"SCENE.—The Inside of the Cottage.—MOPSA, LUBIN (her father), and COLIN (her lover), discovered.
"Enter PEVIDOR, leading the Bear, and singing.
"And he dances, dances, dances,
And goes upright like a Christian swain,
And he shows you pretty fancies,
Nor ever tries to shake off his chain.
"Lubin. Servant, master. Now, Mopsa, you are happy—it is, indeed, a handsome creature. What country does your bear come from?
"Pev. Dis bear, please your worship, is of de race of dat bear of St. Anthony, who was the first convert he made in de woods. St. Anthony bade him never more meddle with man, and de bear observed de command to his dying day.
"Lub. Wonderful!
"Pev. Dis generation be all de same—all born widout toots.
"Colin. What, can't he bite? (puts his finger to the Bear's mouth, who bites him.) Oh Lord, no toots! why you ——
"Pev. Oh dat be only his gum. (Mopsa laughs.)
"Col. For shame, Mopsa—now, I say Maister Lubin, mustn't she give me a kiss to make it well?
"Lub. Ay, kiss her, kiss her, Colin.
"Col. Come, Miss. (Mopsa runs to the Bear, who kisses her.)"
The following scene of the Devils drinking in their subterraneous dwelling, though cleverly imagined, is such as, perhaps, no cookery of style could render palatable to an English audience.
"SCENE.—The Devils' Cave.
"1st Dev. Come, Urial, here's to our resurrection.
"2d Dev. It is a toast I'd scarcely pledge—by my life, I think we're happier here.
"3d Dev. Why, so think I—by Jove, I would despise the man, who could but wish to rise again to earth, unless we were to lord there. What! sneaking pitiful in bondage, among vile money-scrapers, treacherous friends, fawning flatterers—or, still worse, deceitful mistresses. Shall we who reign lords here, again lend ourselves to swell the train of tyranny and usurpation? By my old father's memory, I'd rather be the blindest mole that ever skulked in darkness, the lord of one poor hole, where he might say, 'I'm master here.'
"2d Dev. You are too hot—where shall concord be found, if even the devils disagree?—Come fill the glass, and add thy harmony—while we have wine to enlighten us, the sun be hanged! I never thought he gave so fine a light for my part—and then, there are such vile inconveniences— high winds and storms, rains, &c.—oh hang it! living on the outside of the earth is like sleeping on deck, when one might, like us, have a snug berth in the cabin.
"1st Dev. True, true,—Helial, where is thy catch?
"In the earth's centre let me live,
There, like a rabbit will I thrive,
Nor care if fools should call my life infernal;
While men on earth crawl lazily about,
Like snails upon the surface of the nut,
We are, like maggots, feasting in the kernel.
"1st Dev. Bravo, by this glass. Meli, what say you?
"3d Dev. Come, here's to my Mina—I used to toast her in the upper regions.
"1st Dev. Ay, we miss them here.
"Glee.
"What's a woman good for?
Rat me, sir, if I know.
* * * * *
She's a savor to the glass,
An excuse to make it pass.
* * * * *
"1st Dev. I fear we are like the wits above, who abuse women only because they can't get them,—and, after all, it must be owned they are a pretty kind of creatures.
"All. Yes, yes.
"Catch.
"'Tis woman after all
Is the blessing of this ball,
'Tis she keeps the balance of it even.
We are devils, it is true,
But had we women too,
Our Tartarus would turn to a Heaven!"
A scene in the Third Act, where these devils bring the prisoners whom they have captured to trial, is an overcharged imitation of the satire of Fielding, and must have been written, I think, after a perusal of that author's Satirical Romance, "A Journey from this World to the Next,"—the first half of which contains as much genuine humor and fancy as are to be found in any other production of the kind. The interrogatories of Minos in that work suggested, I suspect, the following scene:—
"Enter a number of Devils.—Others bring in LUDOVICO.
"1st Dev. Just taken, in the wood, sir, with two more.
"Chorus of Devils.
"Welcome, welcome
* * * * *
"Pev. What art thou?
"Ludov. I went for a man in the other world.
"Pev. What sort of a man?
"Ludov. A soldier at your service.
"Pev. Wast thou in the battle of—?
"Ludov. Truly I was.
"Pev. What was the quarrel?
"Ludov. I never had time to ask. The children of peace, who make our quarrels, must be Your Worship's informants there.
"Pev. And art thou not ashamed to draw the sword for thou know'st not what—and to be the victim and food of others' folly?
"Ludov. Vastly.
"Pev. (to the Devils.) Well, take him for to-day, and only score his skin and pepper it with powder—then chain him to a cannon, and let the Devils practise at his head—his be the reward who hits it with a single ball.
"Ludov. Oh mercy, mercy!
"Pev. Bring Savodi.
"(A Devil brings in SAVODI.)
"Chorus as before.
"Welcome, welcome, &c.
"Pev. Who art thou?
"Sav. A courtier at Your Grace's service.
"Pev. Your name?
"Sav. Savodi, an' please Your Highnesses.
"Pev. Your use?
"Sav. A foolish utensil of state—a clock kept in the waiting- chamber, to count the hours.
"Pev. Are you not one of those who fawn and lie, and cringe like spaniels to those a little higher, and take revenge by tyranny on all beneath?
"Sav. Most true, Your Highnesses.
"Pev. Is't not thy trade to promise what thou canst not do,—to gull the credulous of money, to shut the royal door on unassuming merit —to catch the scandal for thy master's ear, and stop the people's voice….
"Sav. Exactly, an' please Your Highnesses' Worships.
"Pev. Thou dost not now deny it?
"Sav. Oh no, no, no.
"Pev. Here—baths of flaming sulphur!—quick—stir up the cauldron of boiling lead—this crime deserves it.
"1st Dev. Great Judge of this infernal place, allow him but the mercy of the court.
"Sav. Oh kind Devil!—yes, Great Judge, allow.
"1st Dev. The punishment is undergone already—truth from him is something.
"Sav. Oh, most unusual—sweet devil!
"1st Dev. Then, he is tender, and might not be able to endure—
"Sav. Endure! I shall be annihilated by the thoughts of it—dear devil.
"1st Dev. Then let him, I beseech you, in scalding brimstone be first soaked a little, to inure and prepare him for the other.
"Sav. Oh hear me, hear me.
"Pev. Well, be it so.
"(Devils take him out and bring in PAMPHILES.)
"Pev. This is he we rescued from the ladies—a dainty one, I warrant.
"Pamphil. (affectedly.) This is Hell certainly by the smell.
"Pev. What, art thou a soldier too?
"Pamphil. No, on my life—a Colonel, but no soldier—innocent even of a review, as I exist.
