Читать книгу English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century - Graham Everitt - Страница 30

Drury Lane Theatre, which was burnt down in 1811, was rebuilt 1812. the following year, and the committee, anxious to celebrate the opening by an address of merit corresponding to the occasion, Rebuilding of Drury Lane Theatre. advertised in the papers for such a composition. Theatrical addresses, however, as we all know by reference to a recent occasion,18 are not always up to the mark; and whether the result of their appeal was unsatisfactory, or whether—as appears not unlikely—they were appalled by the number of competitors, which is said to have been upwards of one hundred, not one was accepted, the advertisers preferring to seek the assistance of Lord Byron, who wrote the actual address which was spoken at the opening on the 10th of October, 1812. Among the competitors was a Dr. Busby, living in Queen Anne Street, who apparently unable to realize the fact that competent men could have the effrontery to reject his “monologue,” refused to accept the verdict of the committee. A few evenings afterwards, the audience and the company were electrified by an unexpected sensation. Busby and his son sat in one of the stage boxes; and the latter, to the amazement of the audience, stepped at the end of the play from his box upon the stage, and began to recite his father’s nonsense, as follows:—

“When energizing objects men pursue, What are the prodigies they cannot do?”

The question remained unanswered; for Raymond, the stage Dr. Busby’s “Monologue.” manager, walked at this moment upon the stage accompanied by a constable, and gave the amateur performer into custody. It is said that his father, not content with this failure, actually made an attempt to recite the “monologue” from his box, until hissed and howled down by the half laughing, half indignant audience. The circumstance is commemorated by an admirable pictorial satire entitled, A Buz in a Box, or the Poet in a Pet, published by S. W. Fores on the 21st of October, in which we see the doctor gesticulating from his box, and imploring the audience to listen to his “monologue.” Young Busby, seated on his father’s Pegasus (an ass), quotes one of the verses of the absurd composition, while the animal (after the manner of its kind) answers the hisses of the audience by elevating its heels and uttering a characteristic “hee haw.” By the side of Busby junior stands the manager (Raymond), apologetically addressing the audience. Certain pamphlets lie scattered in front of the stage, on which are inscribed (among others) the following doggerel:—

“A Lord and a Doctor once started for Fame, Which for the best poet should pass; The Lord was cried up on account of his name, The Doctor cried down for an ass.” “Doctor Buz, he assures us, on Drury’s new stage No horses or elephants there should engage; But pray, Doctor Buz, how comes it to pass, That you your own self should produce there an ass?”

Dr. Busby was a person desirous of achieving literary notoriety at any amount of personal inconvenience. He translated Lucretius, and is said to have given public recitations, accompanied with bread and butter and tea; but in spite of these attractions, the public did not come and the book would not sell, facts which a wicked wag of the period ridiculed, by inserting the following announcement in the column of births of one of the newspapers: “Yesterday, at his house in Queen Anne Street, Dr. Busby of a stillborn Lucretius.”

The medical profession is ridiculed in a satire published in 1813. 1813: Doctors Differ, or Dame Nature against the College.19 Four physicians have quarrelled in consultation over the nature of their patient’s malady, and the proper mode of administering to his relief. Unable to convince one another, they wax so warm in argument that they speedily proceed from words to blows. “I say,” shouts one (beneath the feet of the other three), “I say it is an exfoliation of the glands which has fallen on the membranous coils of the intestines, and must be thrown off by an emetic.” “I say,” says another, raising at the same time his cane to protect his head, “I say it is a pleurisie in the thigh, and must be sweated away.” “You are a blockhead!” cries a third, furiously striking at him with his professional cane. “I say it is a nervous affection of the cutis, and the patient must immediately lose eighteen ounces of blood, and then take a powerful drastic.” “What are you quarrelling about?” asks a fourth, arresting the downfall of his professional brother’s cane. “You are all wrong! I say it is an inflammation in the os sacrum, and therefore fourteen blisters must be immediately applied to the part affected and the adjacents.” The table is down, and the prescriptions of the learned doctors covered with the ink which flows from the ruined inkstand. The amused patient (whom nature has meanwhile relieved of the cause and effect) watches the combat from the adjoining bedroom, and makes preparations to retreat and save both his “pocket and his life.”

