The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 17, No. 480, March 12, 1831

The postman's double-knock at the door the next morning is "more germain to the matter." How that knock often goes to the heart! We distinguish to a nicety the arrival of the Two-penny or the General Post. The summons of the latter is louder and heavier, as bringing news from a greater distance, and as, the longer it has been delayed, fraught with a deeper interest. We catch the sound of what is to be paid—eightpence, ninepence, a shilling—and our hopes generally rise with the postage. How we are provoked at the delay in getting change—at the servant who does not hear the door! Then if the postman passes, and we do not hear the expected knock, what a pang is there! It is like the silence of death—of hope! We think he does it on purpose, and enjoys all the misery of our suspense. I have sometimes walked out to see the Mail-Coach pass, by which I had sent a letter, or to meet it when I expected one. I never see a Mail-Coach, for this reason, but I look at it as the bearer of glad tidings—the messenger of fate. I have reason to say so.—The finest sight in the metropolis is that of the Mail-Coaches setting off from Piccadilly. The horses paw the ground, and are impatient to be gone, as if conscious of the precious burden they convey. There is a peculiar secresy and despatch, significant and full of meaning, in all the proceedings concerning them. Even the outside passengers have an erect and supercilious air, as if proof against the accidents of the journey. In fact, it seems indifferent whether they are to encounter the summer's heat or winter's cold, since they are borne through the air in a winged chariot. The Mail-Carts drive up; the transfer of packages is made; and, at a signal given, they start off, bearing the irrevocable scrolls that give wings to thought, and that bind or sever hearts for ever. How we hate the Putney and Brentford stages that draw up in a line after they are gone! Some persons think the sublimest object in nature is a ship launched on the bosom of the ocean; but give me, for my private satisfaction, the Mail-Coaches that pour down Piccadilly of an evening, tear up the pavement, and devour the way before them to the Land's End!

In Cowper's time, Mail-Coaches were hardly set up; but he has beautifully described the coming in of the Post-Boy:—

"Hark! 'tis the twanging horn o'er yonder bridge,
That with its wearisome but needful length
Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon
Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright;—
He comes, the herald of a noisy world,
With spattered boots, strapped waist, and frozen locks;
News from all nations lumbering at his back.
True to his charge, the close packed load behind,
Yet careless what he brings, his one concern
Is to conduct it to the destined inn;
And having dropped the expected bag, pass on.
He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch!
Cold and yet cheerful; messenger of grief
Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some;
To him indifferent whether grief or joy.
Houses in ashes and the fall of stocks.
Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet
With tears that trickled down the writer's cheeks
Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,
Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains
Or nymphs responsive, equally affect
His horse and him, unconscious of them all."

And yet, notwithstanding this, and so many other passages that seem like the very marrow of our being, Lord Byron denies that Cowper was a poet!—The Mail-Coach is an improvement on the Post-Boy; but I fear it will hardly bear so poetical a description. The picturesque and dramatic do not keep pace with the useful and mechanical. The telegraphs that lately communicated the intelligence of the new revolution to all France within a few hours, are a wonderful contrivance; but they are less striking and appalling than the beacon fires (mentioned by Aeschylus,) which, lighted from hill-top to hill-top, announced the taking of Troy and the return of Agamemnon.

Monthly Magazine

THE SELECTOR; AND LITERARY NOTICES OF NEW WORKS

THE DREAM GIRL

There is a certain valley in Languedoc, at no great distance from the palace of the Bishop of Mendes, where to this day the traveller is struck by some singular diversities of scenery. The valley itself is the most quiet and delightful that France can boast. A stream wanders through it, with just rapidity enough to keep its waters sweet and clear; and, on either side of this line of beauty, some gently swelling meadows extend—on one side to a chain of smooth green hills, and on the other, to the base of a mountain of almost inaccessible rocks. The river is bordered by willows and other shrubs, crowding to dip their branches in the transparent wave; and here and there in its neighbourhood, groves of walnut-trees stud the meadows, serving as a rendezvous of amusement for innumerable nightingales, which at the first dawn of summer assemble on the branches, and, as if in mockery of the poets, fill the evening air with their mirthful music.

The village of Rossignol (so named, probably, on account of the abundance of nightingales in the neighbourhood) was inhabited by very poor, but very happy people. It is true that, in common with other cultivators of the fickle earth, they had sometimes to mourn the overthrow of the husbandman's hopes; and that even their remote and lonely situation did not always protect them from the exactions of those whom birth, violence, or accident had made the lords of the domain. But in such cases, the villagers of Rossignol had a resource, limited, indeed, and attended by hardship, and even danger, but, to a certain extent, absolutely unfailing.

