MRS RADCLIFFE'S POSTHUMOUS WORKS. Now joy, bold comrades, raise ! For these tidings of our might, Lean pates to Whiggish pride With grey Jerry,2 the old shrew: While loud is Hazlitt's growl, 199 Shepherd. It soun's as gin it was gude-but I'm sick o' a' that clan, and canna be amused wi' even true wut wasted upon them; besides, the dowgs hae had their day—hae died o' the mange, and been buried in the dunghill. Tickler. There, my dear bard, conquer your disgust by a peep into this volume. 3 Shepherd. Dog on't, Mr Tickler, gin I hadna jouked there. you had felled me— :—but—ou ay !—a volume of Mrs Radcliffe's* Posthumous Warks. Poems, too! I'm sure they'll be bonny, for she was a true genius. Tickler. Kit, smoke his eyes, how they glare! Shepherd. The description is just perfectly beautifu'. Here's the way o' readin out poetry. "On the bright margin of Italia's shore, Beneath the glance of summer-noon we stray, And, indolently happy, ask no more Than cooling airs that o'er the ocean play. "And watch the bark, that, on the busy strand, 1 See ante, p. 32, note 2. 3 Jouked-dodged. 2 Jerry-Jeremy Bentham. Born 1749; died 1832. 4 Mrs Radcliffe died in 1823, aged 59. 200 SHEPHERD ON REVIEWING. "On the broad deck a various group recline, Who, silent, watch the bark the coast resign, "We, indolently happy, watch alone The wandering airs that o'er the ocean stray, North. I wish you would review these four volumes, James, for next Number. Shepherd. Tuts-What's the use o' reviewin? Naething like a skreed o' extracts into a magazeen taken in the kintra. When I fa' on, tooth and nail, on an article about some new wark, oh, Mr North, but I'm wud when I see the cretur that's undertaken to review't, settin himsel wi' clenched teeth to compose a philosophic creeticism, about the genius o' an owther that every man kens as weel as his ain face in the glass-and then comparing him wi' this, and contrastin him wi' that—and informin you which o' his warks are best, and which warst, and which middlin- balancin a genius against himsel, and settin his verra merits against his character and achievements-instead o' telling you at ance what the plot is about, and how it begins, and gangs on, and is wunded up; in short, pithy hints o' the characters that feegur throughout the story, and a maisterly abridgment o' facts and incidents, wi' noo and then an elucidatory observation, and a glowing panegyric; but, aboon a' things else, lang, lang, lang extracts, judiciously seleckit, and lettin you ken at ance if the owther has equalled or excelled himsel, or if he has struck out a new path, or followed the auld ane into some unsuspeckit scenery o' bonny underwood, or lofty standards or whether but I'm out o' breath, and maun hae a drink. Thank you, Mr North-that's the best bowl you've made yet. Tickler. I never had any professed feeling of the super or preter-natural in a printed book. Very early in life I discovered that a ghost, who had kept me in a cold sweat during a whole winter's midnight, was a tailor who haunted the house, partly through love, and partly through hunger, being HIS DREAD OF THE SUPERNATURAL. 201 enamoured of my nurse, and of the fat of ham which she gave him with mustard, between two thick shaves' of a quartern loaf, and afterwards a bottle of small-beer to wash it down, before she yielded him the parting kiss. After that I slept soundly, and had a contempt for ghosts, which I retain to this day. Shepherd. Weel, it's verra different wi' me. I should be feared yet even for the ninth pairt o' a ghost, and I fancy a tailor has nae mair;-but I'm no muckle affeckit by reading about them-an oral tradition out o' the mouth o' an auld grey-headed man or woman is far best, for then you canna dout the truth o' the tale, unless ye dout a' history thegither, and then, to be sure, you'll end in universal skepticism. North. Don't you admire the romances of the Enchantress of Udolpho? Shepherd. I hae nae doubt, sir, that had I read Udolpho and her ither romances in my boyish days, that my hair would hae stood on end like that o' ither folk, for, by nature and education baith, ye ken, I'm