SOCIETY IN 1875.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2133, 4 November 1875, Page 2

SOCIETY IN 1875.

Garden parties spoiled by showers, kettledrums embellished with juvenile entertainments, countless balls ani.dinners—that is the social chrotAk of-ii'ie year of fashion, a.d. 1875. _ Buric4raot a chronicle which can he accepted as exhaustive. While Minos and the copophone have reigned supreme indoors, and men and women have played with the implements of tennis a game which is not tennis; while there have been skating and tea at *■ Prince's, and pigeon-shooting andpolo at Hurlingham, what have we had elsewhere? Has the oatalogue of crimes against the decalogue diminished? Have < we had fewer breaches against the seventh commandment than usual ? Have we observed inviolate the injunction, Mosaic in | its origin, Christian in its sanction, " Thou shalt not steal?"- Were we willing to publish facts which ordinary observation reveals, or which have been volunteered to us by correspondents on all sides, we might draw a striking picture of the contrast between the pretty airs and pastoral affectations of society, and the unwelcome realities of its actual occupation and its engrossing ambitions. But while the World hag never suffered itself to b,e the organ ofa social obscurantism, it has positively and consistently refused to admit to its pages anything that might seem in the nature of a chronique scandaleuse. We have dealt openly, and we hope fairly, with sins and abusps flagrantly patent. . We have de r clined, as we. shall ever decline,, £o, be t^e, m,oufchpieqG of gossip which " can only gratify a vulgar and prurient curiosity. But passing in retrospect before us only those occurrences which, as matter; of public knowledge, are public property, what is the verdict that should be pronounced upon society in 1875? What is that Chloe and Strephon, Amaryllis and Florio, are chiefly bent on while they po«e

before the world;; with all the-prettiness and innocence of a group of shepherds and shepherdesses in a cabinet-picture of Louis Quatorze ? " Alea quando hos animos habuitP" asked Juvenal; and well may we respond. When, indeed, except now P It matters not whether we go east or west whether we are on the Stock Exchange or in St. James. There cannot unhappily be mentioned a club in London at which anything like systematic gambling for high stakes is the practice that is without its scandal. We hare perpetuated the abuses of tfrockford's and the hells of Pall-mall; we hare guarded ourselves only against their publicity. Gambling is of two kinds—the gambling which arrogate! to itself the name.of business, and tjji© gamt&ng which claims the name of pleasure. It is difficult to say whether the former or the latter has been more pregnant with the- results of disaster and of shame. Censors far less severe than Cato may well hare been alarmed and pained -at the revelation which the Canadian oil-case constituted in February last. Only; one thing was wanted, and that was the independent confirmation of the sust&iciofes"of a general corruption then suggested. Who shall say, after a perusal of the Report of ibe foreign • Loans Committee, that itynb? abundantly forthcoming ? Aa for the Divorce Gourt and its coneomiiants, conjugal infidelities and married elopements, these things we have always/with us, and we shall not touch upon particular occurrences which might ieena to justify exceptional bitterness. It is sad to know that the Parisian colony, of high-born English matrons who have outlawed themselves from English society has been increased, and that is all we choos6 to .say,. It is infinitely more -deplorable to witness, as we have witnessed in two notorious instances, the names bf distinguished members of a ttoble Profession literally dragged through the dirt, and befouled with the mire of enduring^ infainy. "The English army Stands .too high in national as in European esteem to be permanently affected to its own detriment by the criminal conduct of .Alto, card-playing hero, of Nice and of Colonel Valentine "Baker. But it would be idle to say that it has not fcr the/#me seriously ' suffered; The punishment of these men is great exactly in proportion to the position whose .forfeiture -ttiatrj punishihient; involves. tJnhappily when men who are highly placed, and who are notoriously among the friends and intimates of those who are even more liighly placed yet, fall by .their own culpable acts, they are not merely themselves prostrated, they drag with them part of the pedestal on which they stood. 1 The impression rightly or wrongly gets abroad that in more exalted heights the standard of honour and of common pro,bity is not that which is recognised on more plebeian levels, and that connivance at crime is an article in the modern aristocratic code. The two officers to whom we. r.efer have already commeucedvto expiate their sins by social death. But they cannot' carry with.«lfliem into their retirement the effects of the dastardly blow which they have struck at their profession and at society itself. Such men are hostes "humani generis," and if there is one thing as bad even as their hostility it is the toleration extended to their sin by those who should be the most zealous guardians of public and private honour. It is,-in the general lowering of the social tone that, .the most eloquently satirical commentary upon the parade of the airs and graces of Arcadia must'be found, rather than in any specific violation of the laws of custom and morality. We had no wish to illustrate this observation by reference to the columns of a contemporary. But tbe _ offence is so gross, tbe offender occupies a position which, i« usually regarded as so potential, that we cannot pass by the matter in silence. * Vanity Fair ' is, according to its own account, the accredited organ of the English aristocracy. When the price of that print was raised from sixpence to a shilling, its editor announced that the alteration of tariff was made in the interests of patrician exclusiveness, that henceforward, hie newspaper was to be the cus«odian-in-chief of the intellectual requirements of the upper classes and that no person who did not study its pages could possible be regarded as " in society." Such was the declaration distinctly made, which has, so far as we know, up to the present time remain unchallenged. It may therefore be contended with plausibility—though we are thankful to think without truth - that Vanity Fair is the official and responsible organ of society. Is society prepared to be judged by its soi-dtsant interpreter? There is a'contributor to Vanity Fair who signs himself •' Huffier," and who writes week after, week a series of odiously indecent paragraphs under the guise of a letter addressed " urbi et orbi." The inspiration comes from' Mabille ; the style is that of a tenth-rate imitator of " Ouida." Speaking in the person of a cousin of a woman who is supposed to be married to a nobleman who is usually drunk—at least Lady Hummingtoy thus speaks of his Lordship:—"l had andthrrrow with Hum mingtop last night; he was drunk as usual, and he^ all but struck me, tho beast!" Mr "Ruffler" entertains ' j^i^teaders with the account of :to seduce his cousin Jane — the Countess of Hummingtop; and this narrative of iniquity is told in the most licentious and the coarsest manner. In the penultimate number of ' Vanity Far, "Rufßer," who speaks of himself as " Fred," gives us the account of the abortive effort he made to induce " Jane" to elope with him. " Jane" refuses—and, morality apart, she does well to refuse so unutterable a snob—with indignation. But, before "Fred" gets out of earshot of her boudoir, she cries,

