and contemplative animal The stings of natural appetite alone rouse him to action He satisfies his hunger with roots and fruits unvitiated by the malignant adhibition of fire and all its diabolical processes of elixion and assation he slakes his thirst in the mountainstream συμμισγεται τη επιτυχουση and returns to his peaceful state of meditative repose
Mr Jenkison Like the metaphysical statue of Condillac
Mr Escot With all its senses and purely natural faculties developed certainly Imagine this tranquil and passionless being occupied in his first meditation on the simple question of Where am I Whence do I come And what is the end of my existence Then suddenly place before him a chandelier a fiddler and a magnificent beau in silk stockings and pumps bounding skipping swinging capering and throwing himself into ten thousand attitudes till his face glows with fever and distils with perspiration the first impulse excited in his mind by such an apparition will be that of violent fear which by the reiterated perception of its harmlessness will subside into simple astonishment Then let any genius sufficiently powerful to impress on his mind all the terms of the communication impart to him that after a long process of ages when his race shall have attained what some people think proper to denominate a very advanced stage of perfectibility the most favoured and distinguished of the community shall meet by hundreds to grin and labour and gesticulate like the phantasma before him from sunset to sunrise while all nature is at rest and that they shall consider this a happy and pleasurable mode of existence and furnishing the most delightful of all possible contrasts to what they will call his vegetative state would he not groan from his inmost soul for the lamentable condition of his posterity
Mr Jenkison I know not what your wild and original man might think of the matter in the abstract but comparatively I conceive he would be better pleased with the vision of such a scene as this than with that of a party of Indians who would have all the advantage of being nearly as wild as himself dancing their infernal wardance round a midnight fire in a North American forest
Mr Escot Not if you should impart to him the true nature of both by laying open to his view the springs of action in both parties
Mr Jenkison To do this with effect you must make him a profound metaphysician and thus transfer him at once from his wild and original state to a very advanced stage of intellectual progression whether that progression be towards good or evil I leave you and our friend Foster to settle between you
Mr Escot I wish to make no change in his habits and feelings but to give him hypothetically so much mental illumination as will enable him to take a clear view of two distinct stages of the deterioration of his posterity that he may be enabled to compare them with each other and with his own more happy condition The Indian dancing round the midnight fire is very far deteriorated but the magnificent beau dancing to the light of chandeliers is infinitely more so The Indian is a hunter he makes great use of fire and subsists almost entirely on animal food The malevolent passions that spring from these pernicious habits involve him in perpetual war He is therefore necessitated for his own preservation to keep all the energies of his nature in constant activity to this end his midnight wardance is very powerfully subservient and though in itself a frightful spectacle is at least justifiable on the iron plea of necessity
Mr Jenkison On the same iron plea the modern system of dancing is more justifiable The Indian dances to prepare himself for killing his enemy but while the beaux and belles of our assemblies dance they are in the very act of killing theirs—TIME—a more inveterate and formidable foe than any the Indian has to contend with for however completely and ingeniously killed he is sure to rise again “with twenty mortal murders on his crown” leading his army of blue devils with ennui in the van and vapours in the rear
Mr Escot Your observation militates on my side of the question and it is a strong argument in favour of the Indian that he has no such enemy to kill
Mr Jenkison There is certainly a great deal to be said against dancing there is also a great deal to be said in its favour The first side of the question I leave for the present to you on the latter I may venture to allege that no amusement seems more natural and more congenial to youth than this It has the advantage of bringing young persons of both sexes together in a manner which its publicity renders perfectly unexceptionable enabling them to see and know each other better than perhaps any other mode of general association Têteàtêtes are dangerous things Small family parties are too much under mutual observation A ballroom appears to me almost the only scene uniting that degree of rational and innocent liberty of intercourse which it is desirable to promote as much as possible between young persons with that scrupulous attention to the delicacy and propriety of female conduct which I consider the fundamental basis of all our most valuable social relations