"Pev. How rose you then? come, come—the truth.
"Pamphil. Nay, be not angry, sir—if I was preferred it was not my fault—upon my soul, I never did anything to incur preferment.
"Pev. Indeed! what was thy employment then, friend?
"Pamphil. Hunting—
"Pev. 'Tis false.
"Pamphil. Hunting women's reputations.
"Pev. What, thou wert amorous?
"Pamphil. No, on my honor, sir, but vain, confounded vain—the character of bringing down my game was all I wished, and, like a true sportsman, I would have given my birds to my pointers.
"Pev. This crime is new—what shall we do with him?" &c. &c.
This singular Drama does not appear to have been ever finished. With respect to the winding up of the story, the hermit, we may conclude, would have turned out to be the banished counsellor, and the devils, his followers; while the young huntsman would most probably have proved to be the rightful heir of the dukedom.
In a more crude and unfinished state are the fragments that remain of his projected opera of "The Foresters." To this piece (which appears to have been undertaken at a later period than the preceding one) Mr. Sheridan often alluded in conversation—particularly when any regret was expressed at his having ceased to assist Old Drury with his pen,—"wait (he would say smiling) till I bring out my Foresters." The plot, as far as can be judged from the few meagre scenes that exist, was intended to be an improvement upon that of the Drama just described—the Devils being transformed into Foresters, and the action commencing, not with the loss of a son, but the recovery of a daughter, who had fallen by accident into the hands of these free-booters. At the opening of the piece the young lady has just been restored to her father by the heroic Captain of the Foresters, with no other loss than that of her heart, which she is suspected of having left with her preserver. The list of the Dramatis Personae (to which however he did not afterwards adhere) is as follows:—
Old Oscar.
Young Oscar.
Colona.
Morven.
Harold.
Nico.
Miza.
Malvina.
Allanda.
Dorcas.
Emma.
To this strange medley of nomenclature is appended a memorandum— "Vide Petrarch for names."
The first scene represents the numerous lovers of Malvina rejoicing at her return, and celebrating it by a chorus; after which Oscar, her father, holds the following dialogue with one of them:—
"Osc. I thought, son, you would have been among the first and most eager to see Malvina upon her return.
"Colin. Oh, father, I would give half my flock to think that my presence would be welcome to her.
"Osc. I am sure you have never seen her prefer any one else.
"Col. There's the torment of it—were I but once sure that she loved another better, I think I should be content—at least she should not know but that I was so. My love is not of that jealous sort that I should pine to see her happy with another—nay, I could even regard the man that would make her so.
"Osc. Haven't you spoke with her since her return?
"Col. Yes, and I think she is colder to me than ever. My professions of love used formerly to make her laugh, but now they make her weep—formerly she seemed wholly insensible; now, alas, she seems to feel—but as if addressed by the wrong person," &c. &c.
In a following scene are introduced two brothers, both equally enamored of the fair Malvina, yet preserving their affection unaltered towards each other. With the recollection of Sheridan's own story fresh in our minds, we might suppose that he meant some reference to it in this incident, were it not for the exceeding niaiserie that he has thrown into the dialogue. For instance:—
"Osc. But we are interrupted—here are two more of her lovers— brothers, and rivals, but friends.
"Enter NICO and LUBIN.
"So, Nico—how comes it you are so late in your inquiries after your mistress?
"Nico. I should have been sooner; but Lubin would stay to make himself fine—though he knows that he has no chance of appearing so to Malvina.
"Lubin. No, in truth—Nico says right—I have no more chance than himself.
"Osc. However, I am glad to see you reconciled, and that you live together, as brothers should do.
"Nico. Yes, ever since we found your daughter cared for neither of us, we grew to care for one another. There is a fellowship in adversity that is consoling; and it is something to think that Lubin is as unfortunate as myself.
"Lub. Yes, we are well matched—I think Malvina dislikes him, if possible, more than me, and that's a great comfort.
"Nico. We often sit together, and play such woeful tunes on our pipes, that the very sheep are moved at it.
"Osc. But why don't you rouse yourselves, and, since you can meet with no requital of your passion, return the proud maid scorn for scorn?
"Nico. Oh mercy, no—we find a great comfort in our sorrow—don't we, Lubin?
"Lubin. Yes, if I meet no crosses, I shall be undone in another twelve-month—I let all go to wreck and ruin.
"Osc. But suppose Malvina should be brought to give you encouragement.
"Nico. Heaven forbid! that would spoil all.
"Lubin. Truly I was almost assured within this fortnight that she was going to relax.
"Nico. Ay, I shall never forget how alarmed we were at the appearance of a smile one day," &c. &c.
Of the poetical part of this opera, the only specimens he has left are a skeleton of a chorus, beginning "Bold Foresters we are," and the following song, which, for grace and tenderness, is not unworthy of the hand that produced the Duenna:—
"We two, each other's only pride,
Each other's bliss, each other's guide,
Far from the world's unhallow'd noise,
Its coarse delights and tainted joys,
Through wilds will roam and deserts rude—
For, Love, thy home is solitude.
"There shall no vain pretender be,
To court thy smile and torture me,
No proud superior there be seen,
But nature's voice shall hail thee, queen.
"With fond respect and tender awe,
I will receive thy gentle law,
Obey thy looks, and serve thee still,
Prevent thy wish, foresee thy will,
And, added to a lover's care,
Be all that friends and parents are."
But, of all Mr. Sheridan's unfinished designs, the Comedy which he meditated on the subject of Affectation is that of which the abandonment is most to be regretted. To a satirist, who would not confine his ridicule to the mere outward demonstrations of this folly, but would follow and detect it through all its windings and disguises, there could hardly perhaps be a more fertile theme. Affectation, merely of manner, being itself a sort of acting, does not easily admit of any additional coloring on the stage, without degenerating into farce; and, accordingly, fops and fine ladies—with very few exceptions—are about as silly and tiresome in representation as in reality. But the aim of the dramatist, in this comedy, would have been far more important and extensive;—and how anxious he was to keep before his mind's eye the whole wide horizon of folly which his subject opened upon him, will appear from the following list of the various species of Affectation, which I have found written by him, exactly as I give it, on the inside cover of the memorandum-book, that contains the only remaining vestiges of this play:—
"An Affectation of Business. of Accomplishments, of Love of Letters and "Wit Music. of Intrigue. of Sensibility. of Vivacity. of Silence and Importance. of Modesty. of Profligacy. of Moroseness."
