The Silver Domino; Or, Side Whispers, Social and Literary

by Marie Corelli

XIX. BYRON LOQUITUR.

If I did not believe, or pretend to believe, in Spiritualism, Theosophism, Buddhism, or some other fashionable "ism" which is totally opposed to Christianity, I should not be "in the swim" of things. And of course I would rather perish than not be in the swim of things. I cannot, if I wish to "go" with my time, admit to any belief in God; like Zola's Jean Bearnat, I say, "Rien, rien, rien! Quand on souffle sur le soleil ça sera fini," or, with the reckless Corelli, I propound to myself the startling question, "Suppose God were dead? We see that the works of men live ages after their death—why not the works of God?" The exclamation of "Rien, rien!" is la mode, and those who are loudest in its utterance generally take to a belief in bogies—Blavatsky bogies, Annie Besant bogies, Sinnett bogies, Florence Marryat bogies, many of which disembodied spirits, by the by, talk bad grammar and lose control over their H's. My jovial acquaintance, Captain Andrew Haggard (brother of Rider), and I, have rejoiced in the society of bogies very frequently. We have called "spirits from the vasty deep," and sometimes, if all the "influences" have been in working order, they have come. We know all about them. Haggard, perhaps, knows more than I do, for I believe he confesses to being enamoured of a rather pretty bogie—feminine, of course. She has no substance, so the little flirtation is quite harmless. I regret to say the "spirits" do not flirt with me. They don't seem to like me, especially since the Tomkins episode. The Tomkins episode occurred in this wise. At a certain séance in which I took a somewhat too obtrusive part a "bogie" appeared who announced himself as Tomkins. Some one asked for his baptismal name, and he said "George." A devil of mischief prompted me to hazard the remark that I once knew a John Tomkins, but he was dead.

"That's me!" said the bogie, hurriedly. "I'm John."

"How did you come to be George?" I demanded.

"My second name was George," replied the prompt bogie.

"That's odd!" I said. "I never knew it."

"You can't expect to know everything," remarked the bogie, sententiously.

"No, I can't," I agreed. "And, what is more, I never knew a Tomkins at all, John or George, living or dead! You are a fraud, my friend!"

Confusion ensued, and I was promptly expelled as an "unbeliever" who disturbed the "influences." And since that affair the "spirits" are shy of me.

Whether the memory of the Tompkins episode haunted me, or whether it was the effect of an excellent dinner enjoyed with "Labby" just previously, I do not know, but certain it is that on one never-to-be-forgotten evening I saw a ghost—a bonâ-fide ghost, who entered my sleeping apartment without permission, and addressed me without the assistance of a "medium." He was a ghost of average height and build, and I observed that he kept one foot very carefully concealed beneath his long, cloudy draperies, which were disposed about him in the fashion of the classic Greek. Upon his head, which was covered with clustering curls fit to adorn the brows of Apollo, he wore a wreath of laurels whose leaves were traced in light, and these cast a brilliant circle of supernatural radiance around him. In one hand he grasped a scroll, and as he turned his face upon me he beckoned with this scroll, slowly and majestically, after the style of Hamlet's father on the battlements of Elsinore. I trembled, but had no power to move. Again he beckoned, and his eyes flashed fire.

"My lord——!" I stammered, shrinking beneath his indignant gaze, and fervently hoping that I was not the object of his evident wrath.

"Lord me no lords!" said a deep voice that seemed to quiver with disdain. "Speak, puny mortal! Knowest thou me?"

Know him! I should think I did. There was no mistaking him. He was Byron all over—Byron, more thoroughly Byronic of aspect than any portrait has ever made him. Involuntarily I thought of the present Lord Wentworth and his occasionally flabby allusions to his "Grandfather," and smiled at the comparison between ancestor and descendant. My ghostly visitant had a sense of humour, and, reading my thoughts, smiled too.

"I see thou hast wit," he was good enough to observe in more pacific accents. "Hear me, therefore, and mark my every word! There are such follies in this age—such literary rascals, such damned rogues of rhymesters—oh, don't be startled! every one swears in Hades—that I have writ some lines and remodelled others, to suit the exigencies of the modern school of Shams. Never did Art stand at a premium in England, but God knows it should not fall to zero as it is rapidly doing. Listen! and move not while I speak; my lines shall burn themselves upon thy brain till thou inscribe and print them for the world to read; then, and then only, having done my bidding, shalt thou again be free!"

I bowed my head submissively and begged the noble Ghost to proceed, whereupon he unfolded his scroll, and read, with infinite gusto, the following:—

"English Scribes and Small Reviewers.

"Still must I hear? Shall Swinburne mouth and scream

His wordy couplets in a drunken dream,

And I not sing, lest haply small reviews

Should dub me 'dead' and forthwith damn my muse?

No! My proud spirit shall not suffer wrong;

'Booms' are my theme—let satire be my song.

"Through Nature's new-found gift, Magnetic skill,

My soul obeys an influential Will,

And I from Hades rise to life again

To wield once more mine own especial pen,

Which none have rivalled in these sickly days

Of tawdry epics and translated plays,

When knavish cliques o'er honest Art prevail,

And weigh out judgment by the 'Savile' scale.

