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160 THE LEADER. |"No. 308, Saturday ,
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SAMHEI * ROGERS'STABLE TALK. Recollectio...
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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.
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" One Eye May Be Very Agreeable," Says C...
and blood , even when they are the flesh and blood of a Shakspeare , cannot stand this ; so have at you , Ben , for William is roused ! It is Fuller ' s English man-of-war getting under way . There may be a lurch or two as he leaves the harbour , but how swiftly and beautifully he floats at last out into the deep water , and once there , how he masters the element ! How he taeks and turns , and sails round and round his antagonist , and baffles him , and bewilders him , and sends shot after shot into him faster than they can be counted ! I * ot that Ben takes it all quietly . On the contrary , he brings all his mass to bear upon his nimble adversary , and tries to drown him at first with loudness , and throws emphasis and rage into his words , and hurla out learned and
quotations and allusions in the midst of his masculine and witty retorts , even follows his adversary as well as he can into the regions of tie subtle , the hyperbolic , and the sublime . In vain ; for , according to his own testimony afterwards , the adversary he is engaged with is , besides all his other gifts and qualities , a man of unparalleled fluency . " I loved the man , " said Ben , " and do honour his memory on this side idolatry as much as any . He was , indeed , honest and of an open and free nature ; had an excellent phantasy , brave notions , and gentle expressions , wherein he flowed with , that facility that sometimes it was necessary he should be stopped ; ' sujfiaminandus era * , ' as Augustus said of Haterius . " We have not the slightest doubt of it ; only we suspect the stopping of ham , when he was in one of his phrenzies , would not have been so easy .
We have exhausted our space , or we should gladly have made some quotations from a remarkable article on the Kabbala , in the Eclectic Review ; but let the curious reader by all means seek out the article itself , which will give him much information in a very accessible form .
160 The Leader. |"No. 308, Saturday ,
160 THE LEADER . | "No . 308 , Saturday ,
Samhei * Rogers'stable Talk. Recollectio...
SAMHEI * ROGERS'STABLE TALK . Recollections of the Table Talk of Samuel Rogers . To which is added Porsoniana . Moxon . Had the writer on Table Talk in the last Quarterly waited a few weeks , lie might have added to his list one of the -pleasantest of the anecdotical works that subject eml ) races . Samuel Rogers was not a brilliant talker , but lis long life , and the amazing wealth of his acquaintance—including princes and pOet ^ actors and artists , warriors and statesmen , wits and leaders of fashionfurnished his conversation with more anecdotes than perhaps any other man of his time could pretend to . The present volume is just what might have been expected ; richinanecdote , and personal '' 'glimpses ; but by no means remarkable either for \ yifc or wisdom in the passages which Rogers himself
furnishes . The editor has discharged his office with unusual skill . He might , indeed , have spared us several feeble entries , but We have reason to be grateful that he has not been more liberal in this respect . He has printed nothing whifcb . can affect theliving , much that must interest every one ; and he has so arranged the . scattered fragments under their several heads , that details which in themselves would be too trivial for record , become important as cumulative traits from which to form a picture ^ In one word , the book is charming , and will -furnish " Table Talk" for all England . Our task ; will be to enrich our columns with choice morsels . We begin withail exquisite compliment paid . 'by Burke to Reynolds when the painter . gj ^ ye'fa 4 $ ; fareweU '' lecttozei ~''' . Slr ; . Jo ^ ua co 4 clu ' diBd ' 'i > heiepWa ' b 7 .-sa 3 : in ^ , with , great emotion , "And I should desire that the last words which I should pronounce in this Academy and from this place might be the name of—Michael Angelo . " As lie descended from the rostrum , Burke went up to him , took Ma hand , and said , ¦¦ ¦¦ ¦ ¦¦
,. » . - > . " The angel ended , and in Adam ' s ear So charming left his voice , that he a while Thought him still speaking , still stood fix'd to hear . " The following is not new , but is good enough to bear repetition : — Doctor Fordyce sometimes drank-a good deal at dinner . He was summoned one evening to see a lady patient , when he was more -than half-seas-over and conscious that he was so . Feeling her pulse , and finding himself unable to count its beats , he muttered , "Drunk , by God ! " NText morning , recollecting the circumstance , hei was greatly vexed : and just aa he was thinking what explanatioiixrf his behaviour he should offer to the lady , a letter from her w ^ ptibinto hi s « £ &* ¦ * ?•?• - ^ HiT ^' said the letter ' * hat he ^ & s » £ t £ S ? a W ^ ^ blclX 8 h ° whenlie l ^^ ited her j and she Sd banknote ) » ^^ . ^ i- ^ tion of the enclosed ( a hundred-pound