The year 1814 was marked by the bursting of one of the most 1814. extraordinary religious bubbles with which England has ever been scandalized. The person identified with and responsible for the craze to which we allude, was Joanna Southcott, the daughter of Joanna Southcott. a farmer residing at the village of Gettisham, in Devonshire, where she herself was born in the month of April, 1750. At the time, therefore, the imposture was made patent to such of her deluded followers as retained any remnants of the small stock of common sense with which nature had originally endowed them, Joanna was sixty-four years of age.

The village girl appears to have been a constant reader of the Scriptures, which she studied with so much enthusiasm, that a strong religious bias was established, which took almost entire possession of her mind. Still, no marked peculiarity was manifested until after she had attained forty years of age, at which time we find her employed as a workwoman at an upholsterer’s shop at Exeter. The proprietor being a Methodist, the shop was visited by ministers of that persuasion, and Joanna, with her “serious turn of mind,” was not only permitted to join in their discussions, but was regarded by these harmless folk somewhat in the light of a prodigy. To a mind predisposed to religious mania (for it would be unjust to stigmatize Joanna altogether as a wilful impostor) the result was peculiarly unfortunate; she was visited with dreams, which she quickly accepted as spiritual manifestations, instead of being, as they really were, indications of a disordered digestion.

Two years afterwards Joanna retired from secular business, and set up as a prophetess at Exeter. She declared herself to be the woman spoken of as “the bride,” “the Lamb’s wife,” the “woman clothed with the sun.” The county lunatic asylum might have done good at this point; but its wholesome discipline, unfortunately, was not resorted to. She published in 1801 her first inspired book, “The Strange Effects of Faith,” which absolutely brought five “wise men of Gotham” to inquire into her pretensions from different parts of England. Three of these learned pundits were Methodist parsons, and these three parsons declared themselves satisfied that the mission of Joanna was a divine one. It is needless to add that in England, no matter how absurd the nature of a so-called divine mission, it is safe and certain to attract believers; and by the year 1803 the doctrines of Joanna Southcott were eagerly swallowed by numerous simpletons in various parts of the country.

Thus fortified, Joanna issued a manifesto, in which she stated her calling and pretensions: we set it out in all the original baldness of its composition:—

“I, Joanna Southcott, am clearly convinced that my calling is of God, and my writings are indited by His Spirit, as it is impossible for any spirit but an all-wise God, that is wondrous in working, wondrous in wisdom, wondrous in power, wondrous in truth, could have brought round such mysteries, so full of truth, as is in my writings; so I am clear in whom I have believed, that all my writings came from the spirit of the most high God.”

Joanna was clear in whom she believed, and her followers were equally “clear” in their belief in Joanna. This incoherent nonsense was signed in the presence of fifty-eight simpletons, all of whom expressed their confidence in the inspired mission of their precious prophetess.

Her disciples rapidly increased, and she visited in her apostolic character, Bristol, Leeds, Stockport, and other large centres, obtaining numerous converts everywhere. Among them was the celebrated engraver, William Sharp; and to the last this man, who out of his calling was the veriest simpleton living, and who had swallowed successively the doctrines of Richard Brothers, Wright, Bryan, and Joanna, believed in the divine mission of this unincarcerated lunatic.

Although Joanna did not (like Joseph Smith) discover a book, she discovered a seal, which one of her disciples is said to have picked up in a dust-heap at Clerkenwell. With this miraculously acquired talisman the spirit ordered her to “seal up the people,” and as “the people” were limited to one hundred and forty-four thousand, and each of the elect had to pay a sum varying at different times from a guinea to twelve shillings, or even lower, for the privilege of being “sealed up,” the scheme promised at first to turn out a comfortably profitable one. Into the details of the “sealing” it is unnecessary for us to enter. Suffice it to say that the numbers of the “sealed,” up to 1808, when for some unexplained reason the process appears to have been discontinued, exceeded six thousand simpletons; the numbers of her deluded followers in the metropolis and its vicinity alone, are supposed at one time to have amounted to a hundred thousand.

