Immagini della pagina
PDF
ePub
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic][subsumed][merged small][merged small]

HOP-GATHERING.

THE elegant Illustration of Hop Gathering which adorns our pages this week, was taken from a scene in Kent last autumn, by that eminent Artist, Mr. WEIGALL, and for the spirited and faithful manner in which it has been engraved, we are not less indebted to the able workmanship of Mr. JAMES COOPER. The Original Painting was exhibited in the Collection of the New British Water Colour Society of this year. During the season of hop-picking, two distinct classes may be found employed; the one consisting of persons who usually arrive from Ireland, and other parts of our own country, in fact, emigrate into Kent and Sussex for that purpose; and the other of which the present engraving is descriptive-the small farmers and cottagers of the adjacent villages, who, during the season, shut up their houses, and adjourn, men, women, and children, including even the babies, to the neighbouring gardens, where, forming themselves into companies, they toil together the whole day, and in the evening divide the produce of their earnings amongst the different families employed in each group.

MEMOIR OF JOHN WALTER, ESQ. ALTHOUGH it has not been our custom to occupy the pages of this Magazine with obituary notices, (such articles, however gratifying they may be to the feelings of a few individuals, seldom possessing much general interest,) we feel sure our readers will forgive us for departing from this rule on the present occasion, when the event to which we are about to call their attention is one which we should conceive no member of the reading public can regard with indifference. We allude to the death of John Walter, Esq, for four-and forty years editor, and part proprietor of The Times newspaper, a journal which has attained a degree of celebrity and an extent of circulation wholly unprecedented, and which may, in great measure, be attributed to the active zeal, indomitable perseverance, and well directed enterprise of the chief director of this mighty engine. The triumphant success which has attended these efforts may not be considered a fair proof, though, practically, we believe it to be a tolerably certain one, of the skill and judgment by which they were directed; but if any further clue be wanted to the secret of this success, it may be found in the steady power which a consistent adherence to the principles of strict justice, and high integrity, will always obtain over the minds of men. We are indebted to the columns of The Times, of the 29th July, for the following sketch of his early political career, given in an article written (by himself we imagine) in reply to an intemperate attack made by Mr. Wyndham, in the year 1810, upon the press and its conductors :

"The joint proprietor and exclusive manager of this paper became so in the beginning of the year 1803. On his commencing the business, he gave his conscientious and disinterested support to the existing administration that of Lord Sidmouth. The paper continued that support of the men in power, but without suffering them to repay its partiality by contributions calculated to produce any reduction whatsoever in the expense of managing the concern; because, by such admission, the editor was conscious he should have sacrificed the right of condemning any act which he might esteem detrimental to the public welfare. That administration, therefore, had, as he before stated, his disinterested support, because he believed it then, as he believes it now, to have been a virtuous and upright administra

tion; but not knowing how long it might continue so, he did not choose to surrender his right of free judg ment by accepting of obligations, though offered in the most unexceptionable manner.

It

"This Ministry was dissolved in the spring of 1804, when the places of Lord Sidmouth, Lord St. Vincent, &c., were supplied by Mr. Pitt, Lord Melville, &c. was not long before the Catamaran expedition was undertaken by Lord Melville; and again, at a subsequent period, his Lordship's practices in the Navy Department were brought to light by the 10th Report of the Commissioners of Naval Inquiry. The editor's father held at that time, and had held for eighteen years before, the situation of printer to the Customs. duct he found himself obliged to condemn; yet he The editor knew the disposition of the man whose connever refrained a moment, on that account, from speaking of the Catamaran expedition as it merited, or from bestowing on the practices disclosed in the 10th Report the terms of reprobation with which they were greeted by the general sense of the country. The result was as Without the allegation of a he had apprehended. single complaint, his family was deprived of the business, which had been so long discharged by it, of printing for the Customs-a business which was performed by contract, and which, he will venture to say, was executed with an economy and a precision that have not since been exceeded. The Government advertisements were at the same time withdrawn.

