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THE SCRIBBLER.

For the Scribbler.

THE NEGRO’S SOLILOQUY.

...CONCLUDED...

DIALOGUE

BETWEEN EMPTY TUB, ESQUIRE, THE PRINTER’S DEVIL,

AND POST-BOY. Scene—The Office.

Montreal, Sept. 1822.

Myster Macculloh,

Ich hap kesain in ire clineh booch oonter dautum den 19te deezer monat, dass der her Myster Bait-en hat kehyrat mit dass hipsish matchen dee miss Kat-sen. Yaw, yaw, dass is war; auver wass denken zee fun der miss Heinrich, dass grocer mensh, we so gross iss, ass see lank iss. Wullen zee’s denken dass har nauchyains dass se kehyrat war, oont sine fon So rel kekommen, dar war der tifle ins house! Tass alta mensh hat wollen der Bait-en oont sine frow ouss ter fenster schmisen: doo! halloonk doo! hat see kesaacht, wo-room hass too mich nicht kehyrat? doo hast mich immer kesaacht dass too wouldst mich hyrawten, oont yats hatst kehyrat, ine anur—doo grocer pookle doo! doo swyne-a-hoont! Doo oont dine frow moossen glych vech-gain, oont coomen zee nich weeder hair. Daw-rawf hatten Bait-en oont sine frow glych moossen fort fawren soo fooss. Wissen zee wole dass der younge Kaul-cofe hat mich kesaacht, dass dee alte maacht, iss sair cronk, oont tass see hat for dry nacht nich keshloffen. Dass iss yats der dritter mawl dass see so keser-veert iss. Ciss auver nich recht. Wo-room hyrauts see nich mit den Kaul-cofe? Er iss aben so coot ass der Bait-en, dass grocer pookle mensh, oont iss feel yoochner, oont owch feel hipsher; er hat owch wass see so feel arlanght. Yaw, yaw, auver airst, maun mooss wissen when der Kaul-cofe see hyrawten woolt: dass iss ter tifle!

Wullen zee mich yats, her Macculloh, excoo-zeeren; ich mooss vech ins lant feer oder funf stoond; oont glowben zee mich, ire frynd

SOUR-CROUT OONT SWYNYFLEISCH.

Laprairie, a leet ees of de shursh.

Monsieur Le Scripleur,

My practiss do creas very mush; very mush inteet, I av got too malades on my hans, whose position, as we docteurs call it, is very tricat. De one, is of one womans who av got one ver goot quet mans, pour son mari, and she do scole, scole, all de tympes, you never see such scole any evry wair. You no who I means? Eh! non! Eh bien! you does no what we call one firebrans? eh! you can guess, eh! But I ver mush fear, je crains beaucoup, dat I shall not be capab for make his womans tongue be quet:—supposez she was dum, like one tortue, I could make his tongue go two tympes so faster as it will go now;—mais supposez dat I will suckcede for mak his tongue stop, I will get one big name, and be able for buy one hors for go visiter my sick peepes, en cas dey shall call for me. My oder malade is une autre womans; ver leet womans; she is all dry up, you never will have see, une femme si seche. She did av go to de springs, what you call Baul-town, and Scare-a-toad-a, I beleef is de name; you do no wair is it. You shall no for what she did av went dere. Je vais vous le communiquer. She ave been mariée, long, long tympes, and av not been able for to suckcede for get some any prodigy,—progeny—what you do call it, (ce que nous appellons de la familie.) But, supposez she did av go for take les bains, she might juss as well leave it alone, (car elle n’est point en meilleur point de grossesse qu’elle étoit auparavant.) I do tink, I beleef, it is because she is so ver cross, what we call boureuse, and her mari is one leet mans, polite inteet to every body, and for such leet mans, is one of great parts, and you would say so, supposez you did seen him, for such leet mans I never did see one carry so big a noce. But malgré tout, dey can not get wat dey wants. But I will try my best, and do all I am capab to do for her, and supposez I do suckcede well, je vous le ferai savoir.

Votre serviteur,      UN DOCTEUR.

Quebec, Palace-Street, 10th Sept.

L. L. Macculloh, Esq.

Sir—I know of no crime in the catalogue of human infirmities by which the mind can be more debased than by that of hypocrisy, and the wretch who, under its shield, can, by arts of perfidy, violate the most sacred of moral duties, must appear the fairest character, for public exposure, and popular indignation.