'•stop, Fred, stop ! " "I saw," adds in prdpria persona the 'narrator of this pleasing episode, (l that this was the moment to make an effective exit; and I stalked out of the boudoir with great state and pomp, flying the haughty colours of wrongfully suspected innocence." It may be well to add that next day her ladyship runs off with, Jiord pilrertop^ and Lord Hummingtop thus reviews to a friend, the entire episode:— " Well, I had a tidy slant of luck last night; but I'll be shot if I expected to pull off such a double event as winning three thou. and. losing my wife at once. Poor Silver! I'll hope he'Jl like h,er \ Effl p.wed me a good turn) for I pumped for him when he was hard hit at Ascot, and of course I had to pay the cursed bill when it became due. But if my lady gives him half as rough a time with her airs and graces as she used to me, he won't owe me much. Hang it, though ! I wish it had been anybody elso instead of Silver; because he's about 'through,' and old Cress well—nOj who's the other fellow P

—Hannen —won't be able to half melt him in the D. C. Why didn't you run away with her, Goldy, curse you?" continued his Lordship, addressing Mr Goldbank ; "we might have screwed some value out of you. ; v

Now we shall not be far wrong if we characterise this stuff' as mere mischievous blackguardism. The word_ may be strong, but is it suitable. ':'■ It is not the writing of a man who has been educaated in the traditions of English society, who has had experience of the traditions as they exist and are scrupulously observed at a public school, at our two uni--1 versities, in the army, or in the profession 'of diplomacy. The extract is only such as could be penned by a writer who had commenced his social education among the demi-monde of Paris, and who had completed it in the drawing-rooms of St. Johns-wood, And the recipe for the pro-! duction of this offensive sort of tra,sh is so simple. A fair acquaintance with musichall ditties, a few glimpses of high life up stairs from the social inferno of high life down-stairs, and a superficial study of certain novels bf society, will enable him to do the business. -But we pass from what is blackguardism only to what is cheap blasphemy. Under the head of " Flotsam," we read as follows: — "That anarchial order of French ideas, such as • all opinions are free,' ' all tastes are in nature,' and the rest, are to me utterly damnable," And again: " I am very fond of women, but when I am challenged to leave all and follow one as though she were the Messiah, I go away sorrowful, like the young man in Scripture who had great possessions."

It is, we are convinced, impossible for j anyone who has even a tincture of good J sense or cultivated taste to regard such words as those in the last-quoted paragraph with any other feelings save those of indignant disgust. But both in society' and out of society there is a snobbish and uncultivated residuum, which may consider such dull, foul, and pointlea impiety as clever and knowing. Em* such as these better the obscenities of Holy well street, and the railings against God and man contained in Reynolds' News, than this filthy turpitude. This is a matter in which we do not"' care to measure our phrases, and we will tell the public what this sort of stuff is— it is the dregs of the bourgeois and fleshly atheism of France, with tbe addition of the flavour of a sham philosophy which it is hoped may commend it to the "tastes of the aspiring nouveaux riches. Men when they are together and alcne discuss questions of theology and femine virtue in a tone which may be condemnable, but which we do not now condemn. Men who are also gentlemen and men of the world do hot blurt out the frequently stupid and sometimes indecent utterances of their unguarded moments deliberately and in miscellaneous society. They may express themselves in a manner as profane and as vulgar as Ruffler and Blanc Bee amongst themselves, but we do not think they would disgrace themselves, and endeavour to degrade their wives, sisters, and daughters, by promulgating their ribald nonsense — and they would themselves be the first to confess that it was ribald nonsense— in the drawing-room. The publication of these oozings from a foul mind and a filthy pen, in a newspaper which affects to be the organ of society, is an insult to society. We ask will society passively acquiesce in a continuance of the contumely? The aimless blasphemies, the irredeemable vulgarities of' Vanity Fair' will pass harmless from every mind which has a tinge of culture, social or intellectual. But society is now a mob, and there are many persons who are in, or who aspire to be in, society without culture of either kind. For these, and such as these, writing of this'sort is a pest and a bane, and the writer, if he is not strong enough to be an enemy, is a nuisance. Such a prostitution of the functions of journalism is a thousand times more melancholy than the card-sharping of Major Harbord and the indecent assault of Colonel Baker, and the circumstance that society should even appear to tolerate it is a satire infinitely more grievous upon its condition than the infamy of either of these men.— The World.