London, March 25th. Dearest and best, It would be too tiresome if I sent you a daily list of the parties I go to: I shall only mention them when anything strikes me as remarkable; and perhaps hereafter, if I feel the inclination and the power, I shall give you a general ‘apperÇu’ of the whole. The technical part of social life—the arrangements for physical comfort and entertainment—is well understood here. The most distinguished specimen of this is the house of Very few persons of rank have what we, on the Continent, call a palace, in London. Their palaces, their luxury and their grandeur, are to be seen in the country. The Duke of D—— is an exception;—his palace in town displays great taste and richness, and a numerous collection of works of art. The company is always the most select; and though here, as everywhere, too numerous, is rendered less oppressive by the number of rooms: still it is too much like a crowd at a fair. The concerts at D—— House, particularly, are very fine entertainments, where only the very first talent to be found in the metropolis is engaged, and where perfect order combined with boundless profusion reigns throughout. Among other things, the arrangement of the suppers and ‘buffets,’ which are excellent in such crowded parties, is most recommendable. In a separate room is a long table, with the most delicate and choice refreshments of every kind, so placed that it is accessible to the guests only on one side. Behind it stand maid-servants, in a uniform of white gowns and black aprons, who give everybody what he asks for, and have room enough to do their ministering conveniently: behind them is a door communicating with the ‘offices,’ through which everything needful is handed to them without disturbance to the company;—the disagreeable procession of troops of men-servants balancing great trays and pushing about the ‘salons’ with them, always in danger of discharging their contents, cold or warm, into the laps or pockets of the company, is thus avoided. The supper is served at a later hour, by male attendants, in another room, which communicates with the kitchen. The waiting is far better, with much fewer people, than on the Continent, and accomplished without the least confusion. I must observe, by the by, as to ‘bonne chÈre,’ that the very best in the world is to be found at the first tables in London: they have the best French cooks and the best Italian confectioners, for the very simple reason that they pay them best. I am told there are cooks who receive twelve hundred a year here;—to merit, its crown! Sometimes, after concert and supper, at two in the morning dancing begins, and one drives home by sunlight. This suits me admirably, for you know I always had the taste of Minerva’s bird. In such a night-morning I often enjoy a drive in the Park; for, thank heaven! Spring is visibly coming, and the tender green of the young leaves and the pink almond blossoms peep forth over the garden-walls and amid the dark net-work of the swelling branches. March 26th. I devoted this morning to an excursion to Deptford, to see Captain Parry’s ship, the Hecla, which is to sail in a few days for the North Pole. Whether she will reach it, is another matter: I wish it may not fare with Parry as with poor Count Zambeccari, who to this hour is not returned from his last Ærial voyage. Captain Parry did the honours of his singular vessel with great politeness; his air and manner perfectly bespeak the frank, determined, gallant seaman he is known to be. Some curiously formed boats, which were likewise to serve as sledges, lay on the deck. The ship herself has double sides, filled with cork, to keep in the heat; she is also warmed by ‘conduits de chaleur.’ The provisions consist of the strongest extracts; so that a whole ox in his quintessence can be put in a man’s coat-pocket, like the stereotype editions of the ‘chef d’oeuvres’ of the whole literature of England in one volume. All the officers seemed picked men. I found Captain Ross, who has accompanied Captain Parry in all his voyages, a very polished and I was invited to dine in barracks by a Major of the Horse Guards. There is a most advantageous custom prevalent throughout the English army,—I mean the so-called ‘Mess.’ Each regiment has its common table, to which every officer is bound to contribute a certain sum, whether he choose to avail himself of it or not. By this he is entitled to the privilege of dining at it daily, and of bringing an occasional guest according to some established regulations. A committee superintends the economical part. Each officer presides at table in turn, from the colonel down to the youngest lieutenant, and is invested, so long as he is ‘en fonction,’ with the requisite authority. The ‘ton’ of the officers is excellent; far more ‘gentleman-like’ than that commonly to be found on the Continent; at least so I am bound to conclude from this sample. Although the strictest subordination prevails in service, yet when that is over, they meet as gentlemen, so entirely on an equality, that it were impossible for a stranger to discover from their deportment the superior from the subordinate officers. The table was admirably served. There was not wanting either an elegant service of plate, or champagne, claret, or any of the requisites of luxury. The dinner was followed by no excess; and the conversation, though perfectly unconstrained and cheerful, was confined within the bounds of decorum and good breeding. To crown all, the whole did not last too long; so that I had still time to pay some visits at the opera, which is convenient enough for that purpose. March 28th. In most companies pretty high play is the order of the day, and the ladies are the most eager players. The crowding to the ‘ÉcartÉ’ table, which is almost out of fashion at Paris, is incessant; and the white arms of the English beauties appear to great advantage on the table-covers of black velvet embroidered with gold. But if their arms are dangerous, their hands are still more so, ‘car les vieilles surtout trichent impitoyablement.’ There are some old maids whom one meets in the first society who make a regular trade of play, so that they carry off fifty pounds at a stroke without changing a feature. They have small parties at their own houses, which are as ‘like tripots’ as possible. In no country can the admirer of ‘le moyen age,’ ‘fair, fat and forty,’ meet more women in high preservation than in England. Even still more mature years do not obliterate all pretensions. * * * * * * * I closed my day with reading and whist at the Club. My party was most curiously composed;—the Portuguese Ambassador, who is strikingly like Napoleon; a Neapolitan ex-minister, brought hither by the failure of the revolution; the Frenchman whom I described to you at Brighton; and my German insignificance, who however this time gained the victory; for I won eight rubbers and two ‘Monkeys.’ What is a ‘Monkey?’ you ask. Fashion has given strange names to the markers. One for twenty-five pounds is called a Poney; and one for fifty, a ‘Monkey.’ April 3rd. You are accustomed to follow me from the palace to the cottage, and from the decorated room to more beautiful nature. To-day I must introduce you to my dentist, the celebrated Mr. Cartwright. This gentleman is said “Mr. Cartwright will have the pleasure of receiving N—— N—— on such a day and such an hour.” You appear at the appointed time, and are ushered into an elegant room, where a piano-forte, prints, books and other helps to pass time are placed; a very necessary attention, as you often have to wait an hour or more. When I entered, I found the Duchess of Montrose and Lady Melville and her daughters, who were called away ‘gradatim,’ so that at length my turn came. When you have once reached this point, you find indeed infinite reason to be satisfied; for Mr. Cartwright is the most skilful and scientific man of his profession I ever met with,—perfectly devoid of all trace of ‘charlatanerie,’ which the difficulty of access might lead you to anticipate. He has also a settled price, and not an exorbitant one,—‘mais c’est un Grand Seigneur dentiste.’ In the evening, after wandering to four or five places in search of something interesting, I at last fixed myself at Lady ——’s where I was riveted by the conversation of a Captain ——, a half German who is just returned from the East, and gave a very interesting account of his travels. Among other things he told me the following strange anecdotes of Lady Hester Stanhope, a niece of Pitt’s, who left England many years ago, turned Arab, and has established herself in Syria. She is now honoured by the Arabs as a prophet, lives with all the state of a native princess, and seldom allows Europeans to see her. After a great deal of trouble Captain —— gained access to her. The first thing she required was his promise that he would not write anything about her. This vow being made, (luckily I am bound by none such,) she was cheerful and conversable, and talked with equal ease and cleverness. She made it no secret that she had renounced the Christian faith, and at the same time that she still looked for the appearing of the true Son of God, before whom she was appointed to prepare the way. Hereupon she showed the Captain a noble Arab mare, which had a curious bony excrescence on the back exactly in the form of a saddle. “This horse,” said she,—with a look of which Captain —— declared he was still in doubt whether to ascribe to madness or to a desire to hoax him,—“This horse God has saddled for his own Son, and wo to the man who shall dare to mount it! Under my protection it awaits its true master.” She afterwards assured him, ‘en passant,’ that Adam was still living, and that she knew perfectly the place of his concealment, but would not reveal it. The lady of the house listened to his narration, and assured him that Lady Hester had been only ‘quizzing’ him; for that she had known her well, and that never had woman a clearer, more determined, and at the same time more astute mind. For a person of such a character, she has made a good exchange in renouncing Western for Eastern life. She rules; she is free as bird in air; while in the centre of civilization she would never have been able to subtract herself from the slavery which must ever remain, more or less, the dark side of civilized life. April 4th. Sir Alexander Johnston, a great Orientalist, but in another sense of the April 6th. Can you tell me why all objects reflected by art give us only pleasure, whereas all realities have at least one defective side? We see the torments of Laocoon in marble with undisturbed delight, How beautiful does everything appear to me! It is spring;—the violets send forth enchanting fragrance after the heavy shower; swallows are twittering in the air, and pretty little water-wagtails are running merrily round the lake. And now the sun breaks from behind the last lingering dark cloud, in all his majesty, and draws strange characters on the distant mountains. The old limetrees around us gleam like emeralds; gay butterflys try their light wings, and frolic, as if drunk with joy, over the grassy carpet. Bees hum busily around the thousand fresh flowers, and green beetles glitter in the sunlight. But now a splendid bow arises out of the west, spans the blue sky above the castle, and sinks on the black pine-forest. Now is the cheerful white-covered table set, and decked with polished utensils. The juicy fruits of the hot-house, hyacinthine Xeres in crystal cups, and champagne covered with thick mist, from the ice, await the guests:—and see who advances slowly and gravely among the shrubs, with that dignified air? Ah, it is you, dear Julia, I exclaim enraptured—fly towards you, and * * * * * * * Thus does fancy paint. What however in reality unhinges me is, that it is a long time since I had a letter from you, and I really want one to restore my nerves. But I must dress for a couple of ‘Russian steam balls’ as they ought to be called. April 