EIGHTEENTH CENTURY MEN AND MANNERS

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21986, 9 January 1937, Page 15

EIGHTEENTH CENTURY MEN AND MANNERS

OrZCULLT WRITTEN »R THE PRESS.) [By JOHN NICOL.]

- of the interest of A new revelaho * the pro- < the drama gs fhe Elizabe than vious EnS * previous drama not SSVggaS’lJt oi miy. »»« & end Spain. ' •/• ~,=<• JM. Robertson’s deTh Ji on of the fiction of RichardSCriP F°elding, and Smollett; and he Jto it the remark, “They too to be very readable; Ehey forwarded life even as did Ihn better politicians.” The present *l2 disapproves of this addendum Porously refuses to believe ■ rOrissa and Clementina, Partbat A C lms Square and Molly SeaSO ” m A Commodore Trunnion, Tom f 1 iw Lismahago, Matt Bramble, of the entertaining “moany whom one meets in the of the eighteenth century piohave sunk so low in men s as to be worthy of only scholastic interest, and that are reduced to the 'Wei of venerable antiques, hon''S not for what they did but for oU . r af they taught and because they See useful instruments in the Wids of the gracious divinity that Sided over the birth and developof the Age of Reason. ' be true that Thackeray thieves' a perfection of artistry unSd by Fielding; and mdisputably Dickens, in sympathy, breadth vision, and purity anti sanity of outlook, surpasses Smollett. But to say that the early novelists are memorable only as masters of the ' great Victorians is nonsense N6t gore than four of Thackeray s novels are comparable m merit with ‘•Tom Jones,” and one could readily name several of Dickens’s books the combined loss of which would be i more supportable than the loss of Clinker.” ' The Struggle of a Genius In spite of his haughty and irascible manner, his sensitiveness, and bis inability to suppress a love of sarcastic utterance, Smollett was the central luminary of a circle of professional writers. His own versatility as a man of letters was remarkable. Not only did he enrich English literature by splendidly introducing irito it the British sailor and write fhe most laughable piece of fiction ,in the language, but he translated "Qiiixote” and Voltaire, wrote a ; brilliant if superficial history, penneff ' a -fascinating book of travels, estab--1 listed the best review of his genera- ' tibri; founded a popular magazine, edited, a weekly paper, and composed verses that won and have retained a place in standard anthologies, Yet he found: life difficult and had a long Struggle against poverty. Through* unsuitability of temperament, he failed in his profession as physician. His experiences as a sur- ' geon’s mate in the navy during the Carthagena expedition were so little to'his liking that he left the service , in the West Indies, and years later a smouldering grudge against Ad- . miral Knnwles,, which burst into flgme hi' the pages' of the “Critical ; Reyiejv,” jnjilcted ire*a £IOO fine, besides bringing him three ■ months’ imprisonriient. His championing of; Bute’s Government lied to a quarrel with his old friend Wukes and he was rudely abandoned by the very patron whose diise he had espoused. Overwork brought a breakdown in health which rendered, miserable the last decade of his life. When he was 41 years old, his only child Elizabeth died; and from that time onward v until his death nine years later Smollett enjoyed few respites from men- • physical pain. In such circumstances, it would be indeed .strange if his fiction were altogether untainted by the demons of malignify and despair. . ; •He was a scholar and proud of • intimate acquaintarice with Roman manners. His general knowledge, in ari age not lavishly equipped , with books of reference, was encyclopaedic;''and an assertion in one of his i Travel letters that “there is nothing j so-yile and repugnant to nature but .you may plead prescription for it | in-the customs of some nation or other,”." is immediately fortified by a , citation of six specific cases ranging , from the practices of the Parisians l and the natives of Legiboli to those iof “the civilised inhabitants of ■ Kamschatka,” the Nova Zemblans, the Greenlanders, and the Kaffirs. I'TVaried learning lightly worn characI tensed many literary men of the f Georgian period, and we moderns, [hemmed in as we are by the massed £ productions of twentieth century t ; specialisation, without intellectual ,' balance and expansiveness of view, *.may spare time to sigh and regret , ' the change that has come upon us. Two seemingly casual sentences at . the end of. one of Burke’s paragraphs— ‘ The death of a man at a critical rJuncture, - his disgust, his. retreat, his disgrace, have brought innumerable . calamities on a whole nation. A common soldier, a child, a girl at the door J ol ari inn, have changed the face of . fortune, and almost of nature — . are sufficient send a present-day •reader coursing through the recesses of. his mind in search of the inci'.dents in history to which the orator refers; and it is doubtful if many •of us . can keep up the pace. Smollett’s Sfeamen Smollett’s ordinary style was char- • ‘ acterised by precision and force as a passage chosen almost at random from any of his better books will show; i'. u /A true-bred Frenchman dips his fingers, ixnbrowned with snuff, into his plate filled with ragout: between every wee mouthfuls, he produces his snuffbox, and takes a fresh pinch, with the graceful gesticulations; then he Wplays his handkerchief, which may 00 1 called ‘,‘the flag of abomination,” Maun the use of both, scatters his JfVours among those who have the nappmess to sit near him. It must be C’Mfo. however, that a Frenchman drink out of a tankard, in perhaps, a dozen of filthy . s have flabbered, as is the custoa^; in. England. His observation and accuracy are ex- • in every part of the “Travis Especially in his descripNice. His sea worthies in both -■WdcfKk” and “Peregrine” are inS|6d -a hard and ruthless race—a stirpe genus”—and one is at their cold-blooded treachheartlessness, but there is 5? aMk of vitality or vividness in Meuj’iportrayal. Take Pipes, for in“opened his mouth like -*i.^ s^?^'cbd t ” and whose voice was >«Ke the East wind singing through or Hawser Trunnion, ComhUmore m His Majesty’s navy, who,