"On the death of Mr. Pitt, in January, 1806, an administration was formed, containing a portion of that preceding ministry which the editor had so disinterestedly supported on his undertaking the management of the paper. It was by one of these that he was directed to state the injustice that had been sustained in the loss of the Custom-house business. Various plans were proposed for the recovery of it; at last, in the following July, a copy of a memorial, to be presented to the Treasury, was submitted to the editor for his signature; but believing, for certain reasons, that this bare reparation of an injury was likely to be considered as a favour entitling those who granted it to a certain degree of influence over the politics of the journal, the editor refused to sign, or to have any concern in presenting the memorial. But he did more than even this; for, finding that a memorial was still likely to be presented, he wrote to those from whom the restoration of the employment was to spring, disavowing on his part (with whom the sole conducting of the paper remained) all share in an application which he conceived was meant to fetter the freedom of that paper. The printing business to the Customs has, as may perhaps be anticipated, never been restored.

"The editor will now speak of the oppression which he has sustained while pursuing this independent line of conduct. Since the war of 1805, between Austria and France, his arrangements to obtain foreign intelligence were of a magnitude to create no ordinary anxiety in his mind respecting their result; yet, from the period of the Sidmouth administration, Government from time to time employed every means in its power to counteract his designs, and he is indebted for his success only to professional exertion, and the private friendship of persons unconnected with politics. First, in relation to the war of 1805, the editor's packages from abroad were always stopped by Government at the outports, while those for the Ministerial journals were allowed to pass. The foreign captains were always asked by a Government officer at Gravesend, if they had papers for The Times. These, when acknowledged, were as regularly stopped. The Gravesend officer, on being spoken to on the subject, replied, that he would transmit to the editor his papers with the same punetuality as he did those belonging to the publishers of the journals just alluded to, but that he was not allowed. This led to a complaint at the Home Secretary's office, where the editor, after repeated delays, was informed by

the Under Secretary that the matter did not rest with | without being a visionary, may be said to have thought him, but that it was even then in discussion, whether nothing impossible that was useful and good, was early Government should throw the whole open, or reserve an resolved that there should be no impossibility in printexclusive channel for the favoured journals; yet was ing by steam. It took a long time in those days to the editor informed that he might receive his foreign strike off the 3,000 or 4,000 copies of The Times. papers as a favour from Government. This, of course, Mr. Walter could not brook the tedium of the manual implying the expectation of a corresponding favour process. As early as the year 1804 an ingenious comfrom him in the spirit and tone of his publication, was positor, named Thomas Martyn, had invented a selffirmly rejected; and he, in consequence, suffered for a acting machine for working the press, and had produced time (by the loss or delay of important packets) for this a model which satisfied Mr. Walter of the feasibility of resolution to maintain, at all hazards, his independence. the scheme. Being assisted by Mr. Walter with the "The same practices were resorted to at a subsequent necessary funds, he made considerable progress towards period. They produced the same complaints on the the completion of his work, in the course of which he part of the editor; and a redress was then offered to his was exposed to much personal danger from the hostility grievances, provided it could be known what party in of the pressmen, who vowed vengeance against the man politics he meant to support. This, too, was again whose innovations threatened destruction to their craft. declined, as pledging the independence of his paper; To such a length was their opposition carried, that it and, be it observed, respecting the whole period during was found necessary to introduce the various pieces of which the present conductor has now spoken, that it the machine into the premises with the utmost possible was from no determinate spirit of opposition to Govern- secrecy, while Martyn himself was obliged to shelter ment that he rejected the proposals made to him. On himself under various disguises in order to escape their the contrary, he has on several, and those very import- fury. Mr. Walter, however, was not yet permitted to ant occasions, afforded those men his best support, reap the fruits of his enterprise. On the very eve of whose offers, nevertheless, at any time, to purchase, or success he was doomed to bitter disappointment. He whose attempts to compel that support, he has deemed had exhausted his own funds in the attempt, and his himself obliged to reject and resist. Nay, he can with father, who had hitherto assisted him, became disgreat truth add, that advantages in the most desirable heartened, and refused him any further aid. The project forms have been offered him, and that he has refused was therefore for the time abandoned. them.'