Joanna was a coarse, common-place, and somewhat corpulent woman; she dressed in a plain, quaker-like garb, in a gown of Calimancoe, with a shawl and bonnet of drab colour. The three leading preachers in her chapel in Southwark (her great stronghold), were a Mr. Carpenter, who, after learning his business, set up as a prophet on his own account; a Mr. Foley, and a lath-render named Tozer. She had chapels also in Spitalfields, Greenwich, Twickenham, and Gravesend.

The scribblings in prose and verse of this illiterate creature, instead of being committed to the waste paper basket, were solemnly preserved and received as prophecies. Attacked at last with dropsy, her delusions assumed the following objectionable form: she prophesied, and Sharp and his fellow-disciples—some of whom were men of fair education—actually believed, that Christ was to be born again under the name of “Shiloh,” and that she, Joanna, at the age of sixty-five, was to be the mother. The revelation which proclaimed the miraculous accouchement was worded as follows: “This year [1814], in the sixty-fifth year of thy age, thou shalt have a son by the power of the Most High; which if they (the Hebrews) receive as their prophet, priest, and king, then I will restore them to their own land, and cast out the heathen for their sakes, as I cast out them when they cast out Me, by rejecting Me as their Saviour, Prince, and King, for which I said I was born, but not at that time to establish My kingdom.”

One might have imagined that this gibberish would open the eyes of some at least of her votaries: their insane enthusiasm, on the contrary, increased. Joanna was absolutely inundated with the “freewill” offerings of the faithful—a costly cradle, white robes, pinafores, shoes of satin and worsted, flannel shirts, napkins, blankets, silver spoons, pap-boats, mugs, silver tea-pots, sugar-basins, tongs, and corals,—absolutely without number. The absurdity of the simpletons who sent these offerings was severely criticised, both in England and on the Continent; and by way apparently of answering her traducers, Joanna inserted an apostolical advertisement in the Morning Chronicle of Thursday, 22nd September, 1814, and in the Courier of Friday, 23rd, in which she stated that, in consequence of the false and malicious reports in circulation respecting herself, she was desirous of treating for “a spacious and ready-furnished house to be hired for three months, in which her accouchement may take place in the presence of such competent witnesses as shall be appointed by proper authority to prove her character to the world.” The appointed day—the 29th of October—however passed by, and the prophecy remained of course unfulfilled, although, in the manufacturing towns of the north, crowds of the faithful assembled to wait the arrival of the coaches, in expectation of tidings of the great manifestation. The satire entitled, Delivering a Prophetess (in vol. 8 of “The Scourge”), has reference to the actual event which occurred on the 27th of December, 1814, when death relieved Joanna of her delusions and her dropsy; the wretched creature declaring on her deathbed that, “if she had been deceived, she had at all events been the sport of some spirit, good or evil.” Joanna forms the subject of one of Rowlandson’s caricatures of 1814, Joanna Southcott, the Prophetess, Excommunicating the Bishops, published by Tegg on the 20th of September, 1814. We shall also have to refer to her again when we treat of the caricatures of George Cruikshank.

This year (1814) the Princess Charlotte, heiress presumptive Flight of the Princess Charlotte. actually ran away in a hackney coach, to avoid being affianced to the Prince of Orange, to whom Her Royal Highness evinced an invincible repugnance. The event is referred to in a caricature entitled, Plebeian Spirit, or Coachee and the Heiress Presumptive (published by Fores on the 25th of July), which shows us the princess emerging from Warwick House, followed by Britannia (who raises her hands in a suppliant attitude), and the dejected British lion. “Coachman, will you protect me?” she appeals to the driver. “Yes, yes, your Highness,” replies the fellow, “to the last drop of my blood!” A servant in the royal livery holds up his hands in amazement and horror, while another spurs off in hot haste to apprise the Regent of the flight of his daughter. But a satire of far superior merit, entitled, Miss endeavouring to excite a glow with her Dutch Plaything,20 was issued by the same publisher a few days previously, in which the rejected prince figures as a Dutch top, which the princess has kept spinning for some time. “There,” she says to her father at last, “I have kept it up for a long while; you may send it away now, I am tired of it; mother [i.e. the Princess Caroline] has got some better plaything for me.” “What! are you tired already?” exclaims the Regent. “Take another spell at it, or give me the whip.” “No, no,” replies Her Royal Highness; “you may take the top, but I’ll keep the whip.” Behind her is a picture representing an orange falling with Cupid headlong into space. The Regent was so incensed at his daughter’s refractoriness, that he went at once to Warwick House and dismissed all her attendants, and never forgave the Duke of Sussex for his supposed share in breaking off the connection. It was immediately after this event that her mother, the Princess Caroline, contrary to the advice of her friends and well-wishers, applied for permission to make that tour on the Continent which, owing to her own obstinate folly and contempt for the duties of her high station, was destined—as we shall afterwards find—to end in such disastrous consequences to herself.