TJj is on Toltaife-iTcreditable to Adam Smith : — - ^ ronxKA ^ ? 5 ^ ° ^ i I went to Edinburgh , carrying letters of introduction W ^ OWar . Kippw , Dr . Price , & c . ) to Adam Smith , Robertson , and others . When I . nrab saw Smith he was at breakfast , eating strawberries ; and lie descanted on tne superior flavour of those grown in Scotland . I found him very kind and communicative . He was { what Robertson was not ) a man who l » ad seen a great deal of the world . Once , m the course of conversation , I happened to remark of somei writer , -that "he was rathor superficial ,- —a Voltaire . "— " Sir , " cried Smith striking the table with his hand , " there has been but one Voltaire ! " ' Of Erskiue we have some delightful mots . - <—When Lord Erskine heard that somebody had died worth two hundred though ? ' lieobserred » "Well , that ' s a very pretty sum to begin the next world
,, ? # « f nuno , said Erskine , « was suffering from acontinual wakefulness ; and variouBEQethods were tried to eend him to sleep , "but in vain . At last bis pnyaioians resoi-tecl to , an experiment which succeeded perfectly : they dressed him . m a watchman ' s coat , put a lantern into Lis hand , placed him in a aentrvbox , and--he was asleep in ten minutes . " ^ To all letters soliciting his «« subscription" to anything , Eralcino had a regular for ^ of reply viz ., « Sir , I fool much honoured by your application to mo , and I •&* - ° ' ? SCribo V * * «^ er had to turn over tho leaf- " myself your very tjw & cuejxt servant , & c . : ^ M ^^ i 8 of tl \ P lendi <* « oax Pl « y « d by kokUowitz , the Austrian ¦ ¦^ SSfif ^' ^ detested the Jesuits , and in his will made thorn a bequest which mvS ^ l ^^ i T mout " 3 water with expectation . After a devout prot ^ r ^ fer * ^ #° 8 Ociotv 82 , 000-ioro the leaf had to bo turned TOtfSSShirSf ^ irt WSro the ww <* s— " »«««• towards a new building . " £ S « ^ p ? aUy tUe first m * lft 8 t > ««* admirable : - we sSJ ¦ S ^ 3 !! Sl ? tvr Hfa tholxo ^ " ™ »*< « n secrets uliould bo revealed , wLnSS & S ^« ~~ ah £ > 08 aro iawavB made to ° tf s * - have' diued th ^ -e S ? tno pZW V ° * crtftin 1 <* ° ™ ry heat company . I «»« me 1 mice of ? nleB-tl » only time I over had any
conversation with his royal highness . On that occasion the Prince was very agreeable and familiar . Among other anecdotes which he told us of Lord Thurlow I remember these two . The first was : Thurlow once said to the Prince , " Sir , your father will continue to be a popular king as long as he continues to go to church every Sunday , and to be faithful to that ugly woman , your mother ; but you , sir , will never be popular . " The other was this : While his servants Mere carrying Thurlow up-stairs to his bed-room , just before his death , they happened to let his legs strike against the banisters , upon which , he uttered the last words he ever spoTce , —a frightful imprecation on " all their souls . " Erskine said that the Prince of Wale 3 was quite " a cosmogony man" ( alluding to The Vicar of Wakefield ) , for he had only two classical quotations , —one from Homer and one from Virgil , which he never failed to sport when thero was any opportunity of introducing them .
Latterly Erskine was very poor ; and no wonder , for he always contrived to sell out of the funds when they were very low , and to buy in when they were very high . "By heaven , " he would say , "I am a perfect kite , all paper ; the boys might fly me . " Yefc , poor as he was , he still kept the best society : I have met him at the Duke of York ' s , & c . & c . The following epigram may not have been printed before , but it circulates among the Erskine stories : — " The French have taste in all they do , "Which we are quite without ; For Nature , that to them gave (/ out , To us gave only gout . "
Many are the stories respecting the power of man ' s eye on wild animals ; but we believe the effect is attributed to a wrong cause ; here are two : — Thomas Grenville told me this curious fact . When he was a . young man , he one day dined with Lord Spencer at Wimbledon . Among the company Avas George Pitt ( afterwards Lord Bivers ) , who declaimed that he could tame the most furious animal by looking at it steadily . Lord Spencer said , " Well , there is a mastiff in the court-yard here , which is the terror of the neighbourhood : will you try your powers on him ? " Pitt agreed to do . so ; and the company de-Bcended into the court-yard . A servant held the mastiff by a chain . Pitt knelt down at a short distance from the animal , and stared him sternly in ihe faee . They all shuddered . At a signal given , the mastiff was let loose , and rushed furiously towards Pitt , — -then suddenly checked his pace , seemed confounded , aud , leaping over Pitt ' s head , ran away , and was not seen for many hours after .