Mr Escot There would be some plausibility in your argument if it were not the very essence of this species of intercourse to exhibit them to each other under false colours Here all is show and varnish and hypocrisy and coquetry they dress up their moral character for the evening at the same toilet where they manufacture their shapes and faces Illtemper lies buried under a studied accumulation of smiles Envy hatred and malice retreat from the countenance to entrench themselves more deeply in the heart Treachery lurks under the flowers of courtesy Ignorance and folly take refuge in that unmeaning gabble which it would be profanation to call language and which even those whom long experience in “the dreary intercourse of daily life” has screwed up to such a pitch of stoical endurance that they can listen to it by the hour have branded with the ignominious appellation of “small talk” Small indeed—the absolute minimum of the infinitely little
Mr Jenkison Go on I have said all I intended to say on the favourable side I shall have great pleasure in hearing you balance the argument
Mr Escot I expect you to confess that I shall have more than balanced it A ballroom is an epitome of all that is most worthless and unamiable in the great sphere of human life Every petty and malignant passion is called into play Coquetry is perpetually on the alert to captivate caprice to mortify and vanity to take offence One amiable female is rendered miserable for the evening by seeing another whom she intended to outshine in a more attractive dress than her own while the other omits no method of giving stings to her triumph which she enjoys with all the secret arrogance of an oriental sultana Another is compelled to dance with a monster she abhors A third has set her heart on dancing with a particular partner perhaps for the amiable motive of annoying one of her dear friends not only he does not ask her but she sees him dancing with that identical dear friend whom from that moment she hates more cordially than ever Perhaps what is worse than all she has set her heart on refusing some impertinent fop who does not give her the opportunity—As to the men the case is very nearly the same with them To be sure they have the privilege of making the first advances and are therefore less liable to have an odious partner forced upon them though this sometimes happens as I know by woeful experience but it is seldom they can procure the very partner they prefer and when they do the absurd necessity of changing every two dances forces them away and leaves them only the miserable alternative of taking up with something disagreeable perhaps in itself and at all events rendered so by contrast or of retreating into some solitary corner to vent their spleen on the first idle coxcomb they can find
Mr Jenkison I hope that is not the motive which brings you to me
Mr Escot Clearly not But the most afflicting consideration of all is that these malignant and miserable feelings are masked under that uniform disguise of pretended benevolence that fine and delicate irony called politeness which gives so much ease and pliability to the mutual intercourse of civilised man and enables him to assume the appearance of every virtue without the reality of one131
The second set of dances was now terminated and Mr Escot flew off to reclaim the hand of the beautiful Cephalis with whom he figured away with surprising alacrity and probably felt at least as happy among the chandeliers and silk stockings at which he had just been railing as he would have been in an American forest making one in an Indian ring by the light of a blazing fire even though his hand had been locked in that of the most beautiful squaw that ever listened to the roar of Niagara
Squire Headlong was now beset by his maiden aunt Miss Brindlemew Grimalkin Phœbe Tabitha ApHeadlong on one side and Sir Patrick OPrism on the other the former insisting that he should immediately procure her a partner the latter earnestly requesting the same interference in behalf of Miss Philomela Poppyseed The squire thought to emancipate himself from his two petitioners by making them dance with each other but Sir Patrick vehemently pleading a prior engagement the squire threw his eyes around till they alighted on Mr Jenkison and the Reverend Doctor Gaster both of whom after waking the latter he pressed into the service The doctor arising with a strange kind of guttural sound which was half a yawn and half a groan was handed by the officious squire to Miss Philomela who received him with sullen dignity she had not yet forgotten his falling asleep during the first chapter of her novel while she was condescending to detail to him the outlines of four superlative volumes The doctor on his part had most completely forgotten it and though he thought there was something in her physiognomy rather more forbidding than usual he gave himself no concern about the cause and had not the least suspicion that it was at all connected with himself Miss Brindlemew was very well contented with Mr Jenkison and gave him two or three ogles accompanied by a most risible distortion of the countenance which she intended for a captivating smile As to Mr Jenkison it was all one to him with whom he danced or whether he danced or not he was therefore just as well pleased as if he had been left alone in his corner which is probably more than could have been said of any other human being under similar circumstances