In this projected comedy he does not seem to have advanced as far as even the invention of the plot or the composition of a single scene. The memorandum-book alluded to—on the first leaf of which he had written in his neatest hand (as if to encourage himself to begin) "Affectation"— contains, besides the names of three of the intended personages, Sir Babble Bore, Sir Peregrine Paradox, and Feignwit, nothing but unembodied sketches of character, and scattered particles of wit, which seem waiting, like the imperfect forms and seeds in chaos, for the brooding of genius to nurse them into system and beauty.
The reader will not, I think, be displeased at seeing some of these curious materials here. They will show that in this work, as well as in the School for Scandal, he was desirous of making the vintage of his wit as rich as possible, by distilling into it every drop that the collected fruits of his thought and fancy could supply. Some of the jests are far- fetched, and others, perhaps, abortive—but it is pleasant to track him in his pursuit of a point, even when he misses. The very failures of a man of real wit are often more delightful than the best successes of others—the quick-silver, even in escaping from his grasp, shines; "it still eludes him, but it glitters still."
I shall give the memorandums as I find them, with no other difference, than that of classing together those that have relation to the same thought or subject.
"Character—Mr. BUSTLE.
"A man who delights in hurry and interruption—will take any one's business for them—leaves word where all his plagues may follow him— governor of all hospitals, &c.—share in Ranelagh—speaker every where, from the Vestry to the House of Commons—'I am not at home—gad, now he heard me and I must be at home.'—'Here am I so plagued, and there is nothing I love so much as retirement and quiet.'—'You never sent after me.'—Let servants call in to him such a message as 'Tis nothing but the window tax,' he hiding in a room that communicates.—A young man tells him some important business in the middle of fifty trivial interruptions, and the calling in of idlers; such as fidlers, wild-beast men, foreigners with recommendatory letters, &c.—answers notes on his knee, 'and so your uncle died?—for your obliging inquiries—and left you an orphan—to cards in the evening.'
"Can't bear to be doing nothing.—'Can I do anything for any body any where?'—'Have been to the Secretary—written to the Treasury.'—'Must proceed to meet the Commissioners, and write Mr. Price's little boy's exercise.'—The most active idler and laborious trifler.
"He does not in reality love business—only the appearance of it. 'Ha! ha! did my Lord say that I was always very busy? What, plagued to death?'
"Keeps all his letters and copies—' Mem. to meet the Hackney-coach
Commissioners—to arbitrate between,' &c. &c.
"Contrast with the man of indolence, his brother.—'So, brother, just up! and I have been,' &c. &c.—one will give his money from indolent generosity, the other his time from restlessness—' 'Twill be shorter to pay the bill than look for the receipt.'—Files letters, answered and unanswered—'Why, here are more unopened than answered!'
* * * * *
"He regulates every action by a love for fashion—will grant annuities though he doesn't want money—appear to intrigue, though constant; to drink, though sober—has some fashionable vices—affects to be distressed in his circumstances, and, when his new vis-a-vis comes out, procures a judgment to be entered against him—wants to lose, but by ill-luck wins five thousand pounds.
* * * * *
"One who changes sides in all arguments the moment any one agrees with him.
"An irresolute arguer, to whom it is a great misfortune that there are not three sides to a question—a libertine in argument; conviction, like enjoyment, palls him, and his rakish understanding is soon satiated with truth—more capable of being faithful to a paradox—'I love truth as I do my wife; but sophistry and paradoxes are my mistresses—I have a strong domestic respect for her, but for the other the passion due to a mistress.'
"One, who agrees with every one, for the pleasure of speaking their sentiments for them—so fond of talking that he does not contradict only because he can't wait to hear people out.
"A tripping casuist, who veers by others' breath, and gets on to information by tacking between the two sides—like a hoy, not made to go straight before the wind.
"The more he talks, the further he is off the argument, like a bowl on a wrong bias.
* * * * *
"What are the affectations you chiefly dislike?
"There are many in this company, so I'll mention others.—To see two people affecting intrigue, having their assignations in public places only; he affecting a warm pursuit, and the lady, acting the hesitation of retreating virtue—'Pray, ma'am, don't you think,' &c.—while neither party have words between 'em to conduct the preliminaries of gallantry, nor passion to pursue the object of it.
"A plan of public flirtation—not to get beyond a profile.
* * * * *
"Then I hate to see one, to whom heaven has given real beauty, settling her features at the glass of fashion, while she speaks—not thinking so much of what she says as how she looks, and more careful of the action of her lips than of what shall come from them.
* * * * *
"A pretty woman studying looks and endeavoring to recollect an ogle, like Lady ——, who has learned to play her eyelids like Venetian blinds. [Footnote: This simile is repeated in various shapes through his manuscripts—"She moves her eyes up and down like Venetian blinds"— "Her eyelids play like a Venetian blind," &c &c.]
"An old woman endeavoring to put herself back to a girl.
* * * * *
"A true-trained wit lays his plan like a general—foresees the circumstances of the conversation—surveys the ground and contingencies —detaches a question to draw you into the palpable ambuscade of his ready-made joke.
* * * * *
"A man intriguing, only for the reputation of it—to his confidential servant: 'Who am I in love with now?'—'The newspapers give you so and so—you are laying close siege to Lady L., in the Morning Post, and have succeeded with Lady G. in the Herald—Sir F. is very jealous of you in the Gazetteer.'—'Remember to-morrow the first thing you do, to put me in love with Mrs. C.'
"'I forgot to forget the billet-doux at Brooks's'—'By the bye, an't I in love with you?'—'Lady L. has promised to meet me in her carriage to- morrow—where is the most public place?'
"'You were rude to her!'—'Oh, no, upon my soul, I made love to her directly.'
"An old man, who affects intrigue, and writes his own reproaches in the Morning Post, trying to scandalize himself into the reputation of being young, as if he could obscure his age by blotting his character—though never so little candid as when he's abusing himself.
* * * * *
"'Shall you be at Lady ——'s? I'm told the Bramin is to be there, and the new French philosopher.'—'No—it will be pleasanter at Lady ——'s conversazione—the cow with two heads will be there.'
* * * * *
"'I shall order my valet to shoot me the very first thing he does in the morning.'
"'You are yourself affected and don't know it—you would pass for morose.'
"He merely wanted to be singular, and happened to find the character of moroseness unoccupied in the society he lived with.
"He certainly has a great deal of fancy and a very good memory; but with a perverse ingenuity he employs these qualities as no other person does —for he employs his fancy in his narratives, and keeps his recollections for his wit—when he makes his jokes you applaud the accuracy of his memory, and 'tis only when he states his facts that you admire the flights of his imagination. [Footnote: The reader will find how much this thought was improved upon afterwards.]