It must not be supposed, however, that, even in an Arcadia like this,

"The course of true love always did run smooth."

There was one young girl, called Julie, who was cruel enough to have depopulated a whole nation of lovers. She was the most beautiful creature, it is said, that ever skimmed the surface of this breathing world. Her light brown hair was illumined in the bends of the curls with gleams resembling those of auburn, and it was so long and luxuriant, that when, in the ardour of the chase, it became unbound, and floated in clouds around her, that seemed just touched on their golden summits by the sun, she looked more like a thing of air than of earth.

Nor was the illusion dissipated when, flinging away with her white arm the redundant tresses, her face flashed upon the gazer. There was nothing in it of that tinge of earth—for there is no word for the thought—which identifies the loveliest and happiest faces with mortality. There was no shade of care upon her dazzling brow—no touch of tender thought upon her lip—no flash, even of hope, in her radiant eyes. Her expression spoke neither of the past nor the future—neither of graves nor altars. She was a thing of mere physical life—a gay and glorious creature of the sun, and the wind, and the dews; who exchanged as carelessly and unconsciously as a flower, the sweet smell of her beauty for the bounties of nature, and pierced the ear of heaven with her mirthful songs, from nothing higher than the instinct of a bird.

It seemed as if what was absent in her mind had been added to her physical nature. She had the same excess of animal life which is observed in young children; but, unlike them, her muscular force was great enough to give it play. Her walk was like a bounding dance, and her common speech like a gay and sparkling song;—her laugh echoed from hill to hill, like the tone of some sweet, but wild and shrill instrument of music. She out-stripped the boldest of the youths in the chase; skimmed like some phantom shape along the edge of precipices approached even by the wild goat with fear; and looked round with careless joy, from pinnacles which interrupted the flight of the eagle through the air.

With such beauty, and such accomplishments, for the place and time, how many hearts might not Julie have broken! Julie did not break one. She was admired, loved, followed; and she fled, rending the air with her shrieks of musical laughter. Disconcerted, stunned, mortified, and alarmed, the wooer pursued his mistress only with his eyes, and blessed the saints that he had not gained such a phantom for a wife.

Romance of History

INTERIOR OF ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL

If in exterior magnificence St. Paul's surpasses all our other buildings, the interior, however, from many causes, is not so beautiful. You enter, and the naked loftiness of the walls, and the cold and barren stateliness of every thing around, would induce one to believe that an enemy—were such a thing possible in Britain—had taken London, and plundered the cathedral of all its national and religious paintings, together with a world of such rare works of curiosity or antiquity as find a sanctuary in the great churches of other countries. A few statues, some of them of moderate worth, are scattered about the recesses; and certain coloured drawings, done by the yard by Sir James Thornhill, may be distinguished far above; but all between is empty space, save where some tattered banners, pierced with many a shot, the memorials of our naval victories, hang dusty half-pillar high. This nakedness, however, is not so much the fault of the architect as of the clergy, who aught to have adorned this noble pile more largely by the hand of the painter and the sculptor. It was the wish of Wren to beautify the inside of the cupola with rich and durable Mosaic, and he intended to have sought the help of four of the most eminent artists in Italy for that purpose; but he was frustrated by the seven commissioners, who said the thing was so much of a novelty that it would not be liked, and also so expensive that it could not be paid for. The present work, too, over the communion table was intended only to serve till something more worthy could be prepared; and, to supply its place, Wren had modelled a magnificent altar, consisting of four pillars wreathed of the finest Greek marbles, supporting a hemispherical canopy, richly decorated with sculpture. But marble, such as he liked, could not readily be procured: dissensions arose, and the work remained in the models. The interposition of the Duke of York—the malevolence of the commissioners—the Puritanic, for I will not call them Protestant, prejudices of the clergy—and, I must add, the tastelessness of the nation at large, have all conspired to diminish the interior glory of St. Paul's, and render it less imposing on the mind than many a cathedral of less mark and reputation.—George III. saw what was wanting, and would have endeavoured to supply it; but all his efforts to overcome the ecclesiastical objections were unavailing. Let us hope that some of that truly good and English king's descendents may have better success.—Family Library, No. xix.