"This extract will suffice to show the arduous position in which the manager of such a journal as The Times is placed, and the difficulties and temptations with which he has to contend-difficulties which nothing but the highest mental qualifications could enable him to overcome. Of Mr. Walter's later political career we need say but little; with its leading feature, his unyielding crusade against the New Poor Law, and the indefatigable perseverance with which he hurled article after article at the devoted heads of the Somerset House Commissioners, and those who had set them in authority, our readers are not now to be made acquainted; suffice it to say, while the ranks of its defenders were daily thinned, those of its opponents increased in like proportion, until in the chamber of sickness Mr. Walter had the satisfaction of learning that there was scarcely a parliamentary candidate who did not pledge himself to oppose the inhumanities of that law, against which he had so long waged war single-handed. Before we quit the subject, we cannot forbear calling the attention of our readers to a fact which in memory throws us back to the bright old days of chivalry, when a dead Douglas won the field-we allude to the unprecedented way in which the mere prestige of his father's name has gained for Mr. J. Walter the election of Nottingham." We offer no apology to our readers for presenting them with another extract from the same source, as the account of the manner in which Mr. Walter introduced the stupendous invention of the steam printing-press is in itself so interesting as to render such a proceeding superfluous. After telling how he obtained news of the capitulation of Flushing forty-eight hours before the government of the day, The Times proceeds :

"But one achievement alone is sufficient to place Mr. Walter high in that list which the world, as it grows older and wiser, will inore and more appreciate—

"Inventas aut qui vitam excoluere per artes,
Quique sui memores alios fecere merendo.'

He first brought the steam-engine to the assistance of
the public press. Familiar as the discovery is now,
there was a time when it seemed fraught with diffi-
culties as great as those which Fulton has overcome on
one element and Stevenson on another. To take off
5,000 impressions in an hour was once as ridiculous a
conception as to paddle a ship fifteen miles against wind
and tide, or to drag in that time a train of carriages
weighing 100 tons fifty miles. Mr. Walter, who,

"Mr. Walter, however, was not the man to be deterred from what he had once resolved to do. He gave his mind incessantly to the subject, and courted aid from all quarters, with his usual munificence. In the year 1814 he was induced by a clerical friend, in whose judgment he confided, to make a fresh experiment; and accordingly the machinery of the amiable and ingenious Koenig, assisted by his young friend Bauer, was introduced-not, indeed, at first into The Times office, but into the adjoining premises, such caution being thought necessary from the threatened violence of the pressmen. Here the work advanced, under the frequent inspection and advice of the friend alluded to. At one period these two able mechanics suspended their anxious toil, and left the premises in disgust. After the lapse, however, of about three days, the same gentleman discovered their retreat, induced them to return, showed them to their surprise their difficulty conquered, and the work still in progress. The night on which this curious machine was first brought into use in its new abode was one of great anxiety, and even alarm. The suspicious pressmen had threatened destruction to any one whose inventions might suspend their employment -destruction to him and his traps.' They were directed to wait for expected news from the continent. It was about six o'clock in the morning when Mr. Walter went into the press-room, and astonished its occupants by telling them that The Times was already printed by steam! That if they attempted violence there was a force ready to suppress it; but if that they were peaceable, their wages should be continued to every one of them till similar employment could be procured ;'a promise which was, no doubt, faithfully performed; and, having so said, he distributed several copies among them. Thus was this most hazardous enterprise undertaken and successfully carried through, and printing by steam on an almost gigantic scale given to the world. On that memorable day, the 29th of November, 1814, the following announcement appeared in The Times:

"Our journal of this day presents to the public the practical result of the greatest improvement connected with printing since the discovery of the art itself. The reader of this paragraph now holds in his hand one of the many thousand impressions of The Times newspaper, which were taken off last night by a mechanical apparatus. A system of machinery almost organic has been devised and arranged, which, while it relieves the human frame of its most laborious efforts in printing,

far exceeds all human powers in rapidity and despatch. That the magnitude of the invention may be justly appreciated by its effects, we shall inform the public, that after the letters are placed by the compositors and enclosed in what is called the form, little more remains for man to do than to attend upon and watch this unconscious agent in its operations. The machine is then merely supplied with paper-itself places the form, inks it, adjusts the paper to the form newly inked, stamps the sheet, and gives it forth to the hands of the attendant, at the same time withdrawing the form for a fresh coat of ink, which itself again distributes, to meet the ensuing sheet, now advancing for impression; and the whole of these complicated acts is performed with such a velocity and simultaneousness of movement that no less than 1,100 sheets are impressed in one hour.