The subject of this page, of whom, by giving you the nearest approximation in our language to his name, The Rogue, I have laid before you the whole line of his ancestry, has of late become prominent in life by having added to his name, M. P. without which, his profession, that of a petty lawyer, would never have raised him above insignificance.

Although a young husband to a second, but dying, wife, he has, to assuage his grief, distinguished himself for gallantry, and, not content with a partnership concern, carried on snugly under the same roof, he has lately been too notorious in his persevering designs of debauching the wife of another of his friends, also an M. P. The thorns of jealousy, however having too sorely pricked these two female competitors, (for the husbands, I believe, were true Parisians,) a rupture and separation took place; since which his visits and amours are confined to one alone; and, from the circumstances of the case, it is generally stated at the tea-tables in this city, that he has, as a penance, been enjoined to abstain from all Languedoc-wine, and to confine himself in diet to that most meagre fish, the s-turgeon.

Mr. The Rogue, this second perfidious false Lothario, is a great advocate of those ethics, which maintain that “the friend of the husband is of others the most proper to debauch the wife, under the truly moral idea, that, from opportunity and confidence, the attempt is less likely to be frustrated.” But, what aggravates the whole, is that he is implacable against the most venial faults of others; and does he not therefore deserve sir, to become, as he now has, the general topic of conversation and detestation amongst the respectable part of society in this city?

Your’s, &c.      AN OLD WOMAN.

Quebec, near the Chateau, 20th Sept.

Mr. L. L. Macculloh,

Among the many numbers of your interesting Scribbler, I am surprised to find that the talent of our sex has lain so very dormant, particularly when I reflect that your sex is ever ready to accuse ours of volubility of tongue. From the many interesting passages, with which the pages of your work are replete, intent on reproving folly, or exposing ignorance, and endeavouring to give merit its own due, I am influenced by a desire peculiar to our sex to give you a statement of the conduct of many of our would-be ladies, who have no more pretension to that name, either from birth, education, or manners, than a coal-heaver has to present himself at the levee of His most excellent Majesty, King George the fourth. For the present I will beg your permission, as the courier or herald of other pieces from my humble goose-quill, to call your notice to a young lady in this place, aged about thirty-six, of a robust form; and very much addicted to shewing her ivory, who has also a custom of rubbing her hands in such a manner, as to make a stranger suppose, from her grimaces, that she was in a delirious state. This damosell, Mr. Scribbler, keeps a sort of a shop, and terms herself a milliner, dress, and mantua-maker, (so far I will allow her the praise of humility,) and her name has a kind of inverted resemblance to that of our chief justice. From the extreme pomposity and pride with which she receives her customers, one would suppose that they were under an obligation to her, instead of she to them. As a friend to my own sex, I give her this friendly public hint, which I have often before vainly done in private; and do assure her that she will find it for her own interest not to allow ladies to await her pleasure, (as she too often does,) but to be more ready to wait on them immediately and civilly on their being announced. Your timely admonition, Mr. Scribbler, will possibly avail, and oblige her, as well as your new correspondent.

AMANDA.

Having now paid off some of the arrears due to my correspondents, I turn to my own affairs.

The remonstrance to the deputy-post-master-general mentioned in No. 65, having produced no effect, but that of a more spiteful proscription, by menaces of instant dismissal held out to all persons connected with the post-offices in Quebec and Montreal, should they render me the least assistance in any thing whatever, or even correspond with me; I now publish the letter that was written on the occasion to

Burlington, Vermont, 24th Sept. 1822.

Sir,—It was with no little surprise I learnt that you have thought proper, in a letter to the post-master at Montreal, to direct that the Scribbler shall not any longer be allowed to be sent through the post-office, stigmatising it as a diabolical work, and ordering that it shall not even be allowed to be delivered through the boxes of those persons in Montreal, who pay for that convenience at the post-office.

You well know that you are under a written engagement to me, by your own letter, to transmit the Scribbler, postage-free, to every part of British North America, where there is a post-office, for a stipulated sum per annum for each subscriber to whom it is sent, and that I have paid you that stipulated composition in lieu of postage, up to the 1st of July last, when the quarter expired. You know that, upon the faith of that bargain, I have engaged to deliver it every where postage-free to my subscribers. Your stoppage therefore of the Scribbler from going through the post-offices, is a direct violation of your agreement, a piece of dishonesty you ought to be ashamed of, a cheat put upon me and the public. You may be hurt by the honest bluntness of my language, but I have learnt in the school of experience and adversity, to despise that courtly nicety of expression which becomes not the man who has to fight at arm’s length against those who are mighty in wickedness and powerful in wealth. I care not now for persons or places, and it behoves me now to call a rogue, a rogue, whether I find him clothed in purple and fine linen, or grovelling in the dust.