just excessive superstitious. But afore her volumes fell into my hauns, my soul had been frichtened by a' kinds of traditionary terrors, and mony hunder times hae I maist swarfed2 wi' fear in lonesome spats in muirs and woods, at midnicht, when no a leevin thing was movin but mysel and the great moon. Indeed, I canna say that I ever fan' mysel alane in the hush o' darkened nature, without a beatin at my heart; for a sort o' spiritual presence aye hovered about me—a presence o' something like and unlike my ain being—at times felt to be solemn and nae mair-at times sae awfu' that I wushed mysel nearer ingle-licht—and ance or twice in my lifetime, sae terrible that I could hae prayed to sink down into the moss, sae that I micht be saved frae the quaking o' that ghostly wilderness o' a world that wasna for flesh and bluid! North. Look-James-look-what a sky! Shepherd. There'll be thunder the morn. These are the palaces o' the thunder, and before daybreak every window will pour forth lichtnin. Mrs Radcliffe has weel described mony sic, but I have seen some that can be remembered, but never, never painted by mortal pen; for after a', what is 2 Swarfed-swooned. 1 Shaves-slices. 202 GHOSTS IN TRAGEDY. ony description by us puir creturs o' the works o' the Great God? North. Perhaps it is a pity that Mrs Radcliffe never introduced into her stories any real ghosts. Shepherd. I canna just a'thegither think sae. Gin you introduce a real ghost at a', it maun appear but seldom-seldom, and never but on some great or dread account-as the ghost o' Hamlet's father. Then, what difficulty in makin it speak with a tomb voice! At the close o' the tale, the mind would be shocked unless the dead had burst its cerements for some end which the dead alane could have accomplished-unless the catastrophe were worthy an Apparition. How few events, and how few actors would, as the story shut itself up, be felt to have been of such surpassing moment as to have deserved the very laws o' nature to have been in a manner changed for their sakes, and shadows brought frae amang the darkness o' burial-places, that seem to our imaginations locked up frae a' communion wi' the breathin world! North. In highest tragedy, a Spirit may be among the dramatis persona-for the events come all on processionally, and under a feeling of fate. Shepherd. There, too, you see the ghost; and indifferently personated though it may be, the general hush proves that religion is the deepest principle o' our nature, and that even the vain shows o' a theatre can be sublimed by an awe-struck sadness, when, revisiting the glimpses o' the moon, and makin night hideous, comes glidin in and awa in cauld unringin armour, or unsubstantial vapour, a being whose eyes ance saw the cheerfu' sunlight, and whose footsteps ance brought out echoes frae the flowery earth. North. In this posthumous tale of Mrs Radcliffe-I forget the name—a real ghost is the chief agent, and is two or three times brought forward with good effect; but I confess, James, that agreeably to your excellent observations, I became somewhat too much hand-in-glove with his ghostship, and that all supernatural influence departed from him through too frequent intercourse with the air of the upper world. Tickler. Come, James, be done with your palavering about ghosts, you brownie, and "gie us anither sang." Shepherd. Wi' a' my heart. What'll you hae? But beggars shouldna be choosers, sae here it gaes. O weel befa' the maiden gay, Wha lo'es the modest truth sae weel- Amang sae mony men. O weel befa' the bonny thing, 'Tis sweet to hear the music float 'Tis sweet to hear the blackbird's note To see the lambkin's lightsome race— But sweeter far the bonny face O, had it no been for the blush Dear Beauty never had been known, And never had a name. But aye sin' that dear thing of blame But deadliest far the sacred flame There's beauty in the violet's vest There's hinny in the haw There's dew within the rose's breast, The sweetest o' them a'. The sun will rise an' set again, And lace with burning gowd the main- But lovelier far my bonny thing 1 By Hogg. 2 Bught-sheepfold. 203 |