A FULL-LENGTH OF TICKLER. Weep not for her!-It was not hers to feel The miseries that corrode amassing years, As whirl the wither'd leaves from Friendship's tree, Weep not for her!-She is an angel now, The vista'd joys of Heaven's eternal year : Weep not for her !—Her memory is the shrine Sweet as the song of birds among the bowers, Weep not for her!-There is no cause for woe; And from earth's low defilements keep thee back: 193 Omnes. Beautiful-beautiful-beautiful-beautiful indeed! North. James, now that you have seen us in summer, how do you like the Lodge? Shepherd. There's no sic anither house, Mr North, baith for elegance and comfort, in a' Scotland. North. In my old age, James, I think myself not altogether unentitled to the luxuries of learned leisure-Do you find that sofa easy and commodious? Shepherd. Easy and commodious! What! it has a' the saftness o' a bed, and a' the coolness o' a bank; yielding rest without drowsiness, and without snoring repose. Tickler. No sofa like a chair! See James, how I am lying and sitting at the same time! carelessly diffused, yet—— VOL. I. N 194 A KIT-CAT OF NORTH. Shepherd. You're a maist extraordinary feegur, Mr Tickler, I humbly confess that, wi' your head imbedded in a cushion, and your een fixed on the roof like an astronomer; and your endless legs stretched out to the extremities o' the yearth; and your lang arms hanging down to the verra floor, atower the bend o' the chair-settee, and only lift up, wi' a magnificent wave, to bring the bottom o' the glass o' cauld punch to rest upon your chin; and wi' that tamboured waistcoat o' the fashion o'aughty-aught, like a meadow yellow wi' dandylions; and breeks Tickler. Check your hand, and change your measure, my dear Shepherd.-Oh! for a portrait of North! Shepherd. I daurna try't, for his ee masters me; and I fear to tak the same leeberties wi' Mr North that I sometimes venture upon wi' you, Mr Tickler. Yet, oh man! I like him weel in that black neckerchief: it brings out his face grandlyand the green coat o' the Royal Archers gies him a RobinHoodish character, that makes ane's imagination think o' the umbrage o' auld oaks, and the glimmering silence o' forests. Tickler. He blushes. Shepherd. That he does-and I like to see the ingenuous blush o' bashfu' modesty on a wrinkled cheek. It proves that the heart's-blood is warm and free, and the circulation vigorDeil tak me, Mr North, if I dinna think you're something like his majesty the King. ous. North. I am proud that you love the Lodge. There! a bold breeze from the sea! Is not that a pleasant rustle, James?— and lo! every sail on the Firth is dancing on the blue bosom of the waters, and brightening like sea-mews in the sunshine! Shepherd. After a', in het wather, there's naething like a marine villa. What for dinna ye big1 a Yott? North. My sailing days are over, James; but mine is now the ship of Fancy, who can go at ten knots in a dead calm, and carry her sky-scrapers in a storm. Shepherd. Nae wonder, after sic a life o' travel by sea and land, you should hae found a hame at last, and sic a hame! A' the towers, and spires, and pillars, and pinnacles, and bewilderments o' blue house-roofs, seen frae the tae front through amang the leafy light o' interceptin trees-and frae the tither, where we are noo sitting, only here and there a bit sprinklin o' villas, and then atower the grove-heads seeming sae thick and saft, that you think you might lie down on them and tak 1 Big-build. a sleep, the murmuring motion o' the never weary sea! Oh, Mr North, that you would explain to me the nature o' the tides! North. When the moon Shepherd. Stap, stap; I couldna command my attention wi' yon bonny brig huggin the shores o' Inchkeith' sae lovingly -at first I thocht she was but a breakin wave. North. Wave, cloud, bird, sunbeam, shadow or ship-often know I not one from the other, James, when half-sleeping halfwaking, in the debatable and border land between realities and dreams, "My weary length at noontide would I stretch, And muse upon the world that wavers by." Tickler. Yet I never saw you absent in company, North. North. Nor, I presume, spit on the carpet. Shepherd. The ane's just as bad as the ither, or rather the first's the warst o' the twa. What right has ony man to leave his ugly carcass in the room, by itsel, without a soul in't? Surely there could be nae cruelty or uncourtesy in kickin't out o' the door. Absent in company indeed! Tickler. Look at the ninny's face, with his mouth open and his eyes fixed on the carpet, his hand on his chin, and his head a little to the one side-in a fit of absence. North. Thinking, perhaps, about ginger-beer or a radish. Shepherd. Or determining which pair o' breeks he shall draw on when he gangs out to sooper-or his mind far awa in Montgomery's shop, tasting something sweet-or makin profoun' calculation about buyin a second-hand gig—or thinkin himsel waitin for a glass o' mineral water at St Bernard's Wall-or tryin on a foraging-cap for sleepin in cotches-or believin himsel stannin at the window o' a prent-shop, lookin at Miss Foote's pas seul-or forgettin he's no in the kirk, and nae occasion to be sleepy,—or deluded into a belief that he is spittin ower a brig-or Tickler. Stop, James, stop. You are a whale running off with a thousand fathom Shepherd. Thank ye, Mr Tickler. I was beginning to get ower copious. But I wonner what made me think the noo o' the Author o' the Modern Athens.2 What for didna ye tak him through hauns, Mr North? 