* * * * *
"A fat woman trundling into a room on castors—in sitting can only lean against her chair—rings on her fingers, and her fat arms strangled with bracelets, which belt them like corded brawn—rolling and heaving when she laughs with the rattles in her throat, and a most apoplectic ogle— you wish to draw her out, as you would an opera-glass.
* * * * *
"A long lean man with all his limbs rambling—no way to reduce him to compass, unless you could double him like a pocket rule—with his arms spread, he'd lie on the bed of Ware like a cross on a Good Friday bun— standing still, he is a pilaster without a base—he appears rolled out or run up against a wall—so thin that his front face is but the moiety of a profile—if he stands cross-legged, he looks like a caduceus, and put him in a fencing attitude, you will take him for a piece of chevaux- de-frise—to make any use of him, it must be as a spontoon or a fishing- rod—when his wife's by, he follows like a note of admiration—see them together, one's a mast, and the other all hulk—she's a dome and he's built like a glass-house—when they part, you wonder to see the steeple separate from the chancel, and were they to embrace, he must hang round her neck like a skein of thread on a lace-maker's bolster—to sing her praise you should choose a rondeau, and to celebrate him you must write all Alexandrines.
"I wouldn't give a pin to make fine men in love with me—every coquette can do that, and the pain you give these creatures is very trifling. I love out-of-the-way conquests; and as I think my attractions are singular, I would draw singular objects.
"The loadstone of true beauty draws the heaviest substances—not like the fat dowager, who frets herself into warmth to get the notice of a few papier mache fops, as you rub Dutch sealing-wax to draw paper.
* * * * *
"If I were inclined to flatter I would say that, as you are unlike other women, you ought not to be won as they are. Every woman can be gained by time, therefore you ought to be by a sudden impulse. Sighs, devotion, attention weigh with others; but they are so much your due that no one should claim merit from them….
"You should not be swayed by common motives—how heroic to form a marriage for which no human being can guess the inducement—what a glorious unaccountableness! All the world will wonder what the devil you could see in me; and, if you should doubt your singularity, I pledge myself to you that I never yet was endured by woman; so that I should owe every thing to the effect of your bounty, and not by my own superfluous deserts make it a debt, and so lessen both the obligation and my gratitude. In short, every other woman follows her inclination, but you, above all things, should take me, if you do not like me. You will, besides, have the satisfaction of knowing that we are decidedly the worst match in the kingdom—a match, too, that must be all your own work, in which fate could have no hand, and which no foresight could foresee.
* * * * *
"A lady who affects poetry.—'I made regular approaches to her by sonnets and rebusses—a rondeau of circumvallation—her pride sapped by an elegy, and her reserve surprised by an impromptu—proceeding to storm with Pindarics, she, at last, saved the further effusion of ink by a capitulation.'
* * * * *
"Her prudish frowns and resentful looks are as ridiculous as 'twould be to see a board with notice of spring-guns set in a highway, or of Steel- traps in a common—because they imply an insinuation that there is something worth plundering where one would not, in the least, suspect it.
"The expression of her face is at once a denial of all love-suit, and a confession that she never was asked—the sourness of it arises not so much from her aversion to the passion, as from her never having had an opportunity to show it.—Her features are so unfortunately formed that she could never dissemble or put on sweetness enough to induce any one to give her occasion to show her bitterness.—I never saw a woman to whom you would more readily give credit for perfect chastity.
"Lady Clio. 'What am I reading?'—'have I drawn nothing lately?— is the work-bag finished?—how accomplished I am!—has the man been to untune the harpsichord?—does it look as if I had been playing on it?
"'Shall I be ill to-day?—shall I be nervous?'—'Your La'ship was nervous yesterday.'—'Was I?—then I'll have a cold—I haven't had a cold this fortnight—a cold is becoming—no—I'll not have a cough; that's fatiguing—I'll be quite well.'—'You become sickness—your La'ship always looks vastly well when you're ill.'
"'Leave the book half read and the rose half finished—you know I love to be caught in the fact.'
* * * * *
"One who knows that no credit is ever given to his assertions has the more right to contradict his words.
"He goes the western circuit, to pick up small fees and impudence.
* * * * *
"A new wooden leg for Sir Charles Easy.
* * * * *
"An ornament which proud peers wear all the year round—chimneysweepers only on the first of May.
* * * * *
"In marriage if you possess any thing very good, it makes you eager to get every thing else good of the same sort.
* * * * *
"The critic when he gets out of his carriage should always recollect, that his footman behind is gone up to judge as well as himself.
* * * * *
"She might have escaped in her own clothes, but I suppose she thought it more romantic to put on her brother's regimentals."
The rough sketches and fragments of poems, which Mr. Sheridan left behind him, are numerous; but those among them that are sufficiently finished to be cited, bear the marks of having been written when he was very young, and would not much interest the reader—while of the rest it is difficult to find four consecutive lines, that have undergone enough of the toilette of composition to be presentable in print. It was his usual practice, when he undertook any subject in verse, to write down his thoughts first in a sort of poetical prose,—with, here and there, a rhyme or a metrical line, as they might occur—and then, afterwards to reduce with much labor, this anomalous compound to regular poetry. The birth of his prose being, as we have already seen, so difficult, it may be imagined how painful was the travail of his verse. Indeed, the number of tasks which he left unfinished are all so many proofs of that despair of perfection, which those best qualified to attain it are always most likely to feel.
There are some fragments of an Epilogue apparently intended to be spoken in the character of a woman of fashion, which give a lively notion of what the poem would have been, when complete. The high carriages, that had just then come into fashion, are thus adverted to:—
"My carriage stared at!—none so high or fine—
Palmer's mail-coach shall be a sledge to mine.
* * * * *
No longer now the youths beside us stand,
And talking lean, and leaning press the hand;
But ogling upward, as aloft we sit,
Straining, poor things, their ankles and their wit,
And, much too short the inside to explore,
Hang like supporters, half way up the door."
The approach of a "veteran husband," to disturb these flirtations and chase away the lovers, is then hinted at:—
"To persecuted virtue yield assistance,
And for one hour teach younger men their distance,
Make them, in very spite, appear discreet,
And mar the public mysteries of the street."
The affectation of appearing to make love, while talking on different matters, is illustrated by the following simile:
"So when dramatic statesmen talk apart,
With practis'd gesture and heroic start,
The plot's their theme, the gaping galleries guess,
While Hull and Fearon think of nothing less."
The following lines seem to belong to the same Epilogue:—
"The Campus Martius of St. James's Street,
Where the beau's cavalry pace to and fro,
Before they take the field in Rotten Row;
Where Brooks' Blues and Weltze's Light Dragoons
Dismount in files and ogle in platoons."
