On this page

• Departments (1)
  • 
• Text (4)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • Untitled
  • 

    ^uttfnhn.

  • 

    We should do our utmost to encourage the...

  • 

    Saiffimt m & ¥&«&»®Hiffi* ir. October 26...

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    Ar02004

    ^Uttfnhn.

    _^ uttfnhn .

    We Should Do Our Utmost To Encourage The...

    We should do our utmost to encourage the Beautiful , for the Useful encourage itself . —Goethe .

    Saiffimt M & ¥&«&»®Hiffi* Ir. October 26...

    _Saiffimt m & ¥ _&«&»® Hiffi * ir . October 26 , 1851 . £ w _§ AM not in a condition , my dear Giorgio , to supply you as you would | I | desire with accounts of the public events which are exciting the English | in so unusual a degree ; for I have been kept a prisoner by an accident § j _^ altogether unexpected . It would do your heart good to see the _enthusiasm which the cold English are exhibiting on behalf of Hungary and Kossuth . Edwardes , who is a thorough Englishman , and devotedly attached to liberal opinions , is very proud of it . He sympathizes with all

    of us , to a great extent , but complains that the Diberals of the Continent tried to go too fast in 1848 ; and he almost charges us with throwing difficulties in the way of the English Minister . But Hungary he has thoroughly at heart . He recognises her constitutional claims . He would make any sacrifice to support her rights , except going to war . We have got beyond that , he says ; and he points to the state of England as a proof . Say what you may , he argues , we are getting on capitally in every respect . Trade is really increasing . Tbe Exposition , which is just over—and he is always throwing in my teeth the savage neglect I showed in being too late to see it—proved the supremacy of England in trade and useful arts . Of

    real freedom the English enjoy more than any nation under the sun . lne circumstances of the people have improved . The power of the aristocracy is abating ; that of the middle class is increasing ; and the public opinion of the country is now wielded by plain men of business , who promote the interests of society in promoting their own . It is true , he admits , that they do not get on so fast as he could wish , even with approved measures ; but " slow and sure . " And there is no country , he repeats , in which so much substantial happiness is enjoyed . Am I not candid to tell all this to you , my dear fellow , who have so often argued to me the same things ? You , indeed , proved it to me in great part from books , and Edwardes speaks as a man mixing with the world ; a difference which only establishes

    your case tbe more strongly . I have said little to Edwardes of my own feelings , because I would rather sec than say , especially at first . But I do not see that in justice Hungary has half so great a claim on England as Italy ; nor in association ; when we owe to Italy so much of our arts and our civilization ; when so much of our daily avocations originates with her . But be that as it may , I am glad to see my countrymen renewing that sympathy for brave nations abroad which England has owned before ; and I applauded rather than criticized the praises which , while he " was hastening through his tea , Edwardes poured forth with equal generosity upon Hungary and upon England . We were going to a meeting in honour of Kossuth ; and I believe that Edwardes was "to move a resolution ; " but we were not destined to arrive at thc place .

    Just as we had turned into Oxford-street , we found one of the great crowds for which London is famous , collected round one of those " accidents" that enliven thc somewhat tame life of this thriving metropolis : some one had been knocked down by a policeman and seriously hurt . " And it ' s a gentleman / " whispered a working man with emphatic horror . Edwardes descended from his phaeton—I was wrong in calling it a gig ; Edwardes says that gigs arc never seen now , " except in Lincolnshire and Mesopotamia "—and we penetrated to tbe focus of interest . There lay a young man , in deadly stillness , bleeding at thc head , and breathing heavily .

    Thc case was worse thsin thc report : he had been knocked down into the road , and there run over ; and , as wc afterwards found , was suffering from a concussion of thc brain and a broken leg . After some delay , he was removed home—not at any distance ; we remained with him all night ; and 1 have been in the house ever since . Thc first steps towards recovery were only advances to a more shocking state of existence ; a broken log and violent delirium arc not good companions to each other , and I volunteered to watch him in turn with his brother . Thc father was paralyzed with fear ; and thc mother , vigorous as she seemed at a pinch , wanted grip for such a purpose .

    it was a horrid case , aud wc shall never hear the whole merits of it . The young man must have been in wine ; he got into some miserable scuttle , and was , I fancy , brutally treated . The . policeman came next day ; nnd the . poor father , who is a model of helplessness , on the presence of any strong calamity , called on me to stand b y him before the injurer of his son . " lie thought it well to have the presence of a third party . " The policeman had evidently come to beg and bully , in order to save his post . ; and he found bullying the better course . Thc father had no mercy for the man while pleading that he was under provocation ; but when he heard the odious details of thc disturbance , some unintelligible quarrel with or about a profligate woman , he did all lie could to " hush up" the matter ; and at parting he actually shook hands with the policeman ; who stalked out with

    » n air ot magnanimous forgiveness that deserved at least five , shillings . " 1 do not like to bear malice , " said thc tradesman to me . I cannot _describa to you the painful emotions which the aspect of that worthy man

    Saiffimt M & ¥&«&»®Hiffi* Ir. October 26...