At the end of the third set supper was announced and the party pairing off like turtles adjourned to the supperroom The squire was now the happiest of mortal men and the little butler the most laborious The centre of the largest table was decorated with a model of Snowdon surmounted with an enormous artificial leek the leaves of angelica and the bulb of blancmange A little way from the summit was a tarn or mountainpool supplied through concealed tubes with an inexhaustible flow of milkpunch which dashing in cascades down the miniature rocks fell into the more capacious lake below washing the mimic foundations of Headlong Hall The reverend doctor handed Miss Philomela to the chair most conveniently situated for enjoying this interesting scene protesting he had never before been sufficiently impressed with the magnificence of that mountain which he now perceived to be well worthy of all the fame it had obtained
“Now when they had eaten and were satisfied” Squire Headlong called on Mr Chromatic for a song who with the assistance of his two accomplished daughters regaled the ears of the company with the following
TERZETTO132
Grey Twilight from her shadowy hill
Discolours Natures vernal bloom
And sheds on grove and field and rill
One placid tint of deepening gloom
The sailor sighs mid shoreless seas
Touched by the thought of friends afar
As fanned by oceans flowing breeze
He gazes on the western star
The wanderer hears in pensive dream
The accents of the last farewell
As pausing by the mountain stream
He listens to the evening bell
This terzetto was of course much applauded Mr Milestone observing that he thought the figure in the last verse would have been more picturesque if it had been represented with its arms folded and its back against a tree or leaning on its staff with a cockleshell in its hat like a pilgrim of ancient times
Mr Chromatic professed himself astonished that a gentleman of genuine modern taste like Mr Milestone should consider the words of a song of any consequence whatever seeing that they were at the best only a species of pegs for the more convenient suspension of crotchets and quavers This remark drew on him a very severe reprimand from Mr Mac Laurel who said to him “Dinna ye ken sir that soond is a thing utterly worthless in itsel and only effectual in agreeable excitements as far as it is an aicho to sense Is there ony soond mair meeserable an peetifu than the scrape o a feddle when it does na touch ony chord i the human sensorium Is there ony mair divine than the deep note o a bagpipe when it breathes the auncient meelodies o leeberty an love It is true there are peculiar trains o feeling an sentiment which parteecular combinations o meelody are calculated to excite an sae far music can produce its effect without words but it does na follow that when ye put words to it it becomes a matter of indefference what they are for a gude strain of impassioned poetry will greatly increase the effect and a tessue o nonsensical doggrel will destroy it a thegither Noo as gude poetry can produce its effect without music sae will gude music without poetry and as gude music will be mair pooerfu by itsel than wi bad poetry sae will gude poetry than wi bad music but when ye put gude music an gude poetry thegither ye produce the divinest compound o sentimental harmony that can possibly find its way through the lug to the saul”
Mr Chromatic admitted that there was much justice in these observations but still maintained the subserviency of poetry to music Mr Mac Laurel as strenuously maintained the contrary and a furious war of words was proceeding to perilous lengths when the squire interposed his authority towards the reproduction of peace which was forthwith concluded and all animosities drowned in a libation of milkpunch the Reverend Doctor Gaster officiating as high priest on the occasion
Mr Chromatic now requested Miss Caprioletta to favour the company with an air The young lady immediately complied and sung the following simple
BALLAD
“O Mary my sister thy sorrow give oer
I soon shall return girl and leave thee no more
But with children so fair and a husband so kind
I shall feel less regret when I leave thee behind
“I have made thee a bench for the door of thy cot
And more would I give thee but more I have not
Sit and think of me there in the warm summer day
And give me three kisses my labour to pay”
She gave him three kisses and forth did he fare
And long did he wander and no one knew where
And long from her cottage through sunshine and rain
She watched his return but he came not again
Her children grew up and her husband grew grey
She sate on the bench through the long summer day
One evening when twilight was deep on the shore
There came an old soldier and stood by the door
In English he spoke and none knew what he said
But her oatcake and milk on the table she spread
Then he sate to his supper and blithely he sung
And she knew the dear sounds of her own native tongue
“O rich are the feasts in the Englishmans hall
And the wine sparkles bright in the goblets of Gaul
But their mingled attractions I well could withstand
For the milk and the oatcake of Meirions dear land”
“And art thou a Welchman old soldier” she cried
“Many years have I wandered” the stranger replied
“Twixt Danube and Thames many rivers there be