But you have done worse than dishonestly shrunk from your written word; you have endeavoured to curb the freedom of the press, to destroy the liberty of individual opinion, and of individual discussion, to dictate to British subjects what they shall read and what they shall not read, to pronounce upon the merits and demerits of a literary work which I doubt whether you have the brains to understand, or the judgment to appreciate. You have taken upon yourself what the King in council dare not do—you have attempted to set yourself up as a licenser of the press, and to declare, in fact, that without your imprimatur, His Majesty’s Canadian subjects shall not read, either a domestic, or a foreign, essay. The quarrel is not merely mine, but also that of every one of my numerous subscribers, to whom you thus have the arrogance to attempt to prescribe what is right or what is wrong for them to peruse. It is moreover the quarrel of every editor of every paper, for, if you are to be permitted, at your own arbitrary will, without notice given, or reason assigned, to endeavour to put an instant stop to the circulation of my paper, you have the same right, and the same power, with respect to others; and your word, your agreement, your official engagement, is worth less than a pact amongst banditti, for there is even, says the old proverb, “honour amongst thieves.”

But who set you, the deputy-post-master-general of British North America, the mere servant of the post-master-general at home, unconnected with, and uncontrouled by, the provincial government, who set you up as an Inquisitor into what men ought or ought not to read in these provinces? Who set you up as a Legislator to make laws for what passes through the press? Who set you up as a Star-chamber Licenser to stamp with your permit, or stigmatise with your censure, the writings of any man? Who made you an Attorney-general, or an Officer of the crown, to fyle, as it were, an information against my work? Who made you an Examiner and Dictator, without appeal, not only as to what has issued, but what is still to issue, from the press, a Detector of unborn libels and embryo lampoons? Who made you, or what capacitates you, for being a proper Judge, a Critic, and Reviewer, of the merits or demerits any species of literature? Not the post-master-general in London; not the government at home. You can find nothing of all this in your instructions. Not your own talents, or abilities. Not either your own free will, or conception of the duties of your situation. No; you are not a volunteer, I believe, in the cause, but you are pressed into the service by your fears of offending those great persons who have probably required this at your hands, and to whom you ought to have replied, had you possessed a small portion of that sturdy independence which I flatter myself I do; “Mind your own business and I will mind mine; you have nothing to do with the post-office, no more than I have with the acts of the council, or the command of the military.”

Although this measure of spite and intolerance, in which you have allowed yourself to be made a tool of, occasions some difficulty, inconvenience, and expense to me, and the public, yet that you must be aware, can only be temporary, and neither suppress the work, nor impede its circulation. You and your employers, therefore, will act more wisely and prudently in abandoning this step altogether, and allowing matters to take their old course.

I will give you till three weeks after you receive this, (which will be on Monday the 30th instant, and consequently the three weeks will expire on the 21st October,) to repent and reform. If before that time you withdraw your interdict, I will insert an advertisement in the Scribbler, that the misunderstanding with the post-office has ceased, but should I not, on or before that day, learn that you have countermanded your dishonourable, illegal, and arbitrary orders, I will publish this letter in the Scribbler, such further remarks as I may think proper. Take your choice, it is nearly a matter of indifference to me.

I now make my bow to Mr. Sutherland, and I find I can do very well without him, henceforward,

DOMESTIC INTELLIGENCER, No. XIV.

In the latter end of last month our city was livened by the presence of vice-royalty. Gaiety and elasticity appeared in every face and in every movement, and many a convert was made, amongst the unthinking and volatile, to the opinion of those who are advocates for the union of the two provinces, from the expectation that such would be uninterruptedly the case, should Mount-Royal become the seat of government. Among the festivities of the season stood prominent

Lady Viceroy’s Grand Drawing-room.

On the evening appropriated for this celebrated display of affability, condescension and magnificence on one side, and assiduity, fashion, and finery on the other, the nobility and gentry began to arrive about half past nine o’clock, in carriages of various kinds, coaches, chariots, landaulettes, barouches, gigs, caleches, and waggons. Some too, in order to afford the rabble-rout an opportunity of admiring their brilliant dress and fashionable demeanour, most considerately repaired on foot to the scene of action; and, although the shades of evening almost defeated the object of exhibition, enough of light, and rather an over-abundance of wind, served to display the elegance of the ladies’ silk-stockings, and the exuberant grace of their nodding and fluttering plumes. Mrs. Little Benjamin and her party were amongst the most conspicuous, in thus braving, in full dress, the gaze of the croud and the whistling of the breeze.