In the course of the year 1812, England had become involved—scarcely 1812 1815. through any fault of her own—in a war with the United States of America. The causes of difference were mainly due to the obnoxious Orders in Council, which had been forced upon us in consequence of the Berlin and Milan Decrees of Napoleon. As an evidence, however, of our own friendly intentions, it may be mentioned that the Regent had issued a declaration on the 23rd of April, that if at any time the obnoxious decrees should by an authentic act be absolutely repealed, thenceforth the Orders in Council of 7th January, 1807, and 26th April, 1809, should be revoked; America and England. and the American representative, having, on the 20th of May, transmitted to the English Court a copy of a French decree of the 20th of April, by which the decrees of Milan and Berlin were declared to be no longer in force, so far as American vessels were concerned, the Regent declared that, although he could not accept the terms of the decree as satisfying the conditions of his own declaration of the 23rd of April, yet, with the view of re-establishing friendly relations, he revoked the Orders in Council of 7th January, 1807, and April 26th, 1809, so far as regarded American vessels and American cargoes. Of this repeal, be it observed, the United States Government took no notice, it might be in consequence of the very reasonable proviso annexed to the Regent’s concession, that unless the Government of the United States revoked their exclusion of British armed vessels from their harbours, while those of France were admitted, and their interdiction of British commerce, while that of France was allowed, the order was to be of no effect.

A very old English proverb tells us that “a stick is never wanting to beat a dog;” and where one nation wishes to fasten a quarrel on another, and the opportunity be favourable, there will be no difficulty in finding an excuse. There were other causes of discontent; in particular our claim to search not only for English goods, but for British seamen serving on board neutral vessels; and as the sovereignty of the seas depended on upholding these assumptions, our Government was as strenuous in enforcing them as the French emperor was bent on the maintenance of his continental system.

The Americans, however, were anxious for a war with this country, and in particular, the opportunity seemed eminently favourable for attempting the conquest of Canada. A motion in the House of Representatives, for the indefinite postponement of a bill for raising 25,000 additional troops, was rejected by a majority of 98 to 29. An outrageous bill, specially intended as an insult to England, was introduced into the same House about the end of April, “for the protection, recovery, and indemnification of American seamen,” the first clause of which declared that every person who, under pretence of a commission from a foreign power, should impress upon Hostile Spirit of the Americans. the high seas a native seaman of the United States, should be adjudged a pirate and a felon, and should upon conviction suffer death. Another of its articles gave to every such seaman impressed under the British flag, the right of attaching in the hands of any British subject, or in the hands of any debtor of any British subject, a sum equal to thirty dollars per month for the whole time of his detention. This monstrous bill was actually allowed to pass a third reading. The temper of the Americans may be judged by the result of the voting on Mr. Randolph’s motion in the same House, on the 29th of May. That gentleman submitted “that, under the present circumstances, it was inexpedient to resort to a war with Great Britain.” The question being then put, that the House do proceed to the consideration of the said resolution, it was negatived by 62 votes against 37. Under the overpowering influence of these feelings, war was declared against England on the 18th of June, 1812; our own declaration was not issued until the 13th of October following.

“Our American cousins,” did not wait for this joinder of issue; they had invaded Canada early in July. On the 11th of that month, the American General Hull, with a body of 2,500 men—regulars and militia—crossed the river above Detroit with most disastrous consequences to himself. He was speedily forced to retreat, and on the 16th of August to surrender the important fort of Detroit itself, with his 2,500 men and thirty-three pieces of artillery. Although this disaster seriously disconcerted the American plans of invasion, the design was by no means abandoned. A considerable force was assembled in the neighbourhood of Niagara, and on the 13th of October, the American General Wadsworth, with some 1,400 men, made an attack on the British position of Queenstown, on the Niagara river. Wadsworth, with 900 men and many officers, was speedily compelled to surrender to British forces not exceeding the number of his own following.