He had also begun another Epilogue, directed against female gamesters, of which he himself repeated a couplet or two to Mr. Rogers a short time before his death, and of which there remain some few scattered traces among his papers:—
"A night of fretful passion may consume
All that thou hast of beauty's gentle bloom,
And one distemper'd hour of sordid fear
Print on thy brow the wrinkles of a year.
[Footnote: These four lines, as I have already remarked, are taken—with
little change of the words, but a total alteration of the sentiment—from
the verses which he addressed to Mrs. Sheridan in the year 1773. See page
83.]
* * * * *
Great figure loses, little figure wins.
* * * * *
Ungrateful blushes and disorder'd sighs,
Which love disclaims nor even shame supplies.
* * * * *
Gay smiles, which once belong'd to mirth alone,
And startling tears, which pity dares not own."
The following stray couplet would seem to have been intended for his description of Corilla:—
"A crayon Cupid, redd'ning into shape,
Betrays her talents to design and scrape."
The Epilogue, which I am about to give, though apparently finished, has not, as far as I can learn, yet appeared in print, nor am I at all aware for what occasion it was intended.
"In this gay month when, through the sultry hour,
The vernal sun denies the wonted shower,
When youthful Spring usurps maturer sway,
And pallid April steals the blush of May,
How joys the rustic tribe, to view displayed
The liberal blossom and the early shade!
But ah! far other air our soil delights;
Here 'charming weather' is the worst of blights.
No genial beams rejoice our rustic train,
Their harvest's still the better for the rain.
To summer suns our groves no tribute owe,
They thrive in frost, and flourish best in snow.
When other woods resound the feather'd throng,
Our groves, our woods, are destitute of song.
The thrush, the lark, all leave our mimic vale,
No more we boast our Christmas nightingale;
Poor Rossignol—the wonder of his day,
Sung through the winter—but is mute in May.
Then bashful spring, that gilds fair nature's scene,
O'ercasts our lawns, and deadens every green;
Obscures our sky, embrowns the wooden shade,
And dries the channel of each tin cascade!
Oh hapless we, whom such ill fate betides,
Hurt by the beam which cheers the world besides!
Who love the ling'ring frost, nice, chilling showers,
While Nature's Benefit—is death to ours;
Who, witch-like, best in noxious mists perform,
Thrive in the tempest, and enjoy the storm.
O hapless we—unless your generous care
Bids us no more lament that Spring is fair,
But plenteous glean from the dramatic soil,
The vernal harvest of our winter's toil.
For April suns to us no pleasure bring—
Your presence here is all we feel of Spring;
May's riper beauties here no bloom display,
Your fostering smile alone proclaims it May."
A poem upon Windsor Castle, half ludicrous and half solemn, appears, from the many experiments which he made upon it, to have cost him considerable trouble. The Castle, he says,
"Its base a mountain, and itself a rock,
In proud defiance of the tempests' rage,
Like an old gray-hair'd veteran stands each shock—
The sturdy witness of a nobler age."
He then alludes to the "cockney" improvements that had lately taken place, among which the venerable castle appears, like
"A helmet on a Macaroni's head—
Or like old Talbot, turn'd into a fop,
With coat embroider'd and scratch wig at top."
Some verses, of the same mixed character, on the short duration of life and the changes that death produces, thus begin:—
"Of that same tree which gave the box,
Now rattling in the hand of FOX,
Perhaps his coffin shall be made.—"
He then rambles into prose, as was his custom, on a sort of knight- errantry after thoughts and images:—"The lawn thou hast chosen for thy bridal shift—thy shroud may be of the same piece. That flower thou hast bought to feed thy vanity—from the same tree thy corpse may be decked. Reynolds shall, like his colors, fly; and Brown, when mingled with the dust, manure the grounds he once laid out. Death is life's second childhood; we return to the breast from whence we came, are weaned,…."
There are a few detached lines and couplets of a poem, intended to ridicule some fair invalid, who was much given to falling in love with her physicians:—
"Who felt her pulse, obtained her heart."
The following couplet, in which he characterizes an amiable friend of his, Dr. Bain, with whom he did not become acquainted till the year 1792, proves these fragments to have been written after that period:—
"Not savage … nor gentle BAIN—
She was in love with Warwick Lane."
An "Address to the Prince," on the exposed style of women's dress, consists of little more than single lines, not yet wedded into couplets; such as—"The more you show, the less we wish to see."—"And bare their bodies, as they mask their minds," &c. This poem, however, must have been undertaken many years after his entrance into Parliament, as the following curious political memorandum will prove:—"I like it no better for being from France—whence all ills come—altar of liberty, begrimed at once with blood and mire."
There are also some Anacreontics—lively, but boyish and extravagant.
For instance, in expressing his love of bumpers:—
"Were mine a goblet that had room
For a whole vintage in its womb,
I still would have the liquor swim
An inch or two above the brim."
The following specimen is from one of those poems, whose length and completeness prove them to have been written at a time of life when he was more easily pleased, and had not yet arrived at that state of glory and torment for the poet, when
"Toujours mecontent de ce qu'il vient de faire,
Il plait a tout le monde et ne scaurait se plaire:"—
"The Muses call'd, the other morning,
On Phoebus, with a friendly warning
That invocations came so fast,
They must give up their trade at last,
And if he meant t' assist them all,
The aid of Nine would be too small.
Me then, as clerk, the Council chose,
To tell this truth in humble prose.—
But Phoebus, possibly intending
To show what all their hopes must end in,
To give the scribbling youths a sample,
And frighten them by my example,
Bade me ascend the poet's throne,
And give them verse—much like their own.
"Who has not heard each poet sing
The powers of Heliconian spring?
Its noble virtues we are told
By all the rhyming crew of old.—
Drink but a little of its well,
And strait you could both write and spell,
While such rhyme-giving pow'rs run through it,
A quart would make an epic poet," &c. &c.
A poem on the miseries of a literary drudge begins thus promisingly:—
"Think ye how dear the sickly meal is bought,
By him who works at verse and trades in thought?"
The rest is hardly legible; but there can be little doubt that he would have done this subject justice;—for he had himself tasted of the bitterness with which the heart of a man of genius overflows, when forced by indigence to barter away (as it is here expressed) "the reversion of his thoughts," and
"Forestall the blighted harvest of his brain."
It will be easily believed that, in looking over the remains, both dramatic and poetical, from which the foregoing specimens are taken, I have been frequently tempted to indulge in much ampler extracts. It appeared to me, however, more prudent to rest satisfied with the selections here given; for, while less would have disappointed the curiosity of the reader, more might have done injustice to the memory of the author.
CHAPTER VIII.
