The Sketch-Book of Geoffrey Crayon
year, when the magic portal once more swung open on its hinges, he
issued forth so versed in forbidden lore, as to be able to soar above
the heads of the multitude, and to control the powers of Nature.
My curiosity being now fully aroused, I whispered to one of
the familiars, as he was about to leave the room, and begged an
interpretation of the strange scene before me. A few words were
sufficient for the purpose. I found that these mysterious personages,
whom I had mistaken for magi, were principally authors, and were in the
very act of manufacturing books. I was, in fact, in the reading-room of
the great British Library, an immense collection of volumes of all ages
and languages, many of which are now forgotten, and most of which are
seldom read: one of these sequestered pools of obsolete literature to
which modern authors repair, and draw buckets full of classic lore, or
“pure English, undefiled,” wherewith to swell their own scanty rills of
thought.
Being now in possession of the secret, I sat down in a corner, and
watched the process of this book manufactory. I noticed one lean,
bilious-looking wight, who sought none but the most worm-eaten volumes,
printed in black letter. He was evidently constructing some work of
profound erudition, that would be purchased by every man who wished to
be thought learned, placed upon a conspicuous shelf of his library, or
laid open upon his table--but never read. I observed him, now and then,
draw a large fragment of biscuit out of his pocket, and gnaw; whether
it was his dinner, or whether he was endeavoring to keep off that
exhaustion of the stomach, produced by much pondering over dry works, I
leave to harder students than myself to determine.
There was one dapper little gentleman in bright-colored clothes, with a
chirping gossiping expression of countenance, who had all the appearance
of an author on good terms with his bookseller. After considering him
attentively, I recognized in him a diligent getter-up of miscellaneous
works, which bustled off well with the trade. I was curious to see how
he manufactured his wares. He made more stir and show of business than
any of the others; dipping into various books, fluttering over the
leaves of manuscripts, taking a morsel out of one, a morsel out of
another, “line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there
a little.” The contents of his book seemed to be as heterogeneous as
those of the witches’ cauldron in Macbeth. It was here a finger and
there a thumb, toe of frog and blind worm’s sting, with his own gossip
poured in like “baboon’s blood,” to make the medley “slab and good.”
After all, thought I, may not this pilfering disposition be implanted in
authors for wise purposes? may it not be the way in which Providence
has taken care that the seeds of knowledge and wisdom shall be preserved
from age to age, in spite of the inevitable decay of the works in
which they were first produced? We see that Nature has wisely, though
whimsically provided for the conveyance of seeds from clime to clime,
in the maws of certain birds; so that animals, which, in themselves, are
little better than carrion, and apparently the lawless plunderers of the
orchard and the corn-field, are, in fact, Nature’s carriers to disperse
and perpetuate her blessings. In like manner, the beauties and fine
thoughts of ancient and obsolete authors are caught up by these flights
of predatory writers, and cast forth, again to flourish and bear fruit
in a remote and distant tract of time. Many of their works, also,
undergo a kind of metempsychosis, and spring up under new forms. What
was formerly a ponderous history, revives in the shape of a romance--an
old legend changes into a modern play--and a sober philosophical
treatise furnishes the body for a whole series of bouncing and sparkling
essays. Thus it is in the clearing of our American woodlands; where we
burn down a forest of stately pines, a progeny of dwarf oaks start up in
their place; and we never see the prostrate trunk of a tree mouldering
into soil, but it gives birth to a whole tribe of fungi.
Let us not then, lament over the decay and oblivion into which ancient
writers descend; they do but submit to the great law of Nature, which
declares that all sublunary shapes of matter shall be limited in their
duration, but which decrees, also, that their element shall never
perish. Generation after generation, both in animal and vegetable life,
passes away, but the vital principle is transmitted to posterity, and
the species continue to flourish. Thus, also, do authors beget authors,
and having produced a numerous progeny, in a good old age they sleep
with their fathers, that is to say, with the authors who preceded
them--and from whom they had stolen.
Whilst I was indulging in these rambling fancies I had leaned my head
against a pile of reverend folios. Whether it was owing to the soporific
emanations for these works; or to the profound quiet of the room; or
to the lassitude arising from much wandering; or to an unlucky habit
of napping at improper times and places, with which I am grievously
afflicted, so it was, that I fell into a doze. Still, however, my
imagination continued busy, and indeed the same scene continued before
my mind’s eye, only a little changed in some of the details. I dreamt
that the chamber was still decorated with the portraits of ancient
authors, but that the number was increased. The long tables had
disappeared, and, in place of the sage magi, I beheld a ragged,
threadbare throng, such as may be seen plying about the great repository
of cast-off clothes, Monmouth Street. Whenever they seized upon a book,
by one of those incongruities common to dreams, methought it turned into
a garment of foreign or antique fashion, with which they proceeded to
equip themselves. I noticed, however, that no one pretended to clothe
himself from any particular suit, but took a sleeve from one, a cape
from another, a skirt from a third, thus decking himself out piecemeal,
while some of his original rags would peep out from among his borrowed
finery.