[ocr errors]

That the completion of an invention of this kind, not the effect of chance, but the result of mechanical combinations methodically arranged in the mind of the artist, should be attended with many obstructions and much delay, may be readily admitted. Our share in the event has indeed only been the application of the discovery under an agreement with the patentees to our own particular business; yet few can conceive-even with this limited interest-the various disappointments and deep anxiety to which we have for a long course of time been subjected.'

"From that day to the end of his life Mr. Walter never ceased to improve on the original plan; and if we should soon be able to accelerate the press considerably but safely beyond its present speed, we shall be indebted to him and those whom he employed, for that result.

fascinated. They are like Pope's poetry;—all possible care seems to have been lavished on the form, but the soul has evaporated during the process."

A common-place observation enough, reader. Can you guess the sex of the speaker? According to all conventional rules,-and it is by those that the world walks, it ought to be a lady. The prime article in the creed of that great complex, hollow-hearted rationalist, Society, is a belief that women love delicately to detract from each other's merits. Not a man in the world, who has outlived the noble credulousness of his youth, (which, trust me, comes ever nearer to the truth than the shallow unbelief of after years,-just as the man who walks blindfold towards a tree is more likely to reach it than he who goes in an opposite direction, with his eyes wide open,) but thinks that his safest mode of recommending himself to any woman is to proclaim his indifference to the attractions of another. And what do the ladies all the while? They tolerate it, as an attempt to please, however mistaken, and they laugh inwardly to think how little the mystery of their hearts is comprehended by those who seek to win them. Exactly thus felt Mrs. Dalton, while listening to the observation which we have just recorded;-perhaps a secret consciousness that she herself possessed, in the highest degree, the species of fascination alluded to, rendered her peculiarly alive to its meaning. The speaker was Sir Mark Wyvil, a middle-aged baronet, of unimpeachable fashion, laboriously attractive, and resolutely youthful. The subject of his criticism was Edith Kinnaird.

Her third season had just drawn to a close, having consisted, like the two which preceded it, of a series of uninterrupted triumphs, a perpetual incense of admiration. She was now staying at Selcombe Park, the noble owners of which had assembled a large circle of guests, to beguile the tediousness of a magnificent autumn in a beautiful country. Lord and Lady Selcombe were amiable, respectable, and moderately pleasant people; they had great wealth, of which they duly expended a reputable fraction in charities, publie and private; the gentleman was a regular attendant in the House, a most affable president of agricultural meetings, a hearty Tory, a steady church-goer, (on Sundays,) and a profound hater of "the Oxford theology,"-in short, the popular ideal of a country gentleman could scarce have found anywhere a better embodiment. The lady was passée, but elegant-of toilette studious and elaborate; she patronised district societies and charity bazaars; was frequently heard to lament that she lived in such a whirl of engagements that she had no leisure for any serious pursuit; kept a

"As a step in the progress of civilization, the steam press can only be compared to the original discovery of printing itself. Had it not been for that timely invention, literature and information must have been restricted in their growth, and still more in their extent, by the labour, expense, and delay incident to the multiplication of copies; and that at a time when the human mind was preparing for its mightiest efforts. When one copy of even a small book was the work of many days, it is evident that the mass of mankind must be strangers to all novelty in literature. Forty years since the world had come again to exactly the same sort of stand-still. If the pressmen of the daily journals had continued their labours till one day's 'form' was replaced by the next, they could only have supplied the wants of a certain limited class. Steam gave wings to the press, enlarging its powers to the scale of the world. It has enabled the metropolitan press to issue an adequate supply for all England, even before the inhabitants of the metropolis itself have assembled at the breakfast table. By this potent aid we printed and circulated|first-rate governess for her daughters; worked a pair of fifty thousand copies of our paper, containing Sir Robert Peel's celebrated speech announcing the repeal of the Corn Laws, in the course of the following morning.