HIS FIRST SPEECHES IN PARLIAMENT.—ROCKINGHAM ADMINISTRATION.— COALITION.—INDIA BILL.—RE-ELECTION FOR STAFFORD.
The period at which Mr. Sheridan entered upon his political career was, in every respect, remarkable. A persevering and vindictive war against America, with the folly and guilt of which the obstinacy of the Court and the acquiescence of the people are equally chargeable, was fast approaching that crisis, which every unbiassed spectator of the contest had long foreseen,—and at which, however humiliating to the haughty pretensions of England, every friend to the liberties of the human race rejoiced. It was, perhaps, as difficult for this country to have been long and virulently opposed to such principles as the Americans asserted in this contest, without being herself corrupted by the cause which she maintained, as it was for the French to have fought, in the same conflict, by the side of the oppressed, without catching a portion of that enthusiasm for liberty, which such an alliance was calculated to inspire. Accordingly, while the voice of philosophy was heard along the neighboring shores, speaking aloud those oracular warnings, which preceded the death of the Great Pan of Despotism, the courtiers and lawyers of England were, with an emulous spirit of servility, advising and sanctioning such strides of power, as would not have been unworthy of the most dark and slavish times.
When we review, indeed, the history of the late reign, and consider how invariably the arms and councils of Great Britain, in her Eastern wars, her conflict with America, and her efforts against revolutionary France, were directed to the establishment and perpetuation of despotic principles, it seems little less than a miracle that her own liberty should have escaped with life from the contagion. Never, indeed, can she be sufficiently grateful to the few patriot spirits of this period, to whose courage and eloquence she owes the high station of freedom yet left to her;—never can her sons pay a homage too warm to the memory of such men as a Chatham, a Fox, and a Sheridan; who, however much they may have sometimes sacrificed to false views of expediency, and, by compromise with friends and coalition with foes, too often weakened their hold upon public confidence; however the attraction of the Court may have sometimes made them librate in their orbit, were yet the saving lights of Liberty in those times, and alone preserved the ark of the Constitution from foundering in the foul and troubled waters that encompassed it.
Not only were the public events, in which Mr. Sheridan was now called to take a part, of a nature more extraordinary and awful than had often been exhibited on the theatre of politics, but the leading actors in the scene were of that loftier order of intellect, which Nature seems to keep in reserve for the ennoblement of such great occasions. Two of these, Mr. Burke and Mr. Fox, were already in the full maturity of their fame and talent,—while the third, Mr. Pitt, was just upon the point of entering, with the most auspicious promise, into the same splendid career:
"Nunc cuspide Patris Inclytus, Herculeas olim mature sagittas."
Though the administration of that day, like many other ministries of the same reign, was chosen more for the pliancy than the strength of its materials, yet Lord North himself was no ordinary man, and, in times of less difficulty and under less obstinate dictation, might have ranked as a useful and most popular minister. It is true, as the defenders of his measures state, that some of the worst aggressions upon the rights of the Colonies had been committed before he succeeded to power. But his readiness to follow in these rash footsteps, and to deepen every fatal impression which they had made;—his insulting reservation of the Tea Duty, by which he contrived to embitter the only measure of concession that was wrung from him;—the obsequiousness, with which he made himself the channel of the vindictive feelings of the Court, in that memorable declaration (rendered so truly mock-heroic by the event) that "a total repeal of the Port Duties could not be thought of, till America was prostrate at the feet of England;"—all deeply involve him in the shame of that disastrous period, and identify his name with measures as arbitrary and headstrong, as have ever disgraced the annals of the English monarchy.
The playful wit and unvarying good-humor of this nobleman formed a striking contrast to the harsh and precipitate policy, which it was his lot, during twelve stormy years, to enforce:—and, if his career was as headlong as the torrent near its fall, it may also be said to have been as shining and as smooth. These attractive qualities secured to him a considerable share of personal popularity; and, had fortune ultimately smiled on his councils, success would, as usual, have reconciled the people of England to any means, however arbitrary, by which it had been attained. But the calamities, and, at last, the hopelessness of the conflict, inclined them to moralize upon its causes and character. The hour of Lord North's ascendant was now passing rapidly away, and Mr. Sheridan could not have joined the Opposition, at a conjuncture more favorable to the excitement of his powers, or more bright in the views which it opened upon his ambition.
He made his first speech in Parliament on the 20th of November, 1780, when a petition was presented to the House, complaining of the undue election of the sitting members (himself and Mr. Monckton) for Stafford. It was rather lucky for him that the occasion was one in which he felt personally interested, as it took away much of that appearance of anxiety for display, which might have attended his first exhibition upon any general subject. The fame, however, which he had already acquired by his literary talents, was sufficient, even on this question, to awaken all the curiosity and expectation of his audience; and accordingly we are told in the report of his speech, that "he was heard with particular attention, the House being uncommonly still while he was speaking." The indignation, which he expressed on this occasion at the charges brought by the petition against the electors of Stafford, was coolly turned into ridicule by Mr. Rigby, Paymaster of the Forces. But Mr. Fox, whose eloquence was always ready at the call of good nature, and, like the shield of Ajax, had "ample room and verge enough," to protect not only himself but his friends, came promptly to the aid of the young orator; and, in reply to Mr. Rigby, observed, that "though those ministerial members, who chiefly robbed and plundered their constituents, might afterwards affect to despise them, yet gentlemen, who felt properly the nature of the trust allotted to them, would always treat them and speak of them with respect."
It was on this night, as Woodfall used to relate, that Mr. Sheridan, after he had spoken, came up to him in the gallery, and asked, with much anxiety, what he thought of his first attempt. The answer of Woodfall, as he had the courage afterwards to own, was, "I am sorry to say I do not think that this is your line—you had much better have stuck to your former pursuits." On hearing which, Sheridan rested his head upon his hand for a few minutes, and then vehemently exclaimed, "It is in me, however, and, by G—, it shall come out."
It appears, indeed, that upon many persons besides Mr. Woodfall the impression produced by this first essay of his oratory was far from answerable to the expectations that had been formed. The chief defect remarked in him was a thick and indistinct mode of delivery, which, though he afterwards greatly corrected it, was never entirely removed.