But the bright waves of Cynfael are fairest to me
“I felled the grey oak ere I hastened to roam
And I fashioned a bench for the door of my home
And well my dear sister my labour repaid
Who gave me three kisses when first it was made
“In the old English soldier thy brother appears
Here is gold in abundance the saving of years
Give me oatcake and milk in return for my store
And a seat by thy side on the bench at the door”
Various other songs succeeded which as we are not composing a song book we shall lay aside for the present
An old squire who had not missed one of these anniversaries during more than half a century now stood up and filling a halfpint bumper pronounced with a stentorian voice—“To the immortal memory of Headlong ApRhaiader and to the health of his noble descendant and worthy representative” This example was followed by all the gentlemen present The harp struck up a triumphal strain and the old squire already mentioned vociferating the first stave they sang or rather roared the following
CHORUS
Hail to the Headlong the Headlong ApHeadlong
All hail to the Headlong the Headlong ApHeadlong
The Headlong ApHeadlong
ApBreakneck ApHeadlong
ApCataract ApPistyll ApRhaiader ApHeadlong
The bright bowl we steep in the name of the Headlong
Let the youths pledge it deep to the Headlong ApHeadlong
And the rosylipped lasses
Touch the brim as it passes
And kiss the red tide for the Headlong ApHeadlong
The loud harp resounds in the hall of the Headlong
The light step rebounds in the hall of the Headlong
Where shall music invite us
Or beauty delight us
If not in the hall of the Headlong ApHeadlong
Huzza to the health of the Headlong ApHeadlong
Fill the bowl fill in floods to the health of the Headlong
Till the stream rubyglowing
On all sides oerflowing
Shall fall in cascades to the health of the Headlong
The Headlong ApHeadlong
ApBreakneck ApHeadlong
ApCataract ApPistyll ApRhaiader ApHeadlong
Squire Headlong returned thanks with an appropriate libation and the company readjourned to the ballroom where they kept it up till sunrise when the little butler summoned them to breakfast
CHAPTER XIV
THE PROPOSALS
THE chorus which celebrated the antiquity of her lineage had been ringing all night in the ears of Miss Brindlemew Grimalkin Phœbe Tabitha ApHeadlong when taking the squire aside while the visitors were sipping their tea and coffee “Nephew Harry” said she “I have been noting your behaviour during the several stages of the ball and supper and though I cannot tax you with any want of gallantry for you are a very gallant young man Nephew Harry very gallant—I wish I could say as much for every one” added she throwing a spiteful look towards a distant corner where Mr Jenkison was sitting with great nonchalance and at the moment dipping a rusk in a cup of chocolate “but I lament to perceive that you were at least as pleased with your lakes of milkpunch and your bottles of Champagne and Burgundy as with any of your delightful partners Now though I can readily excuse this degree of incombustibility in the descendant of a family so remarkable in all ages for personal beauty as ours yet I lament it exceedingly when I consider that in conjunction with your present predilection for the easy life of a bachelor it may possibly prove the means of causing our ancient genealogical tree which has its roots if I may so speak in the foundations of the world to terminate suddenly in a point unless you feel yourself moved by my exhortations to follow the example of all your ancestors by choosing yourself a fitting and suitable helpmate to immortalize the pedigree of Headlong ApRhaiader”
“Egad” said Squire Headlong “that is very true Ill marry directly A good opportunity to fix on some one now they are all here and Ill pop the question without further ceremony”
“What think you” said the old lady “of Miss Nanny GlenDu the lineal descendant of Llewelyn ApYorwerth”
“She wont do” said Squire Headlong
“What say you then” said the lady “to Miss Williams of Pontyglasrhydyrallt the descendant of the ancient family of——”
“I dont like her” said Squire Headlong “and as to her ancient family that is a matter of no consequence I have antiquity enough for two They are all moderns people of yesterday in comparison with us What signify six or seven centuries which are the most they can make up”
“Why to be sure” said the aunt “on that view of the question it is no consequence What think you then of Miss Owen of NiddyGygfraen She will have six thousand a year”
“I would not have her” said Squire Headlong “if she had fifty Ill think of somebody presently I should like to be married on the same day with Caprioletta”
“Caprioletta” said Miss Brindlemew “without my being consulted”
“Consulted” said the squire “I was commissioned to tell you but somehow or other I let it slip However she is going to be married to my friend Mr Foster the philosopher”
“Oh” said the maiden aunt “that a daughter of our ancient family should marry a philosopher It is enough to make the bones of all the ApRhaiaders turn in their graves”
“I happen to be more enlightened” said Squire Headlong “than any of my ancestors were Besides it is Capriolettas affair not mine I tell you the matter is settled fixed determined and so am I to be married on the same day I dont know now I think of it whom I can choose better than one of the daughters of my friend Chromatic”