7th. As the Lord Mayor has invited me to his great dinner, I rode into the city this morning to call on him: this is rather a perilous enterprise, with I dined with Count Munster, a noble representative of Germany, who has endeavoured as far as possible to preserve German simplicity in his household. Everybody knows his distinguished qualities as a statesman: he is not less remarkable for his agreeable manners and talents in social and domestic life. Since his residence in England, he has designed and painted the decorations for his castle in the Harz, with great taste and skill; and his wife’s paintings on glass are very beautiful: in a few years all the windows of the castle chapel will be adorned with her own works. The German housewife however is no mere modern bel-esprit, or artist, but, like one of the knightly dames who are the subjects of her pencil, she takes care to have excellent beer brewed in her own house:—she gave me some, which I drank with all the gratitude of a guest in the hall of Valhalla. In the evening a great fÊte at Lord Hertford’s, with concert, ball, French-play, &c., assembled the fashionable and half-fashionable world The company, ‘c’est a dire la foule,’ was not more vivacious than usual, and the whole affair ‘magnifiquement ennuyex.’ Another house worth seeing is that of the great banker ——, especially on account of the fine collection of pictures. Here is also that triumph of modern sculpture, Thorwaldson’s Jason, and some valuable antiques. On a sort of terrace on part of the house are hanging-gardens; and though the shrubs have only three feet of earth, they grow very luxuriantly. The lady of the gardens is however no Semiramis; ‘il s’en faut,’ whatever she may think * * * * * * * * * * I could not help comparing her with her far more wealthy rival Madame R——, and remarking how far the Jewish golden queen surpassed the Christian one in cordial amiability and external dignity and good-breeding. April 8th. What contributes much to the ‘dullness’ of English society, is the haughty aversion which Englishmen (note well that I mean in their own country, for ‘abroad’ they are ready enough to make advances) show to addressing an unknown person; if he should venture to address them, they receive it with the air of an insult. They sometimes laugh at themselves for this singular incivility, but no one makes the least attempt to act differently when an opportunity offers. There is a story that a lady saw a man fall into the water, and earnestly entreated the dandy who accompanied her, and who was a notoriously good swimmer, to save his life. Her friend raised his ‘lorgnette’ with the phlegm indispensable to a man of fashion, looked earnestly at the drowning man, whose head rose for the last time, and calmly replied, “It’s impossible, Madam, I never was introduced to that gentleman.” I made the acquaintance of a man of very different manners this evening; the Persian ChargÉ d’Affaires, an Asiatic of very pleasant address, and whose splendid costume and black beard were only deformed, in my eyes, by the Persian peaked cap of black sheepskin. He speaks very good English, and made very acute observations on European society. Among other things he said, that though in many respects we were much further advanced than they, yet that all their views of existence were of a firmer and more composed character; that every man reconciled himself to his lot; whereas he remarked here an incessant fermentation, an everlasting discontent, both of masses and of individuals; nay, he confessed that he felt himself infected by it, and should have great trouble, on his return to Persia, to fall back into that old happy track, in which a man who is unfortunate consoles himself, exclaiming, “Whose dog am I then, to want to be happy?” This indeed furnishes ample matter for reflection to the pursuers of the ideal, to which secret association I, alas! belong. A ball at Mrs. Hope’s was very splendid, ‘mais c’est toujours la mÊme chose.’ In a party to which I went before this, I was presented to the Duke of Gloucester. I only mention the fact for the sake of remarking, that the English Princes of the Blood observe a much more courteous sort of etiquette than most of those on the Continent: the Duke, who was playing whist, rose from the table, and did not sit down again till our short conversation was ended. But let me go back for a moment to the beginning of the day. The gardens of the neighbourhood are now in full bloom, the weather is fine, and my ride this morning brought me about thirty miles from town. In variety and richness the suburbs of London surpass those of any other capital; which here and there display natural beauties, but never that exquisite mixture of nature and the highest cultivation,—never at least in any considerable masses. I should have gladly ridden further and further, and returned at length with great regret. The meadows around me were so luxuriant, that it was only at a distance they looked green; when you were near them they were embroidered with blue, yellow, red, and lilac, like a carpet of Tournay. The cows were wading up to their bellies in the gay flowers, or resting under the shadow of huge domes of foliage, impenetrable to every ray of sun. It was magnificent, and adorned with a richness which art can never reach. In an hour’s riding I reached a hill where the ruins of a church stood in the midst of a garden. The sun darted its rays from behind a cloud athwart the whole sky, like a huge torch, the centre of which rested directly on the metropolis of the world,—the immeasurable Babel which lay outstretched with its thousand towers, and its hundred thousand sins, its fog and smoke, its treasures and its misery, further than the eye could reach. It was in vain! I must plunge into it again, from the spring and its bursting blossoms, from the green meadows—again into Accept my farewell—my next letter will go on to tell what became of Daniel in the lion’s den. Your faithful friend L——. |