1 An island in the Firth of Forth near Edinburgh. 2 Robert Mudie was the author of Modern Athens (i. e. Edinburgh), and many other works, most or all of which are now forgotten. He died in 1842. 196 THE AUTHOR OF MODERN ATHENS. North. Because I think him a man of some talent; and, for the sake of talent, I can overlook much, seeing that blockheads are on the increase. Shepherd. On the increase, say ye? North. I fear so. Now, he is miserably poor. And knowing that many dull dogs dine at shilling ordinaries (beef, bread, and beer, with some vegetables) regularly once a-day, when he, who is really a man of merit, can afford to do so only on Tuesdays and Fridays, he naturally gets irritated and misanthropical; and what wonder, if, on the dinnerless afternoons, he writes what he would not commit on a full stomach, and much that he would sincerely repent of over a tureen of hotchpotch or a haggis? Tickler. You hear the rumbling of empty bowels, poor fellow, in his happiest passages. Shepherd. But wull you tell me that being puir's ony reason for being a blackguard ? The North. You mistake me-I did not say, James, that the author of Modern Athens is absolutely a blackguard. usage, too, that he met with in his native country—literally kicked out of it, you know—could not but ruffle and sour his temper; and such is my opinion both of his head and heart, that, but for that unlucky application to his posteriors, I verily believe he might have been somewhat of an honest man, and a libeller merely of foreign countries. Shepherd. Weel-it's verra gude in you, Mr North, to make sic an ingenious defence for the scoonrel; but I canna forgie him for abusin alike the lasses and the leddies o' Scotland. North. There are lassies and leddies in Scotland, my dear James, of whom you know nothing-houses where, it is obvious from his writings, the author of Modern Athens must have had his howf;'-and really, when one considers from what originals he painted his portraits of Edina's girlery, the wonder is that his daubings are not even more disgusting than they are; but the likenesses are strong, although his nymphs must have been unsteady sitters. Tickler. Poor devil! suppose we send him a few poundsShepherd. I wad dae nae sic thing. You canna serve sic chiels by charity. It does them nae gude. Neither am I convinced that he wouldna tell lees when he's no hungry. Yon wasna a solid argument about the empty stomach. 1 Howf-haunt. 2 Dae-do. Sic THE BATTLE OF THE BLOCKHEADS. 197 a neerdoweel wadna scruple to utter falsehoods in the face o' a round o' beef. Cram him till he's like to burst, and he'll throw up onything but truth-loosen his shirt-neck when he's lying dead-drunk on a form, and he'll unconsciously ettle at a lee in maudlin syllablings, till his verra vomit is a libel, and falsehood rancifies the fume o' the toasted cheese that sickness brings harlin out o' his throat in a gin-shower aneuch to sicken a fulzie-man.1 North. Stop, James, stop-that's out of all bounds Tickler. By the by, North, I have a letter from Mullion in my pocket, apologising, I believe, for not dining here to-day. There it is, folded up in the Secretary's usual business-like style. North (reading). Why, it's an article. Shepherd. An article-let's hear't. Mullion and me never agrees verra weel in company; but when he's absent I hae a great kindness for him, and naebody can dispute his abeelities. North. It seems a sort of parody. THE BATTLE OF THE BLOCKHEADS.2 BY MR SECRETARY MULLION. AIR-" Battle of the Baltic." Of Wastle, Hogg, and North, Sing the glory and renown, And of Tickler, who came forth With his bald and shining crown, As their pens along our page brightly shone ; Turnipologist and Stot, All the breeds of Whiggish kine, 1 Anglicè, a night-man. 2 By D. M. Moir. 3 "Wastle" was a mere mythical contributor to Blackwood, and does not appear to have represented any real person in particular. 4 The story went that the Edinburgh phrenologists had been hoaxed by means of a cast taken from a Swedish turnip. They reported that its organs were very finely developed, and that it was remarkable, in particular, for "tune," "ideality," and "veneration!" |