“A Saxon” said the aunt turning up her nose and was commencing a vehement remonstrance but the squire exclaiming “Music has charms” flew over to Mr Chromatic and with a hearty slap on the shoulder asked him “how he should like him for a soninlaw” Mr Chromatic rubbing his shoulder and highly delighted with the proposal answered “Very much indeed” but proceeding to ascertain which of his daughters had captivated the squire the squire demurred and was unable to satisfy his curiosity “I hope” said Mr Chromatic “it may be Tenorina for I imagine Graziosa has conceived a penchant for Sir Patrick OPrism”—“Tenorina exactly” said Squire Headlong and became so impatient to bring the matter to a conclusion that Mr Chromatic undertook to communicate with his daughter immediately The young lady proved to be as ready as the squire and the preliminaries were arranged in little more than five minutes
Mr Chromatics words that he imagined his daughter Graziosa had conceived a penchant for Sir Patrick OPrism were not lost on the squire who at once determined to have as many companions in the scrape as possible and who as soon as he could tear himself from Mrs Headlong elect took three flying bounds across the room to the baronet and said “So Sir Patrick I find you and I are going to be married”
“Are we” said Sir Patrick “then sure wont I wish you joy and myself too for this is the first I have heard of it”
“Well” said Squire Headlong “I have made up my mind to it and you must not disappoint me”
“To be sure I wont if I can help it” said Sir Patrick “and I am very much obliged to you for taking so much trouble off my hands And pray now who is it that I am to be metamorphosing into Lady OPrism”
“Miss Graziosa Chromatic” said the squire
“Och violet and vermilion” said Sir Patrick “though I never thought of it before I dare say she will suit me as well as another but then you must persuade the ould Orpheus to draw out a few notes of rather a more magical description than those he is so fond of scraping on his crazy violin”
“To be sure he shall” said the squire and immediately returning to Mr Chromatic concluded the negotiation for Sir Patrick as expeditiously as he had done for himself
The squire next addressed himself to Mr Escot “Here are three couple of us going to throw off together with the Reverend Doctor Gaster for whipperin now I think you cannot do better than make the fourth with Miss Cephalis and then as my fatherinlaw that is to be would say we shall compose a very harmonious octave”
“Indeed” said Mr Escot “nothing would be more agreeable to both of us than such an arrangement but the old gentleman since I first knew him has changed like the rest of the world very lamentably for the worse now we wish to bring him to reason if possible though we mean to dispense with his consent if he should prove much longer refractory”
“Ill settle him” said Squire Headlong and immediately posted up to Mr Cranium informing him that four marriages were about to take place by way of a merry winding up of the Christmas festivities
“Indeed” said Mr Cranium “and who are the parties”
“In the first place” said the squire “my sister and Mr Foster in the second Miss Graziosa Chromatic and Sir Patrick OPrism in the third Miss Tenorina Chromatic and your humble servant and in the fourth to which by the by your consent is wanted——”
“Oho” said Mr Cranium
“Your daughter” said Squire Headlong
“And Mr Panscope” said Mr Cranium
“And Mr Escot” said Squire Headlong “What would you have better He has ten thousand virtues”
“So has Mr Panscope” said Mr Cranium “he has ten thousand a year”
“Virtues” said Squire Headlong
“Pounds” said Mr Cranium
“I have set my mind on Mr Escot” said the squire
“I am much obliged to you” said Mr Cranium “for dethroning me from my paternal authority”
“Who fished you out of the water” said Squire Headlong
“What is that to the purpose” said Mr Cranium “The whole process of the action was mechanical and necessary The application of the poker necessitated the ignition of the powder the ignition necessitated the explosion the explosion necessitated my sudden fright which necessitated my sudden jump which from a necessity equally powerful was in a curvilinear ascent the descent being in a corresponding curve and commencing at a point perpendicular to the extreme line of the edge of the tower I was by the necessity of gravitation attracted first through the ivy and secondly through the hazel and thirdly through the ash into the water beneath The motive or impulse thus adhibited in the person of a drowning man was as powerful on his material compages as the force of gravitation on mine and he could no more help jumping into the water than I could help falling into it”
“All perfectly true” said Squire Headlong “and on the same principle you make no distinction between the man who knocks you down and him who picks you up”