DEATH OF RICHELIEU

Richelieu in the meantime had reached his palace in the capital. Roman despot was never more courted nor more feared; but death was coming fast to close his triumphant career. A mortal malady wasted him: yet the cardinal abated nothing of his pride, nor of his vindictiveness. He exiled some of the king's personal and cherished officers; he insulted Anne of Austria, the queen: remained seated during a visit that she paid him, and threatened to separate her from her children. Even his guards no longer lowered their arms in the presence of the monarch. His demeanor to Louis XIII. was that of one potentate to another. In December of 1642 the malady of the cardinal became inveterate, and every hope of life was denied him. He summoned the king to his dying bed, recapitulated the great and successful acts of his administration, and recommended Mazarin as the person to continue its spirit, and to be his successor. Louis promised obsequiousness. Richelieu then received the last consolations of religion, and went through these pious and touching ceremonies with an apparently firm and undisturbed conscience. The man of blood knew no remorse. His acts had all been, he asserted, for his country's good; and the same unbending pride and unshaken confidence that had commanded the respect of men, seemed to accompany him into the presence of his Maker. He died like a hero of the Stoics, though clad in the trappings of a prince of the church. Most of those present were edified by his firmness; but one bishop, calling to mind the life, the arrogance, and the crimes of the minister, observed, that "the confidence of the dying Richelieu filled him with terror." The crime of having trodden out the last spark of his country's liberties, and of having converted its monarchic government into pure despotism, is that for which Richelieu is most generally condemned. But the state of anarchy which he removed was license, not liberty. The task of reconciling private independence with public peace, civil rights with the existence of justice,—and this without precedent or tradition, without that rooted stock on which freedom, in order to grow and bear fruit, must be grafted,—was a conception which, however familiar to our age, was utterly unknown, and impracticable to that of Richelieu. With the horrors of civil war fresh in the memory of all, the general desire was for tranquillity and peace, not liberty; to which, moreover, had it been contemplated, the first necessary step was that of humbling the aristocracy. It was impossible that constitutional freedom could grow out of the chaos of privileges, and anarchy, and organized rebellion, that the government had to contend with. In building up her social fabric France had in fact gone wrong, destroyed the old foundations, and rebuilt on others without solidity or system. To introduce order or add solidity to so ill-constructed a fabric, was impossible; Richelieu found it necessary to raze all at once to the ground, except the central donjon of despotism, which he left standing. Had Richelieu, with all his genius and sagacity, undertaken for liberty what he achieved for royalty, his age would have rejected or misunderstood him, as it did Bacon and Galileo. He might, indeed, as a man of letters, have consigned such a political dream to the volume of an Utopia, but from action or administration he would have been soon discarded as a dreamer. Liberty must come of the claim of the mass; of the general enlightenment, firmness, and probity. It is no great physical secret, which a single brain, finding, may announce and so establish: it is a moral truth, which, like a gem, hides its ray and its preciousness in obscurity, nor becomes refulgent till all around it is beaming with light.—Cabinet Cyclopaedia—History of France.

THE GATHERER

A snapper up of unconsidered trifles.

    SHAKSPEARE.

From what town in England does all the butter come in the London market?—Cowes.

Which is the closest town in Ireland, and is the best when drawn?—Cork.

A Dirty Member.—A member of a certain house was noticed the other night to be very dirty in his appearance, which a wit accounted for by saying he supposed the gentleman had been assisting the Chancellor of the Exchequer in taking the duty off coals!—From "the Age."

LUXURY

Was once restricted by an English law, wherein the prelates and nobility were confined to two courses at every meal, and two kinds of food in every course, except on great festivals: it also prohibited all who did not enjoy a free estate of £100. per annum, from wearing furs, skins, or silk, and the use of foreign cloth was confined to the royal family alone, to all others it was prohibited, 1337. In 1340, an edict was issued by Charles VI. of France, which says, "Let no one presume to treat with more than a soup and two dishes."

T. GILL

KNAVE

Formerly signified valet or servant as appears from Wickliffe's New Testament, kept in Westminster Library, and where we read—"Paul the knave of Jesus Christ." Hence the introduction of the knave in the pack of cards.

STEEL THREE HUNDRED TIMES DEARER THAN GOLD

Steel may be made three hundred times dearer than standard gold, weight for weight; six steel wire pendulums, weight one grain, to the artists 7s. 6d. each, 2l. 5s.; one grain of gold only 2d.

T. GILL

SCRAPS

Omai, the South Sea Islander, was once at a dinner in London, where stewed Morello cherries were offered to him. He instantly jumped up, and quitted the room. Several followed him; but he told them that he was no more accustomed to partake of human blood than they were. He continued rather sulky for some time, and it was only by the rest of the company partaking of them, that he would be convinced of his error, and induced to return to the table.

At White Hall Mill, in Derbyshire, a sheet of paper was manufactured last year, which measured 13,800 feet in length, four feet in width, and would cover an acre and a half of ground.

Among the ancient Saxons at Magdeburgh, the greatest beauties were at stated times deposited in charge of the magistrates, with a sum of money as the portion of each, to be publicly fought for; and fell to the lot of those who were famous at tilting.

W.G.C