Nothing can be more fulsome or loathsome to my mind than the continual sham-religious clap-traps which the author has put into the mouth of his hero; nothing more unsailor-like than his namby- pamby starlit descriptions, which my ingenious colleague has, I see, alluded to. "Thy faith my anchor, and thine eyes my haven," cries the gallant captain to his lady. See how loosely the sentence is constructed, like a thousand others in the book. The captain is to cast anchor with the girl's faith in her own eyes; either image might pass by itself, but together, like the quadrupeds of Kilkenny, they devour each other. The captain tells his lieutenant to BID HIS BARK VEER ROUND to a point in the harbor.
Was ever such language? My lady gives Sir Maurice a thousand pounds to WAFT him (her son) to some distant shore. Nonsense, sheer nonsense; and what is worse, affected nonsense!
Look at the comedy of the poor cousin. "There is a great deal of game on the estate--partridges, hares, wild-geese, snipes, and plovers (SMACKING HIS LIPS)--besides a magnificent preserve of sparrows, which I can sell TO THE LITTLE BLACKGUARDS in the streets at a penny a hundred. But I am very poor--a very poor old knight!"
Is this wit or nature? It is a kind of sham wit; it reads as if it were wit, but it is not. What poor, poor stuff, about the little blackguard boys! what flimsy ecstasies and silly "smacking of lips" about the plovers. Is this the man who writes for the next age?
O fie! Here is another joke:--"Sir Maurice. Mice! zounds, how can I Keep mice! I can't afford it! They were starved To death an age ago. The last was found Come Christmas three years, stretched beside a bone In that same larder, so consumed and worn By pious fast, 'twas awful to behold it!
I canonized its corpse in spirits of wine, And set it in the porch--a solemn warning To thieves and beggars!"
Is not this rare wit? "Zounds! how can I keep mice?" is well enough for a miser; not too new, or brilliant either; but this miserable dilution of a thin joke, this wretched hunting down of the poor mouse! It is humiliating to think of a man of esprit harping so long on such a mean, pitiful string. A man who aspires to immortality, too! I doubt whether it is to be gained thus; whether our author's words are not too loosely built to make "starry pointing pyramids of." Horace clipped and squared his blocks more carefully before he laid the monument which imber edax, or aquila impotens, or fuga temporum might assail in vain. Even old Ovid, when he raised his stately, shining heathen temple, had placed some columns in it, and hewn out a statue or two which deserved the immortality that he prophesied (somewhat arrogantly) for himself. But let not all be looking forward to a future, and fancying that, "incerti spatium dum finiat aevi," our books are to be immortal. Alas! the way to immortality is not so easy, nor will our "Sea Captain" be permitted such an unconscionable cruise. If all the immortalities were really to have their wish, what a work would our descendants have to study them all!
Not yet, in my humble opinion, has the honorable baronet achieved this deathless consummation. There will come a day (may it be long distant!) when the very best of his novels will be forgotten; and it is reasonable to suppose that his dramas will pass out of existence, some time or other, in the lapse of the secula seculorum. In the meantime, my dear Plush, if you ask me what the great obstacle is towards the dramatic fame and merit of our friend, I would say that it does not lie so much in hostile critics or feeble health, as in a careless habit of writing, and a peevish vanity which causes him to shut his eyes to his faults. The question of original capacity I will not moot; one may think very highly of the honorable baronet's talent, without rating it quite so high as he seems disposed to do.
And to conclude: as he has chosen to combat the critics in person, the critics are surely justified in being allowed to address him directly.
With best compliments to Mrs. Yellowplush, I have the honor to be, dear Sir, Your most faithful and obliged humble servant, JOHN THOMAS SMITH.
And now, Smith having finisht his letter, I think I can't do better than clothes mine lickwise; for though I should never be tired of talking, praps the public may of hearing, and therefore it's best to shut up shopp.
What I've said, respected Barnit, I hoap you woan't take unkind. A play, you see, is public property for every one to say his say on; and I think, if you read your prefez over agin, you'll see that it ax as a direct incouridgment to us critix to come forrard and notice you. But don't fansy, I besitch you, that we are actiated by hostillaty; fust write a good play, and you'll see we'll prays it fast enuff. Waiting which, Agray, Munseer le Chevaleer, l'ashurance de ma hot cumsideratun.
Voter distangy, Y.