There was a portly, rosy, well-fed parson, whom I observed ogling
several mouldy polemical writers through an eyeglass. He soon contrived
to slip on the voluminous mantle of one of the old fathers, and having
purloined the gray beard of another, endeavored to look exceedingly
wise; but the smirking commonplace of his countenance set at naught
all the trappings of wisdom. One sickly-looking gentleman was busied
embroidering a very flimsy garment with gold thread drawn out of several
old court-dresses of the reign of Queen Elizabeth. Another had trimmed
himself magnificently from an illuminated manuscript, had stuck a
nosegay in his bosom, culled from “The Paradise of Dainty Devices,” and
having put Sir Philip Sidney’s hat on one side of his head, strutted off
with an exquisite air of vulgar elegance. A third, who was but of puny
dimensions, had bolstered himself out bravely with the spoils from
several obscure tracts of philosophy, so that he had a very imposing
front, but he was lamentably tattered in rear, and I perceived that
he had patched his small-clothes with scraps of parchment from a Latin
author.
There were some well-dressed gentlemen, it is true, who only helped
themselves to a gem or so, which sparkled among their own ornaments,
without eclipsing them. Some, too, seemed to contemplate the costumes
of the old writers, merely to imbibe their principles of taste, and to
catch their air and spirit; but I grieve to say, that too many were apt
to array themselves, from top to toe, in the patchwork manner I have
mentioned. I shall not omit to speak of one genius, in drab breeches
and gaiters, and an Arcadian hat, who had a violent propensity to the
pastoral, but whose rural wanderings had been confined to the classic
haunts of Primrose Hill, and the solitudes of the Regent’s Park. He had
decked himself in wreaths and ribbons from all the old pastoral poets,
and, hanging his head on one side, went about with a fantastical,
lackadaisical air, “babbling about green field.” But the personage that
most struck my attention was a pragmatical old gentleman in clerical
robes, with a remarkably large and square but bald head. He entered the
room wheezing and puffing, elbowed his way through the throng with a
look of sturdy self-confidence, and, having laid hands upon a thick
Greek quarto, clapped it upon his head, and swept majestically away in a
formidable frizzled wig.
In the height of this literary masquerade, a cry suddenly resounded from
every side, of “Thieves! thieves!” I looked, and lo! the portraits about
the walls became animated! The old authors thrust out, first a head,
then a shoulder, from the canvas, looked down curiously for an instant
upon the motley throng, and then descended, with fury in their eyes,
to claim their rifled property. The scene of scampering and hubbub that
ensued baffles all description. The unhappy culprits endeavored in vain
to escape with their plunder. On one side might be seen half a dozen
old monks, stripping a modern professor; on another, there was sad
devastation carried into the ranks of modern dramatic writers. Beaumont
and Fletcher, side by side, raged round the field like Castor and
Pollux, and sturdy Ben Jonson enacted more wonders than when a volunteer
with the army in Flanders. As to the dapper little compiler of farragos
mentioned some time since, he had arrayed himself in as many patches and
colors as harlequin, and there was as fierce a contention of claimants
about him, as about the dead body of Patroclus. I was grieved to
see many men, to whom I had been accustomed to look up with awe and
reverence, fain to steal off with scarce a rag to cover their nakedness.
Just then my eye was caught by the pragmatical old gentleman in the
Greek grizzled wig, who was scrambling away in sore affright with half
a score of authors in full cry after him. They were close upon his
haunches; in a twinkling off went his wig; at every turn some strip of
raiment was peeled away, until in a few moments, from his domineering
pomp, he shrunk into a little, pursy, “chopp’d bald shot,” and made his
exit with only a few tags and rags fluttering at his back.
There was something so ludicrous in the catastrophe of this learned
Theban that I burst into an immoderate fit of laughter, which broke the
whole illusion. The tumult and the scuffle were at an end. The chamber
resumed its usual appearance. The old authors shrunk back into their
picture-frames, and hung in shadowy solemnity along the walls. In short,
I found myself wide awake in my corner, with the whole assemblage of
hookworms gazing at me with astonishment. Nothing of the dream had been
real but my burst of laughter, a sound never before heard in that grave
sanctuary, and so abhorrent to the ears of wisdom, as to electrify the
fraternity.
The librarian now stepped up to me, and demanded whether I had a card of
admission. At first I did not comprehend him, but I soon found that the
library was a kind of literary “preserve,” subject to game-laws, and
that no one must presume to hunt there without special license and
permission. In a word, I stood convicted of being an arrant poacher, and
was glad to make a precipitate retreat, lest I should have a whole pack
of authors let loose upon me.
A ROYAL POET.
Though your body be confined
And soft love a prisoner bound,
Yet the beauty of your mind
Neither check nor chain hath found.
Look out nobly, then, and dare
Even the fetters that you wear.
FLETCHER.
ON a soft sunny morning in the genial month of May I made an excursion
to Windsor Castle. It is a place full of storied and poetical