Kitabı oku: «The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 10, No. 273, September 15, 1827», sayfa 4

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

PREPARATIONS FOR A JOURNEY

I am fond of travelling: yet I never undertake a journey without experiencing a vague feeling of melancholy. There is to me something strangely oppressive in the preliminaries of departure. The packing of a small valise; the settlement of accounts—justly pronounced by Rabelais a blue-devilish process; the regulation of books and papers;—in short, the whole routine of valedictory arrangements, are to me as a nightmare on the waking spirit. They induce a mood of last wills and testaments—a sense of dislocation, which, next to a vacuum, Nature abhors—and create a species of moral decomposition, not unlike that effected on matter by chemical agency. It is not that I have to lament the disruption of social connexions or domestic ties. This, I am aware, is a trial sometimes borne with exemplary fortitude; and I was lately edified by the magnanimous unconcern with which a married friend of mine sang the last verse of "Home! sweet home!" as the chaise which was to convey him from the burthen of his song drove up to the door. It does not become a bachelor to speculate on the mysteries of matrimonial philosophy; but the feeling of pain with which I enter on the task of migration has no affinity with individual sympathies, or even with domiciliary attachments. My landlady is, without exception, the ugliest woman in London; and the locality of Elbow-lane cannot be supposed absolutely to spellbind the affection of one occupying, as I do, solitary chambers on the third floor.

The case, it may be supposed, is much worse when it is my lot to take leave, after passing a few weeks at the house of a friend in the country;—a house, for instance, such as is to be met with only in England:—with about twenty acres of lawn, but no park; with a shrubbery, but no made-grounds; with well-furnished rooms, but no conservatory; and with a garden, in which dandy tulips and high-bred anemones do not disdain the fellowship of honest artichokes and laughing cauliflowers—no bad illustration of the republican union of comfort with elegance which reigns through the whole establishment. The master of the mansion, perhaps an old and valued schoolfellow:—his wife, a well-bred, accomplished, and still beautiful woman—cordial, without vulgarity—refined, without pretension—and informed, without a shade of blue! Their children!… But my reader will complete the picture, and imagine, better than I can describe, how one of my temperament must suffer at quitting such a scene. At six o'clock on the dreaded morning, the friendly old butler knocks at my room-door, to warn me that the mail will pass in half an hour at the end of the green lane. On descending to the parlour, I find that my old friend has, in spite of our over-night agreement and a slight touch of gout, come down to see me off. His amiable lady is pouring out for me a cup of tea—assuring me that she would be quite unhappy at allowing me to depart without that indispensable prelude to a journey. A gig waits at the door: my affectionate host will not permit me to walk even half a mile. The minutes pass unheeded; till, with a face of busy but cordial concern, the old butler reminds me that the mail is at hand. I bid a hasty and agitated farewell, and turn with loathing to the forced companionship of a public vehicle.

My anti-leave-taking foible is certainly not so much affected when I quit the residence of an hotel—that public home—that wearisome resting-place—that epitome of the world—that compound of gregarious incompatibilities—that bazaar of character—that proper resort of semi-social egotism and unamalgable individualities—that troublous haven, where the vessel may ride and tack, half-sheltered, but finds no anchorage. Yet even the Lilliputian ligatures of such a sojourn imperceptibly twine round my lethargic habits, and bind me, Gulliver-like, a passive fixture. Once, in particular, I remember to have stuck at the Hôtel des Bons Enfants, in Paris—a place with nothing to recommend it to one of ordinary locomotive energies. But there I stuck. Business of importance called me to Bordeaux. I lingered for two months. At length, by one of those nervous efforts peculiar to weak resolutions, I made my arrangements, secured my emancipation, and found myself on the way to the starting-place of the Diligence. I well remember the day: 'twas a rainy afternoon in spring. The aspect of the gayest city in the world was dreary and comfortless. The rain dripped perpendicularly from the eves of the houses, exemplifying the axiom, that lines are composed of a succession of points. At the corners of the streets it shot a curved torrent from the projecting spouts, flooding the channels, and drenching, with a sudden drum-like sound, the passing umbrellas, whose varied tints of pink, blue, and orange, like the draggled finery of feathers and flounces beneath them, only made the scene more glaringly desolate. Then came the rush and splatter of cabriolets, scattering terror and defilement. The well-mounted English dandy shows his sense by hoisting his parapluie; the French dragoon curls his mustachio at such effeminacy, and braves the liquid bullets in the genuine spirit of Marengo; the old French count picks his elastic steps with the placid and dignified philosophy of the ancien régime; while the Parisian dames, of all ranks, ages, and degrees, trip along, with one leg undraped, exactly in proportion to the shapeliness of its configuration.

The huge clock of the Messagéries Royales told three as I entered the gateway. The wide court had an air of humid dreariness. On one side stood a dozen of those moving caravansaras, the national vehicles, with their leathern caps—like those of Danish sailors in a north-wester—hanging half off, soaked with wet. Opposite was the range of offices, busy with all the peculiar importance of French bureaucracie. Their clerks, decorated with ribbons and crosses, wield their pens with all the conscious dignity of secretaries of state; and "book" a bale or a parcel as though they were signing a treaty, or granting an amnesty. The meanest employé seems to think himself invested with certain occult powers. His civility savours of government patronage; and his frown is inquisitorial. To his fellows, his address is abrupt and diplomatic. He seems to speak in cipher, and to gesticulate by some rule of freemasonry. But to the uninitiated he is explanatory to a scruple, as though mischief might ensue from his being misapprehended. He makes sure of your understanding by an emphasis, which reminds one of the loudness of tone used towards a person supposed to be hard of hearing—a proceeding not very flattering where there happens to be neither dulness nor deafness in the case. In a word, the measured pedantry of his whole deportment betrays the happy conviction in which he rejoices of being conversant with matters little dreamt of in your philosophy. Among the bystanders, too, there are some who might, probably with more reason, boast their proficiency in mysterious lore—fellows of smooth aspect and polite demeanour, whom at first you imagine to have become casual spectators from mere lack of better pastime, but whose furtive glances and vagrant attention betray the familiars of the police—that complex and mighty engine of modern structure, which, far more surely than the "ear of Dionysius," conveys to the tympanum of power each echoed sigh and reverberated whisper. It is a chilling thing to feel one's budding confidence in a new acquaintance nipped by such frosty suspicions; yet—Heaven forgive me!—the bare idea has, before now, caused me to drop, unscented, the pinch of carote which has been courteously tendered by some coffee-house companion. In the group before me, I fancied that I could distinguish some of this ungentle brotherhood; and my averted eye rested with comparative complacency even on a couple of gens d'armes, who were marching up and down before the door, and whose long swords and voluminous cocked hats never appeared to me less offensive.

In the mean time, knots of travellers were congregating round the different vehicles about to depart. In the centre of each little band stood the main point of attraction—Monsieur le Conducteur—that important personage, whose prototype we look for in vain among the dignitaries of Lad-lane, or the Bull-and-Mouth, and whose very name can only be translated by borrowing one of Mr. M'Adam's titles—"the Colossus of Roads." With fur cap, official garb, and the excursive eye of a martinet, he inspects every detail of preparation—sees each passenger stowed seriatim in his special place—then takes his position in front—gives the word to his jack-booted vice, whose responsive whip cracks assent—and away rolls the ponderous machine, with all the rumbling majesty of a three-decker from off the stocks.—Monthly Magazine.