It is not a little amusing to find him in one of his early speeches, gravely rebuking Mr. Rigby and Mr. Courtenay [Footnote: Feb. 26.—On the second reading of the Bill for the better regulation of His Majesty's Civil List Revenue.] for the levity and raillery with which they treated the subject before the House,—thus condemning the use of that weapon in other hands, which soon after became so formidable in his own. The remarks by which Mr. Courtenay (a gentleman, whose lively wit found afterwards a more congenial air on the benches of the Opposition) provoked the reprimand of the new senator for Stafford, are too humorous to be passed over without, at least, a specimen of their spirit. In ridiculing the conduct of the Opposition, he observed:—
"Oh liberty! Oh virtue! Oh my country! had been the pathetic, though fallacious cry of former Oppositions; but the present he was sure acted on purer motives. They wept over their bleeding country, he had no doubt. Yet the patriot 'eye in a fine frenzy rolling' sometimes deigned to cast a wishful squint on the riches and honors enjoyed by the minister and his venal supporters. If he were not apprehensive of hazarding a ludicrous allusion, (which he knew was always improper on a serious subject) he would compare their conduct to that of the sentimental alderman in one of Hogarth's prints, who, when his daughter is expiring, wears indeed a parental face of grief and solicitude, but it is to secure her diamond ring which he is drawing gently from her finger."
"Mr. Sheridan (says the report) rose and reprehended Mr. Courtenay for turning every thing that passed into ridicule; for having introduced into the house a style of reasoning, in his opinion, every way unsuitable to the gravity and importance of the subjects that came under their discussion. If they would not act with dignity, he thought they might, at least, debate with decency. He would not attempt to answer Mr. Courtenay's arguments, for it was impossible seriously to reply to what, in every part, had an infusion of ridicule in it. Two of the honorable gentlemen's similes, however, he must take notice of. The one was his having insinuated that the Opposition was envious of those who basked in court sunshine; and desirous merely to get into their places. He begged leave to remind the honorable gentleman that, though the sun afforded a genial warmth, it also occasioned an intemperate heat, that tainted and infected everything it reflected on. That this excessive heat tended to corrupt as well as to cherish; to putrefy as well as to animate; to dry and soak up the wholesome juices of the body politic, and turn the whole of it into one mass of corruption. If those, therefore, who sat near him did not enjoy so genial a warmth as the honorable gentleman, and those who like him kept close to the noble Lord in the blue ribbon, he was certain they breathed a purer air, an air less infected and less corrupt."
This florid style, in which Mr. Sheridan was not very happy, he but rarely used in his speeches afterwards.
The first important subject that drew forth any thing like a display of his oratory was a motion which he made on the 5th of March, 1781, "For the better regulation of the Police of Westminster." The chief object of the motion was to expose the unconstitutional exercise of the prerogative that had been assumed, in employing the military to suppress the late riots, without waiting for the authority of the civil power. These disgraceful riots, which proved to what Christianity consequences the cry of "No Popery" may lead, had the effect, which follows all tumultuary movements of the people, of arming the Government with new powers, and giving birth to doctrines and precedents permanently dangerous to liberty. It is a little remarkable that the policy of blending the army with the people and considering soldiers as citizens, which both Montesquieu and Blackstone recommend as favorable to freedom, should, as applied by Lord Mansfield on this occasion, be pronounced, and perhaps with more justice, hostile to it; the tendency of such a practice being, it was said, to weaken that salutary jealousy, with which the citizens of a free state should ever regard a soldier, and thus familiarize the use of this dangerous machine, in every possible service to which capricious power may apply it. The Opposition did not deny that the measure of ordering out the military, and empowering their officers to act at discretion without any reference to the civil magistrate, was, however unconstitutional, not only justifiable but wise, in a moment of such danger. But the refusal of the minister to acknowledge the illegality of the proceeding by applying to the House for an Act of Indemnity, and the transmission of the same discretionary orders to the soldiery throughout the country, where no such imminent necessity called for it, were the points upon which the conduct of the Government was strongly, and not unjustly, censured.
Indeed, the manifest design of the Ministry, at this crisis, to avail themselves of the impression produced by the riots, as a means of extending the frontier of their power, and fortifying the doctrines by which they defended it, spread an alarm among the friends of constitutional principles, which the language of some of the advocates of the Court was by no means calculated to allay. Among others, a Noble Earl,—one of those awkward worshippers of power, who bring ridicule alike upon their idol and themselves,—had the foolish effrontery, in the House of Lords, to eulogize the moderation which His Majesty had displayed, in not following the recent example of the king of Sweden, and employing the sword, with which the hour of difficulty had armed him, for the subversion of the Constitution and the establishment of despotic power. Though this was the mere ebullition of an absurd individual, yet the bubble on the surface often proves the strength of the spirit underneath, and the public were justified by a combination of circumstances, in attributing designs of the most arbitrary nature to such a Court and such an Administration. Meetings were accordingly held in some of the principal counties, and resolutions passed, condemning the late unconstitutional employment of the military. Mr. Fox had adverted to it strongly at the opening of the Session, and it is a proof of the estimation in which Mr. Sheridan already stood with his party, that he was the person selected to bring forward a motion, upon a subject in which the feelings of the public were so much interested. In the course of his speech he said:—
"If this doctrine was to be laid down, that the Crown could give orders to the military to interfere, when, where, and for what length of time it pleases, then we might bid farewell to freedom. If this was the law, we should then be reduced to a military government of the very worst species, in which we should have all the evils of a despotic state, without the discipline or the security. But we were given to understand, that we had the best protection against this evil, in the virtue, the moderation, and the constitutional principles of the sovereign. No man upon earth thought with more reverence than himself of the virtues and moderation of the sovereign; but this was a species of liberty which he trusted would never disgrace an English soil. The liberty that rested on the virtuous inclinations of any one man, was but suspended despotism; the sword was not indeed upon their necks, but it hung by the small and brittle thread of human will."
The following passage of this speech affords an example of that sort of antithesis of epithet, which, as has been already remarked, was one of the most favorite contrivances of his style:—
"Was not the conduct of that man or men criminal, who had permitted those Justices to continue in the commission? Men of tried inability and convicted deficiency! Had no attempt been made to establish some more effectual system of police, in order that we might still depend upon the remedy of the bayonet, and that the military power might be called in to the aid of contrived weakness and deliberate inattention?"
One of the few instances in which he ever differed with his friend, Mr. Fox, occurred during this session, upon the subject of a Bill which the latter introduced for the Repeal of the Marriage Act, and which he prefaced by a speech as characteristic of the ardor, the simplicity, the benevolence and fearlessness of his disposition, as any ever pronounced by him in public. Some parts, indeed, of this remarkable speech are in a strain of feeling so youthful and romantic, that they seem more fit to be addressed to one of those Parliaments of Love, which were held during the times of Chivalry, than to a grave assembly employed about the sober realities of life, and legislating with a view to the infirmities of human nature.