“I make this distinction” said Mr Cranium “that I avoid the former as a machine containing a peculiar cataballitive quality which I have found to be not consentaneous to my mode of pleasurable existence but I attach no moral merit or demerit to either of them as these terms are usually employed seeing that they are equally creatures of necessity and must act as they do from the nature of their organisation I no more blame or praise a man for what is called vice or virtue than I tax a tuft of hemlock with malevolence or discover great philanthropy in a field of potatoes seeing that the men and the plants are equally incapacitated by their original internal organisation and the combinations and modifications of external circumstances from being any thing but what they are Quod victus fateare necesse est”
“Yet you destroy the hemlock” said Squire Headlong “and cultivate the potato that is my way at least”
“I do” said Mr Cranium “because I know that the farinaceous qualities of the potato will tend to preserve the great requisites of unity and coalescence in the various constituent portions of my animal republic and that the hemlock if gathered by mistake for parsley chopped up small with butter and eaten with a boiled chicken would necessitate a great derangement and perhaps a total decomposition of my corporeal mechanism”
“Very well” said the squire “then you are necessitated to like Mr Escot better than Mr Panscope”
“That is a non sequitur” said Mr Cranium
“Then this is a sequitur” said the squire “your daughter and Mr Escot are necessitated to love one another and unless you feel necessitated to adhibit your consent they will feel necessitated to dispense with it since it does appear to moral and political economists to be essentially inherent in the eternal fitness of things”
Mr Cranium fell into a profound reverie emerging from which he said looking Squire Headlong full in the face “Do you think Mr Escot would give me that skull”
“Skull” said Squire Headlong
“Yes” said Mr Cranium “the skull of Cadwallader”
“To be sure he will” said the squire
“Ascertain the point” said Mr Cranium
“How can you doubt it” said the squire
“I simply know” said Mr Cranium “that if it were once in my possession I would not part with it for any acquisition on earth much less for a wife I have had one and as marriage has been compared to a pill I can very safely assert that one is a dose and my reason for thinking that he will not part with it is that its extraordinary magnitude tends to support his system as much as its very marked protuberances tend to support mine and you know his own system is of all things the dearest to every man of liberal thinking and a philosophical tendency”
The Squire flew over to Mr Escot “I told you” said he “I would settle him but there is a very hard condition attached to his compliance”
“I submit to it” said Mr Escot “be it what it may”
“Nothing less” said Squire Headlong “than the absolute and unconditional surrender of the skull of Cadwallader”
“I resign it” said Mr Escot
“The skull is yours” said the squire skipping over to Mr Cranium
“I am perfectly satisfied” said Mr Cranium
“The lady is yours” said the squire skipping back to Mr Escot
“I am the happiest man alive” said Mr Escot
“Come” said the squire “then there is an amelioration in the state of the sensitive man”
“A slight oscillation of good in the instance of a solitary individual” answered Mr Escot “by no means affects the solidity of my opinions concerning the general deterioration of the civilised world which when I can be induced to contemplate with feelings of satisfaction I doubt not but that I may be persuaded to be in love with tortures and to think charitably of the rack141”
Saying these words he flew off as nimbly as Squire Headlong himself to impart the happy intelligence to his beautiful Cephalis
Mr Cranium now walked up to Mr Panscope to condole with him on the disappointment of their mutual hopes Mr Panscope begged him not to distress himself on the subject observing that the monotonous system of female education brought every individual of the sex to so remarkable an approximation of similarity that no wise man would suffer himself to be annoyed by a loss so easily repaired and that there was much truth though not much elegance in a remark which he had heard made on a similar occasion by a postcaptain of his acquaintance “that there never was a fish taken out of the sea but left another as good behind”
Mr Cranium replied that no two individuals having all the organs of the skull similarly developed the universal resemblance of which Mr Panscope had spoken could not possibly exist Mr Panscope rejoined and a long discussion ensued concerning the comparative influence of natural organisation and artificial education in which the beautiful Cephalis was totally lost sight of and which ended as most controversies do by each party continuing firm in his own opinion and professing his profound astonishment at the blindness and prejudices of the other
In the meanwhile a great confusion had arisen at the outer doors the departure of the ballvisitors being impeded by a circumstance which the experience of ages had discovered no means to obviate The grooms coachmen and postillions were all drunk It was proposed that the gentlemen should officiate in their places but the gentlemen were almost all in the same condition This was a fearful dilemma but a very diligent investigation brought to light a few servants and a few gentlemen not above halfseasover and by an equitable distribution of these rarities the greater part of the guests were enabled to set forward with very nearly an even chance of not having their necks broken before they reached home