During one of my visits to Italy , while I was walking , a little before my carriage , on the road , not far from Vicenza , I perceived two huge dogs , nearly as tall as myself , "bounding towards me ( from , out a gate-way , though there was no house in sight ) . : £ recollected what Pitt had done ; and trembling from head to foot , I yet had resolution enough to-stand quite still and eye them with a fixed look . They gradually relaxed their speed from a gallop to a trot , came up to me , stopped for a moment , and tlen went back again . Such facts ought to be registered ; but , as before Milted , we doubt the explanation ; it is not the iixed look which confounds the animal , but the unusual attitude . Dogs are not accustomed to be attacked by men kneeling before them , or standing motionless- That puts them out . An Indian officer once informed us that he was with a sepoy in the jungle , when they espied
a tiger crouching and about to spring ; the sepoy instantly crouched likewise , and placing his two hands trumpetwise before his lips , shouted : in another instant the tiger was heard crash , crash , crash , leaping through the jungle . The explanation seems to be that the tiger was alarmed by this unaccustomed mode of defence . Certain it is that in the East , where dogs in troops rush out upon the traveller like so many wolves , the only safety is in seating oneself on the ground , and laying aside the stick or gun . The dogs form a circle round you , but will not attack you so long as you remain thus motionless . Curiously enough Homer has in the Odyssey noticed this very custom . When Ulysses returns home , and goes to his shepherds , the dogs all rush out upon him , barking furiously ; but " Ulysses craftily seated himself , and laid aside his staff . "
Oi /* ev WKXijywrtr lireSpaiAQv * avrap OSvafftv ? E £ ero KtpSotrvvy , aKijTrrpov £ s 01 tKirtoe ^ eipoff . Now Ulysses could not have fixed them all with his eye . Apropos of Homer , an example of his accurate observation will he worth quoting from this vo . lume : — Some traveller relates , that an Indian being asleep in his cauoe , which was fastened to the shore , a little above the Falls of Niagara , an English soldier wantonly cut the fastenings , and the canoe drifted iufco tho current ;—tbat the Indian , after vainly trying the use of his paddlea , and perceiving that ho was just approaching the Falls , covered his head with his mat , lay down in the canoe , and calmly resigned himself to his fate . So Homer , following nature , tells us iu tho Odyssey that Ulysses , when his companions had opened the bug which eoiitninocl
the winds , covered his head with his mantle , and lay down iu the -vessel . Here is a glorious mot of Sydney Smith's : — MissLydia White ( long since dead ) was a lady who delightod in giving parties to as many celebrated people as she could collect . The following iuntnneo of her readiness . in reply was communicated to me by my friend tho Rev . W . Harness . " At ono of Lydift White ' s small and most agreeablo dinuers , in Park-stroot , tho company ( most of them , except the hostess , being Whigs ) wore cli * cim » ing j » rather a querulous strain the desperate prospects of their pnrty . ' Yed , ' said Sydney Smith , ' wo are in a most deplorable condition : wo must do Homethiug to help ourselves 5 I think we had better sacrifice a Tory virgin . ' This was pointedly addressod to Lydia White , who , nt onco catching oud applying ^ allusion to Iphigenia , answored , ' I believe there in nothing tho Whigs would not do to raise the wind . '"
Lydia ' s reply was smait , and muat have made them laugh , but the flavour and humour of sacrificing a Tory virgin ia of a much higher strain . ¦ Charles Jamea Fox in his- ' hot youth ' : — Fox ( in his earlier days , I moan ) , Shoridan , Fibzpntrick , & c , IcmI sveh a lifo ! Lord Tankorvillo assured me that ho haa played ocu-da with Fit / . patriok at Brooks ' s from ton o ' clock at night till nonr six o'clock tho noxfc aflornoou , n waiter standing by to toll them " whoso deal it was , " they boing too nloejiy to km > w After losing la ^ go sums at hazard , Fox would go homo—not to doatroy himHolf ; as Mb friends BonoetimoB foavodbut—to sib < lown quiotlv and roncl Grouk .
, Ho once wonaJbout eight thousand pounds : and ono of hifibond-orodltwrfl , who soon hoard of hie good luck , presented himaclf , and asked for payment . " Inipossiblo , sir , " replied Fox ; "I inu « b ( first disohargo my debts ) of lumouv . " r lh « bond-creditor remonstrated . "Well , sir , givo me your bond . " It was dolivorod to Fox , who tor « ifc in pioces and threw thorn into the fire . "Now , nlv , " said Fox , " my dobt to you is o debt of honour ; " and immodiatoly paid him .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 16, 1856, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_16021856/page/16/
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