"We have little more to add. About a year since, Mr. Walter became aware of the first symptoms of the painful complaint which was destined to end the career of one whose life had proved so eminently useful to the country which had given him birth. After many months of suffering, he expired at his residence in Printinghouse-square, on Wednesday, the 28th of July."

THE MAIDEN AUNT.-No. IV.

CHAP. I.

"BEAUTIFUL!—yes, there can be no doubt that she is very beautiful; her face is absolutely faultless, and her figure magnificent. But it gives me no pleasure to look at her; her manifest self-consciousness destroys the charm at once. It is always so with perfect beauties; you may be forced to admire, but you are not

slippers annually for her husband; and was esteemed by all her acquaintance "a pattern wife and mother." The other members of the party at Selcombe Park shall speak for themselves as they are introduced to the reader. Yet we must bestow one word on Mrs. Dalton ere we proceed to record her answer to Sir Mark Wyvil's observation. She was, by some, considered a little too blue to be feminine-Heaven forbid that we should unravel all the meaning of that phrase, or develope all the consequences which it involves !--but even this worst sin in woman was tolerated, for the sake of the fascinations which accompanied it. She might perhaps have seen thirty summers, but her attraction depended not on feature or complexion, and was rather increased than impaired by time. Its elements consisted in the singular gracefulness of her figure, movements, and manners, the varying expression of her large dark eyes, the only really fine feature which she possessed, the ready, ringing laugh, musical as that of childhood, and that rarest, and perhaps most winning of all gifts-perfect melody of voice. For these she was forgiven if she presumed to discourse of literature at a dinner party, and to know a little more of art than most of the men who devoted themselves to her. Yet, even these would

scarcely have preserved her from the danger of being secretly voted a bore, had she not added to them the charm of a vanity sufficiently under discipline to avoid offensiveness, sufficiently evident to save her friends from the painful necessity of compelled respect. She was accessible to delicate flattery, capable of refined coquetry, pleased with attention, and always ready to glide from literature to playfulness from playfulness to sentiment, at least in the social sense of the term. She was therefore charming; and when we add that her voice was as bewitching in singing as in speaking, her talent for music so remarkable as to be recognised even in these days when education labours to bring all students up or down to the same level of undistinguishable but cultivated mediocrity, it will be at once allowed that she was irresistible. We have here sketched the external development of her characterheart, mind, and soul, (if she has them,) must be left for a more gradual discovery. Her husband was a member of Parliament, still engaged with his duties, though it was the second week of August. They had been married several years, but had no children.

With a slightly sarcastic expression in her beautiful eyes, she rejoined,-" A stronger proof of the omnipotence of Miss Kinnaird's claims could scarcely be found than that she has inspired Sir Mark Wyvil with a simile."

rather that Edith would learn to undervalue wisdom,
virtue, and discretion, than that she would approach
to any distrust of the perfection of her idol. Aunt
Peggy would have been alarmed, could she have wit-
nessed this period of her darling's mental history; but
her alarm would have been groundless. The exercise
of hearty love and admiration, if only the object be in
the main good and admirable, is, in itself, the most
ennobling process to which the spiritual part of man's
nature can be subjected. Let all who are around the
young, or around those whom any peculiarity of tem-
perament preserves in the youth of their hearts to a
later period of life, beware how they shut up this sweet
fountain or turn it into bitterness by ridicule, by
surprise, by criticism, by contradiction, or by cold
withdrawal of sympathy. Lose not the glory of a sun-
set by seeking to count the spots in the sun.
fess that they are there, if you will force us to the
confession; but we are not thinking about them, and
we do not mean to look at them ;-suffer us to take the
beauty and goodness of God's works into our inmost
hearts!

We con

"Miss Kinnaird," said one of the two gentlemen who were hovering around the chairs of that lady and Mrs. Dalton, "how does the diary proceed? and when are you going to fulfil your promise, and read us the events of a whole day?"

"When they are written," returned Edith, laughing. What a gigantic idea you must have of my powers, both bodily and mental, if you think I have strength enough left to make an entry in my diary, after dancing as I have done every night since I came here!"