CHAPTER XV
THE CONCLUSION
THE squire and his select party of philosophers and dilettanti were again left in peaceful possession of Headlong Hall and as the former made a point of never losing a moment in the accomplishment of a favourite object he did not suffer many days to elapse before the spiritual metamorphosis of eight into four was effected by the clerical dexterity of the Reverend Doctor Gaster
Immediately after the ceremony the whole party dispersed the squire having first extracted from every one of his chosen guests a positive promise to reassemble in August when they would be better enabled in its most appropriate season to form a correct judgment of Cambrian hospitality
Mr Jenkison shook hands at parting with his two brother philosophers “According to your respective systems” said he “I ought to congratulate you on a change for the better which I do most cordially and to condole with you on a change for the worse though when I consider whom you have chosen I should violate every principle of probability in doing so”
“You will do well” said Mr Foster “to follow our example The extensive circle of general philanthropy which in the present advanced stage of human nature comprehends in its circumference the destinies of the whole species originated and still proceeds from that narrower circle of domestic affection which first set limits to the empire of selfishness and by purifying the passions and enlarging the affections of mankind has given to the views of benevolence an increasing and illimitable expansion which will finally diffuse happiness and peace over the whole surface of the world”
“The affection” said Mr Escot “of two congenial spirits united not by legal bondage and superstitious imposture but by mutual confidence and reciprocal virtues is the only counterbalancing consolation in this scene of mischief and misery But how rarely is this the case according to the present system of marriage So far from being a central point of expansion to the great circle of universal benevolence it serves only to concentrate the feelings of natural sympathy in the reflected selfishness of family interest and to substitute for the humani nihil alienum puto of youthful philanthropy the charity begins at home of maturer years And what accession of individual happiness is acquired by this oblivion of the general good Luxury despotism and avarice have so seized and entangled nine hundred and ninetynine out of every thousand of the human race that the matrimonial compact which ought to be the most easy the most free and the most simple of all engagements is become the most slavish and complicated—a mere question of finance—a system of bargain and barter and commerce and trick and chicanery and dissimulation and fraud Is there one instance in ten thousand in which the buds of first affection are not most cruelly and hopelessly blasted by avarice or ambition or arbitrary power Females condemned during the whole flower of their youth to a worse than monastic celibacy irrevocably debarred from the hope to which their first affections pointed will at a certain period of life as the natural delicacy of taste and feeling is gradually worn away by the attrition of society become willing to take up with any coxcomb or scoundrel whom that merciless and mercenary gang of coldblooded slaves and assassins called in the ordinary prostitution of language friends may agree in designating as a prudent choice Young men on the other hand are driven by the same vile superstitions from the company of the most amiable and modest of the opposite sex to that of those miserable victims and outcasts of a world which dares to call itself virtuous whom that very society whose pernicious institutions first caused their aberrations—consigning them without one tear of pity or one struggle of remorse to penury infamy and disease—condemns to bear the burden of its own atrocious absurdities Thus the youth of one sex is consumed in slavery disappointment and spleen that of the other in frantic folly and selfish intemperance till at length on the necks of a couple so enfeebled so perverted so distempered both in body and soul society throws the yoke of marriage that yoke which once rivetted on the necks of its victims clings to them like the poisoned garments of Nessus or Medea What can be expected from these illassorted yokefellows but that like two illtempered hounds coupled by a tyrannical sportsman they should drag on their indissoluble fetter snarling and growling and pulling in different directions What can be expected for their wretched offspring but sickness and suffering premature decrepitude and untimely death In this as in every other institution of civilised society avarice luxury and disease constitute the TRIANGULAR HARMONY of the life of man Avarice conducts him to the abyss of toil and crime luxury seizes on his illgotten spoil and while he revels in her enchantments or groans beneath her tyranny disease bursts upon him and sweeps him from the earth”
“Your theory” said Mr Jenkison “forms an admirable counterpoise to your example As far as I am attracted by the one I am repelled by the other Thus the scales of my philosophical balance remain eternally equiponderant and I see no reason to say of either of them ΟΙΧΕΤΑΙ ΕΙΣ ΑΙΔΑΟ151”