,-.-V - / Smollett and His Times

in his own words, ‘‘was not hoisted in the service over the bellies of better men. nor strutted athwart the quarter deck in a laced doublet, and thingumbobs at the wrist, but served all offices on board from cook s shifter to command of a vessel. The naval part of “Roderick,” from the hero’s arrest on Tower HilJ onward, is a grim and grisly x'ecord of surpassing intexest, more illuminating than many historical tomes, and every reader of it must metaphorically doff his cap to' the memory of the indomitable Morgan and thank his stars for the contrast demonstrating that, in one sphere at least, “man’s inhumanity to man” has been largely eliminated from English civilisation during thu last 200 years. Smollett was always, blunt and often coarse, descending at times to the level of It is own Jan-ki-dtzm, who “possessed the art of making balls of filth which were famous for sticking and stinking.” For this reason, his reputation as a novelist rests on only two books, with part of a third: but “Humphrey Clinker alone is enough to outweigh his faults and vices many times over, an : for this delightful picture of eighteenth century men, women and manners the world is eternally his debtor. Plot and Character His conception of a work of fiction was the loose one that is well exemplified in “Gil Bias.” “A novel, to quote his own definition, “is a large, diffused picture comprehending the characters of life, disposed in different groups and exhibited in various attitudes.” A principal personage, however, is needed “to unite the incidents and unwind the clue to the labyrinth.” His practice accorded precisely with his theory, so that his novels lack both the intricately constructed plot that we find, say, in “Tom Jones” and the careful elaboration of detail that is characteristic of Richardson’s finely drawn romances. Smollett was normally so busy narrating with vigour and ■ vivacity the humours of the present that he tended to lose sight of past and future alike and paid small heed to the development of character. Despite the array of adventures through which he has been led in the interim, the Peregrine Pickle of Volume IV. is, in all essentials except age, identical with the Peregrine of Volume I.; for even though he makes a parade of leading them up from childhood, Smollett has his heroes substantially ready made. He conducts them through a variety of incidents, usually comic, often farcical, always purporting to be instructive or amusing; then when he thinks the play has lasted long enough, he disposes of them happily, as in the cases of Roderick and Peregrine, or miserably, as in the case, of Ferdinand, Count Fathom. ' A -. The method is a perilous One, fit to be undertaken only by a writer of superlative narrative skill or equipped with a full armoury of humorous or satiric, weapons. Smollett’s success is a tribute to the pictorial and graphic qualities of his style, which enabled him, m “Humphrey Clinker,” to triumph over the added technical difficulty of casting a fictitious narrative into epistolary form without impairing its force and energy. “Redgauntlet” may flag, and Richardson s long letters grow tedious with refinement of detail; but “Clinker” is alive and lusty from the first sentence to the end. The opening pages are a shining example of the merit of -plunging “in medias res,” and the most inveterate of Scott’s admirers must regret that he sadly failed to learn the lesson taught by his fel-low-countryman. The comedy supplied by the immortal Win and Tabby, forerunners of. many other entertaining people whose forte has been to play tricks with the spelling of the English language, would be sufficient in itself to redeem a book from oblivion, but in this exquisite masterpiece is a mere foil to the deep and genuine humour of Matt. Bramble, that most attractive of misanthropes, and to the charms of his niece and nephew, Lydia and Jerry Melford. As for the gaunt lieutenant, Lismahago, suffice it' to say that if there is in Smollett one scene memorable above others it is the one where this lean, weatherbeaten son of Scotland, proud though poor, arrives after long exile at his native home, learns that his nephew has gone into partnership with a weaver, hears the sound of treddles in the great hall, and, transported with indignation, like one risen from the dead, horsewhips the degenerate rascal who has made his father s house a den of thieves.