The sting of the words was neutralized by the smile with which they were spoken, and Sir Mark, drawing“ his chair very decidedly forwards, seemed to be preparing himself in a business-like manner for a playful encounter of wits, when he was checked by the entrance of Miss Kinnaird herself.

She came from the garden, laden with flowers. A scarf, hastily substituted for a bonnet, was twisted round her head, the ends falling on her shoulders; her delicate colour flushed into crimson with the exertion of her late employment; her hands full of roses. Since we last saw her, her marvellous beauty has matured into a steadier brilliancy, her step has acquired something of stateliness, her manner something of composure, blended with a more even vivacity; the world admires her ten times as much as it used to do, for the last lingering tint of the glory of childhood has faded away, and childhood is a mystery and a wonder, and the world does not like mysteries, and is far too well educated to wonder at anything..

Two gentlemen advanced from opposite sides of the room-the one from a book, the other from a lounge to relieve her of her fragrant burden. Sir Mark Wyvil lifted his cold critical eyes to her face, and then turned to Mrs. Dalton with an expressive smirk (for such a man cannot smile, there is heart in a smile). In every gesture and movement of poor Edith,-in the manner in which she resigned her flowers to her two assiduous squires, in the tone with which she declared herself tired, in the careless grace with which she threw herself upon the nearest chair, in the little pause which intervened ere she removed her unwonted head-dress, he saw only the panoply of conquest, consciously assumed and used for a purpose. His discernment was lost on Mrs. Dalton, however, for she had joined her younger friend at the table, and was helping her to sort the flowers. Few things had more entirely gratified Edith than the manner in which Mrs. Dalton had singled her out from the circle at Selcombe Park, with the apparent resolution of making her a friend. To a girl of intelligence, enthusiasm, and warm affections, the caressing demeanour of the first woman of genius with whom she had ever come in contact, was absolutely irresistible, and she repaid it with a kind of uncalculating idolatry, which effectually secured its continuance. The influence which Mrs. Dalton thus acquired was of somewhat dubious advantage to the character of her admirer; for if the delicious sophistry of love should fail in making all she did and said appear "wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best," the danger was

"Is it a green book with silver clasps?" pursued the questioner.

"Yes," answered Edith, a little puzzled.

"Then I have seen it !" exclaimed he, triumphantly. "I passed under the window of your room after breakfast this morning: the table was standing in the window, and I saw a green book with silver clasps upon it. It was lying by a pocket-handkerchief with a lace border, and a white kid glove, trimmed with blue, was lying in a heap with it. Yes!" continued he, accumulating the evidence," there were two roses in a china vase, and a gold vinaigrette, and a sash, checked white and lilac. I said to Vaughan, at the moment, I am quite sure that is Miss Kinnaird's diary.' He did not think it was, but I felt quite sure."

The smile with which Edith looked up at Lord Vaughan, as this speech was concluded, proved that, on her side at least, all unpleasant recollections connected with the event of three years ago had passed away. Whether it also betokened a lurking consciousness that her power was undiminished, we will not determine.

"I am not by any means certain that you are right," observed she, gravely addressing the speaker, whose eyes opened to their widest extent, in pure astonishment.

"O! my dear Edith," cried Mrs. Dalton, "you do not know what a dangerous thing it is to contradict Mr. Delamaine. His accuracy is positively unbounded. 1 don't believe he ever was mistaken in a date, a name, or a number, in his life."

"Well," said Mr. Delamaine, visibly delighted, "I do believe I am_tolerably accurate. That is the habit of mind which I have always laboured to acquire. I could tell you some curious traits relative to that very subject,-I mean, the accuracy with which Mrs. Dalton is good enough to say that I remember even the most trivial occurrences. Remind me"-turning to Lord Vaughan-" to tell you a story about a pair of ear-rings, and the way in which I recollected something. It is not exactly apropos just now; but I dare say we shall resume the conversation."

Lord Vaughan promised to remind him, with the air of a well-bred victim, and Mr. Delamaine proceeded, "Thornton always used to remark, if memory be not accurate, it is worthless.' I remember perfectly

« IndietroContinua »