The hostility of Mr. Fox to the Marriage Act was hereditary, as it had been opposed with equal vehemence by his father, on its first introduction in 1753, when a debate not less memorable took place, and when Sir Dudley Ryder, the Attorney-general of the day, did not hesitate to advance, as one of his arguments in favor of the Bill, that it would tend to keep the aristocracy of the country pure, and prevent their mixture by intermarriage with the mass of the people. However this anxiety for the "streams select" of noble blood, or views, equally questionable, for the accumulation of property in great families, may have influenced many of those with whom the Bill originated,—however cruel, too, and mischievous, some of its enactments may be deemed, yet the general effect which the measure was intended to produce, of diminishing as much as possible the number of imprudent marriages, by allowing the pilotage of parental authority to continue till the first quicksands of youth are passed, is, by the majority of the civilized world, acknowledged to be desirable and beneficial. Mr. Fox, however, thought otherwise, and though—"bowing," as he said, "to the prejudices of mankind,"—he consented to fix the age at which young people should be marriageable without the consent of parents, at sixteen years for the woman and eighteen for the man, his own opinion was decidedly for removing all restriction whatever, and for leaving the "heart of youth" which, in these cases, was "wiser than the head of age," without limit or control, to the choice which its own desires dictated.
He was opposed in his arguments, not only by Mr. Sheridan, but by Mr. Burke, whose speech on this occasion was found among his manuscripts after his death, and is enriched, though short, by some of those golden sentences, which he "scattered from his urn" upon every subject that came before him. [Footnote: In alluding to Mr. Fox's too favorable estimate of the capability of very young persons to choose for themselves, he pays the following tribute to his powers:—"He is led into it by a natural and to him inevitable and real mistake, that the ordinary race of mankind advance as fast towards maturity of judgment and understanding as he has done." His concluding words are:—"Have mercy on the youth of both sexes; protect them from their ignorance and inexperience; protect one part of life by the wisdom of another; protect them by the wisdom of laws and the care of nature."] Mr. Sheridan, for whose opinions upon this subject the well-known history of his own marriage must have secured no ordinary degree of attention, remarked that—
"His honorable friend, who brought in the bill, appeared not to be aware that, if he carried the clause enabling girls to marry at sixteen, he would do an injury to that liberty of which he had always shown himself the friend, and promote domestic tyranny, which he could consider only as little less intolerable than public tyranny. If girls were allowed to marry at sixteen, they would, he conceived, be abridged of that happy freedom of intercourse, which modern custom had introduced between the youth of both sexes; and which was, in his opinion, the best nursery of happy marriages. Guardians would, in that case, look on their wards with a jealous eye, from a fear that footmen and those about them might take advantage of their tender years and immature judgment, and persuade them into marriage, as soon as they attained the age of sixteen."
It seems somewhat extraordinary that, during the very busy interval which passed between Mr. Sheridan's first appearance in Parliament and his appointment under Lord Rockingham's administration in 1782, he should so rarely have taken a part in the debates that occurred— interesting as they were, not only from the importance of the topics discussed, but from the more than usual animation now infused into the warfare of parties, by the last desperate struggles of the Ministry and the anticipated triumph of the Opposition. Among the subjects, upon which he appears to have been rather unaccountably silent, was the renewal of Mr. Burke's Bill for the Regulation of the Civil List,—an occasion memorable as having brought forth the maiden speech of Mr. Pitt, and witnessed the first accents of that eloquence which was destined, ere long, to sound, like the shell of Misenus, through Europe, and call kings and nations to battle by its note. The debate upon the legality of petitions from delegated bodies, in which Mr. Dunning sustained his high and rare character of a patriot lawyer;—the bold proposal of Mr. Thomas Pitt, that the Commons should withhold the supplies, till pledges of amendment in the administration of public affairs should be given;—the Bill for the exclusion of Excise Officers and Contractors from Parliament, which it was reserved for a Whig Administration to pass;—these and other great constitutional questions, through which Mr. Burke and Mr. Fox fought, side by side, lavishing at every step the inexhaustible ammunition of their intellect, seem to have passed away without once calling into action the powers of their new and brilliant auxiliary, Sheridan.
The affairs of Ireland, too, had assumed at this period, under the auspices of Mr. Grattan and the example of America, a character of grandeur, as passing as it was bright,—but which will long be remembered with melancholy pride by her sons, and as long recall the memory of that admirable man, to whose patriotism she owed her brief day of freedom, and upon whose name that momentary sunshine of her sad history rests. An opportunity of adverting to the events, which had lately taken place in Ireland, was afforded by Mr. Fox in a motion for the re-commitment of the Mutiny Bill; and on this subject, perhaps, the silence of Mr. Sheridan may be accounted for, from his reluctance to share the unpopularity attached by his countrymen to those high notions of the supremacy of England, which, on the great question of the independence of the Irish Parliament, both Mr. Fox and Mr. Burke were known to entertain. [Footnote: As the few beautiful sentences spoken by Burke on this occasion, in support of his friend's motion, have been somewhat strangely omitted in the professed collection of all his speeches, I shall give them here as they are reported in the Parliamentary History:—"Mr. Burke said, so many and such great revolutions had happened of late, that he was not much surprised to hear the Right Hon. Gentleman (Mr. Jenkinson) treat the loss of the supremacy of this country over Ireland as a matter of very little consequence. Thus, one star, and that the brightest ornament of our orrery, having been suffered to be lost, those who were accustomed to inspect and watch our political heaven ought not to wonder that it should be followed by the loss of another.—
So star would follow star, and light light,
Till all was darkness and eternal night."]
Even on the subject of the American war, which was now the important point that called forth all the resources of attack and defence on both sides, the co-operation of Mr. Sheridan appears to have been but rare and casual. The only occasions, indeed, connected with this topic upon which I can trace him as having spoken at any length, were the charges brought forward by Mr. Fox against the Admiralty for their mismanagement of the naval affairs of 1781, and the Resolution of censure on His Majesty's Ministers moved by Lord John Cavendish. His remarks in the latter debate upon the two different sets of opinions, by which (as by the double soul, imagined in Xenophon) the speaking and the voting of Mr. Rigby were actuated, are very happy:—
"The Right Hon. Gentleman, however, had acted in this day's debate with perfect consistency. He had assured the House that he thought the Noble Lord ought to resign his office; and yet he would give his vote for his remaining in it. In the same manner he had long declared, that he thought the American war ought to be abandoned; yet had uniformly given his vote for its continuance. He did not mean, however, to insinuate any motives for such conduct;—he believed the Right Hon. Gentleman to have been sincere; he believed that, as a member of Parliament, as a Privy Councillor, as a private gentleman, he had always detested the American war as much as any man; but that he had never been able to persuade the Paymaster that it was a bad war; and unfortunately, in whatever character he spoke, it was the Paymaster who always voted in that House."