On the other hand, the losses of the Americans on land were to some extent balanced by their naval successes. On the 19th of August, the English frigate Guerriere, Captain Dacres, was forced American Naval Successes. after a gallant but (as we shall see) unequal fight, to strike her colours to the American frigate Constitution, Captain Hull. Under similar conditions, the English frigate Macedonia, Captain Carden, was forced on the 25th of October, after an hour’s hard fighting, in which the English lost 104 men killed and wounded, to yield to the American frigate United States, Commodore Decatur. These successes were due to the following causes: the rate of the American frigates corresponded to the largest British; but in size, weight of metal, and number of men, were almost equal to line-of-battle ships; the American navy too, at this time, was manned by sailors many of whom were unfortunately British tars, while many more had been trained in British service.

Although we do not profess to give a history of the Anglo-American war of 1812-14, some slight sketch of its more remarkable incidents seems necessary for the purpose of enabling the reader to understand what has to follow. Having named some of the American naval successes, we can scarcely pass over the well-known fight of the 1st of June, 1813. Captain Broke, of the British frigate Shannon, 330 men, burning with indignation at the naval defeats of his countrymen, having diligently perfected his crew in discipline, offered battle to the United States frigate Chesapeake, for which he had long been watching. The Chesapeake was a fine ship, carrying forty-nine guns (18- and 32-pounders) and a complement of 440 men. The American captain, nothing loth, bore down on his antagonist off Boston light-house. The ships were soon in close contact; but the gallant English captain, discerning his opportunity, gave orders for boarding, himself setting the example; and after a sanguinary fight of only fifteen minutes, hauled down his adversary’s flag and carried off the Chesapeake in triumph. The invasion of Canada was still persevered in by the Americans, with varying successes and defeats; but the results of the campaign of 1813 were in the end disastrous to them; and by the 12th of December, both provinces of Canada were freed from the invaders, who retired to winter quarters within their own territory. Another determined attempt to penetrate into Canada was made by them The English Assume the Offensive. in July, 1814, the British troops in the first instance being obliged to fall back: this was on the 5th. Their triumph, however, was of brief duration. Veteran troops, who had served under Wellington in Spain, had meanwhile arrived at Quebec; General Drummond arrested the further retreat of Riall’s division, and a decisive battle ensued, which terminated in the defeat of the Americans, who were obliged to retire with precipitation beyond the Chippewa. On the following day they abandoned their camp, threw the greater part of their baggage and provisions into the rapids, and after destroying the bridge over the Chippewa, continued their retreat in great disorder to Fort Erie. Out of a force of 5,000 men, they had lost in killed, wounded, and prisoners at least 1,500. This defeat, and the timely arrival of veteran troops from Europe, appear to have decided the British commanders to change the defensive warfare they had hitherto adopted, and the small operations they had conducted on the coast of the southern States, for offensive movements of greater vigour.

A large naval force was despatched under the command of Vice-Admiral Cockrane, having on board a powerful land force commanded by General Ross. The latter landed on the 20th of August at Benedict; marched to Nottingham on the 21st, and to Upper Marlborough on the 22nd, Admiral Cockrane in the meanwhile, with the barges, armed launches, and other boats of the fleet, having the marines on board, proceeding up the Patuxent on the flank of the army. The American Commodore blew up his vessels, seventeen in number, with the exception of one which fell into the hands of the British. The troops reached Bladensburg (about five miles from Washington) on the 24th.

About 9,400 Americans (400 of whom were cavalry) drawn up to oppose them, were speedily routed, with the loss of ten pieces of artillery and the capture of their commanding officer, General Barney. It appears to have been General Ross’s first intention to return to his ships after laying the capital under contribution; but the Americans having fired upon the bearer of the flag of truce who was sent forward with the conditions, all thoughts of an arrangement were Burning of Washington. dissipated. The soldiers pressed into the city, and after burning a frigate and sloop of war, the President’s residence, the capitol—including the Senate House and House of Representatives, dockyard, arsenal, war office, treasury, and the great bridge over the Potomac, re-embarked on the 30th of August.