At a quarter past ten o’clock the room was crouded with all the beauty and elegance that Mount-Royal could boast of. The ladies’ dresses were, in general, most superb, and the prevailing fashion of high feathers added considerably to the grand effect of the scene.^[1] Spangles and artificial flowers were likewise to be seen in great profusion; and a display of jewels was observable that few would have supposed this place adequate to produce.

Among the fashionables present we particularly noticed, the Hon. Tory Loverule, his lady, and family; the Count and Countess of Oldjoseph; Baron Grunt; Lord Goddamnhim; his brother, the hon. Sandy Tan; Mr. Justice Gobble and his lady; the hon. Miss M’Gilliwiffit; Mr. Justin Dearfool, and his niece; the Marquis d’Argentcourt; Mr. and Miss Foresight; Mr. and Mrs. Jarrett; Capt. and Mrs. Hornblow; the hon. Mrs. Slipslop MacRope; Mr. and Mrs. Hogsflesh; Dr. and Mrs. Drugwell; Messrs. Bigman, Vigourous, Roll-on, MacHairy, Swell, Grunt, etc. etc. All the officers of the garrison were, of course also of the party, and when intermixed with the ladies, gave occasion to the following impromptu:

The ladies were all successively introduced to Lady Viceroy, and performed their various curtsies, bobs, and bends, very adroitly, considering how few opportunities they had had of being drilled. Among the gentlemen, the elegant, free and easy, and courtly costume of trowsers, was very prevalent; it was deeply to be regretted that some of them could not obtain their new suits from their taylors, in time for this important occasion; but that was owing, it is said, to the circumstance of the taylors themselves having to be at the Drawing-room, and being of course engaged in adonising themselves in preference to their customers.

Coffee and other refreshments were handed round, and about eleven o’clock the party broke up; and the company retired home highly edified, entertained, and ennuyée.

Our contemporaries having given a full account of

Mr. Phillips’s Concert,

which took place, under the auspices of lord and lady Viceroy, on the following evening, we shall not enlarge upon the performances, of which we will only say, in the words of a Corinthian from St. James’ Street, who happened to be present, “they did very well for the Mount-Royalers.”

To describe the company would be very little else than a repetition of the account of the drawing-room party; with the exception, however, of the verdant sons of Mars, who were not so numerously intermixed among the “blooming and sparkling belles of society,” so feelingly described by one of our brother-editors. There was rather a monopoly of an advantageous situation at the head of the piano-forte, whilst Mr. Phillips and Miss Davis were singing, where a trio composed of three noblemen, viz: Lord Goddamnhim, Count Oldjoseph, and Baron Grunt, maintained their ground the greatest part of the evening. It was remarked that his lordship looked particularly hungry, and almost devoured with his eyes, the “Psyche with whom every one must fall in love at first sight.” These noblemen, it is true, came in late, probably to show their high breeding, along with the Loverule-family, and when the best seats were occupied. When they came in and perceived they were thus placed in the rear of the rest of the company, a station so little befitting persons of their high pretensions, Count Oldjoseph stalked forward and requested room might be made in the front-seats for the ladies of his party, and although two perfect courtiers (Mr. Reaper, and his shadow, Mr. Sparrowhawk,) stood up to receive the Count, (by which manœuvre, by the bye, they lost their places; not an uncommon event with courtiers!) he was referred, to a number of the company, ladies and gentlemen, who were standing, for want of seats, and who had previous claims to accommodation; this disregard to his dignity mightily mortified the Count, whose eyes flashed fire, and he—very wisely—stalked back agen.

To Correspondents. My own edition of Plato, will appear as soon as possible. Hapless Love is too prosaic, and common place. Old Cuffee shall have a place and welcome. Le Diable Boiteux requires consideration. The substance of A Disgusted Quilldriver’s second letter will appear when next I take up that subject. A Subscriber will see that the Old Woman has not been forgotten. Gregory Gizzard’s invective against Lord Goddamnhim, is, mirabile dicta even too coarse and too bad for the subject.

L. L. M.

TRANSCRIBER NOTES

Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been employed.

Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors occur.

[The end of The Scribbler 1822-10-24 Volume 2, Issue 69 edited by Samuel Hull Wilcocke]