    gave me—his tribulation at the sight of blood and p hysical sufferin clumsiness ; his anxiety to escape and " leave it all to the doctor and « * women ; " his feverish solicitude to hush up « _William ' s wildnesses » i the premises of police , and keep his shop free from " anything unusual _^' the fussy , chop-fallen , pursy obtrusively evasive bearing . And yet l seemed anxious , and prepared to do " all for the best , " if he did but kn how . Onl y " these things upset him so ; " they are «* so remark ably d _^ agreeable . " Edwardes delighted him by telling him that the best thi that he could do was to keep out of the way ; and next to his reliance _^ the unbounded ability of " the doctor , " I believe _, was his gratitude to _nT *

    He told me forty times , that he could not express his sense of the kindnes the perfectly unexpected and unmerited kindness , which I had sh own to th ' family ; and in return , at every interval of business , he was indefati gable _C seeing ( f that I was made comfortable , " " that I had all I wanted . " g has concentrated his own share of the labour thrown upon the _househol 1 in surrounding me with superfluous materials for festive feeding , and with a perfect plethora of bedrooih comforts , including several things of which I cannot guess the use .

    Meanwhile I have grown to be quite " one of the family , " and am treated with a degree of confidence that seems extended to no one else . Of course calamity exercises its usual power , in performing the work of time . But part of tbis sudden familiarity , I believe , lies in the fact that lam regarded as " a foreigner , " and it is thought that things may be done before me which would not be permitted if I were an Englishman . Why is this ? Is it not because half of the ordinary sense of right and wrong lies in the notion of what your companion will think of you . " Honi soit qui mal y _pense , " is the rule of chivalry—obsolete just now in England ; but the rule of daily life is , " Disgrace to him of whom ill is thought . "

    It is a good fanuly ; would it were as happy . It comprises Mr . Johnson and his wife—a woman far short of fifty , but worn to a framework for the most respectable costume that London could exhibit ; her children , of whom the eldest is a g irl some twenty-five or thirty years of age ; the youth in bed ; three other daughters , the youngest about twelve ; a second son , about sixteen or seventeen ; and the wife ' s cousin , not much older than the oldest daughter . We—how soon one gets to appropriate others into that

    multiple egotism we I—we are gradually " settling down into our ordinary ways ; " and very strange ways they are—at least , to me . Could I write down all of respect , surprise , affection , regret , and indignation , that the ordinary life of this ordinary family causes me , I might take many days to write this letter—far longer than poor William will suffer me to remain at the work . Anything in the account that you cannot understand , I dare say Helen can remember enough to explain to you .

    To be frank to you , this poor fellow lying beside my chair in his bed is a most insufferable animal . Convalescence only developes the odious inanity of his being . Pale , exhausted , feeble , he calls for attention to his comforts in a voice of irritated , _irppatient complaint at their not having been anticipated . From the fragmentary disclosures which he has made , I learn that his life hitherto , since he got away from school , has been one of business by day and " pleasure" by night . What the " p leasure" is 1 can only guess . Reminiscences of places of amusement not the most artistic—triumphs over policemen , of whom our poor friend has bastinadoed enough to garrison a great town—allusions , when we are alone , to

    more than one " poor girl" who has been very faithful to him—such for the past .- for the future , profit by the lesson just incurred , sticking to business , and reform : for the present , mere and absolute suspension of ideas . The poor wretch has not read , has not experienced , h not loved , has not lived—he has been but the subject of accident and instinct . He cordially loves nothing ; not even " Eliza , " on whom be intends to confer his battered body , as soon as he can arrange a partnership with his lather . To describe the utter vacuity of his mind , at present , in the transition between the Chateau Rouge stage of life , and tbe counting-house stage , would be impracticable : you cannot describe a negation , nor paint a vacuum . The scraps of half _boastfpl , repentant ribaldry—the silly f _« ftts of bravado—the convalescent mind narrowing to a very few ideas , the

    guides of the wise future—the tightening selfishness of the man not worth a place in the world , but now the object of nn organized solicitude—"" ike a composition of vanity ludicrously disgusting . Edwardes tells me that young Johnson is a perfect specimen of the London ' ' gent . " I can assure you that a gent , in articulo mortis is not a sublime object . 1 llC father tells me that although William is wild— " and we have all beeu wild in our day , sir , "— he is a shar p fellow , aud may have a p lace in the business us soon as he is married— " and a wife as soon as he asks * her , " Many a girl would be glad tp have him , tbe father says ; _» lil

    Edwardes declares that it is true ! William loves nothing ; and how any one can love him I cannot _gueas , save for that blind instinct which , by the blessing of our Heavenly J _' ath « » is stronger than man's precepts and maxims . A more utterly vahmlj - being _thaq the sick man appeared as he lay iu hed , it would be _nnpossi > c to imagine . So actively worthless , so mischievous in all that there »» him of faculties , _thut truly thc thought came over me more than oi . ee , n it was a less true servico to any living creature to help in the lab _»» lugging him back into health and life , than to help in tho purifying proce _*» of tho opposite sort . A finger and thumb might have done it . A » i » y it was Ices reason that restrained me than that same blind instinct . is oleur tlrot some dp love him . Not Ids father ; who only _respe cts in"

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 28, 1852, page 20, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_28081852/page/20/