The petty vices of the time demand

Another scourging from my fearless hand;

Still are there flocks of geese for me to chase,

Still false pretenders to the 'poet's' place.

Who dare to pile detraction on my name,

Let such beware, for scribblers are my game!

Speed Pegasus! Ye modern pensters small,

Watts, Brydges, Morris, Arnold, have at you all!

Remember well how once upon a time

I poured along the town a flood of rhyme

So strong and scathing that the little fry

Of rhymesters like yourselves were doomed to die!

Moved by that triumph past, I still pursue

The self-same road, despite the New Review

And Quarterly, and other journals silly,

That take dull articles by Mr. Lilly.

"Most men serve out their time to every trade

Save book-reviewers—these are ready-made.

Crib jokes from Yankee journals, got by rote,

With just enough of memory to misquote;

Ignore all beauty; find or forge a fault;

Revive old puns and call them 'attic salt';

Then to the 'Speaker' or to Henley go

(The 'pay' for book-reviews is always low);

Fear not to lie—'twill seem a ready hit;

Shrink not from blasphemy—'twill pass for wit;

Care not for feeling; launch a scurrilous jest,

And be a critic with the very best!

"Will any own such judgment? No, as soon

Trust wavering shadows 'neath th' inconstant moon,

Hope that a 'promised' critique will be done

By bland O'Connor of the Sunday Sun,

Believe that Hodge's claims will ne'er increase,

Believe in Gladstone's schemes for Ireland's peace,

Or any other thing that's false, before

You trust reviewers, who themselves are sore.

Never let thought or fancy be misled

By Lang's cold heart or Alfred Austin's head;

While such are censors, 'twould be sin to spare;

While such are critics, why should I forbear?

And yet so near these modern writers run

'Tis doubtful whom to seek and whom to shun,

Nor know we when to spare or where to strike,

The bards and critics are so much alike!

"To bygone times my lingering thoughts are cast;

Good taste and reason with those times are past!

Look round and turn each trifling printed page;

Survey the precious works that please the age;

This truth at least let satire's self allow,

No dearth of pens can be complained of now.

The loaded press beneath its labour groans,

And printers' devils shake their weary bones,

While Arnold's epics cram the creaking shelves,

And Kipling's ballads shine in hot-pressed twelves

'New' schools of twaddle in their turn arise,

Where jingling rhymsters grapple for the prize,

And for a time these psuedo-bards prevail;

Each public 'library' assists their sale,

And, hurling lawful genius from its throne,

Takes up some puny idol of its own,

And judges Poesy as just a cross

'Twixt Ashby Sterry, Lang, and Edmund Gosse.

"Behold! in various throngs the scribbling crew,

For notice eager, pass in long review;

Each spurs his jaded Pegasus apace:

Rhyme and romance maintain an equal race.

The Grand Old Paradox of Hawarden

Seizes in haste his too prolific pen,

And, heedless how the reading world is bored,

Thrusts to the front a Mrs. Humphry Ward,

With 'Robert Elsmere' frightened out of faith,

And 'David Grieve' a-prosing us to death;

Next trumpets Caine's 'integrity of aim,'

And gives to 'Mademoiselle Ixe' a name.

O Gladstone, Gladstone! 'Boom' it not so strong

Boomers may 'boom' too often and too long!

If thou wilt write on impulse, prithee spare!

More vapid authors were too much to bear;

But if, in spite of all thy friends can say,

Thou still wilt boomwards boom thy frantic way,

And in long articles to stupid papers

Thou still wilt cut thy literary capers,

Unhappy Art thy fresh intent may rue;

God save us, Gladstone, from thy next 'review'!

"Lo, the mild teacher of the Buddhist school,

The follower of the tamest blank-verse rule,

The simple Arnold, with his 'Asia's Light,'

Who wins attention by translation-right;

And both by precept and example shows

That prose is verse, and verse is merely prose,

Convinced himself, by demonstration plain,

There never will be such a book again,

And never such a 'marvellous proper' man

To charm the hearts of ladies in Japan!

"Who out at Putney on the common strays,

Unsocial in his converse and his ways?

'Tis Swinburne, the Catullus of his day,

As sweet but as immoral in his lay.

Grieved to condemn, the Muse must still be just,

Nor spare melodious advocates of lust.

Pure is the flame which o'er her altar burns;

From grosser incense with disgust she turns.

Mend, Swinburne, mend thy morals and thy taste;

Be warm, but pure; be amorous, but chaste;

Thy borrowed fancies to Villon restore,

And use old Scripture similes no more!

"Behold! ye cliques; one moment spare the text!

Hall Caine's last work, and worst—until his next!

Whether he drafts his 'sagas' into plays,

Or damns his brother authors with faint praise,

His elephantine style is still the same,

Forever turgid, and forever tame.

Boom for the 'Scapegoat'! it has been re-writ

To suit the measure of the critics' wit;

'Bondsman' and 'Deemster' tweak each other's toes,

And as a spurious 'genius' Caine doth pose,

Taking himself and all his books on trust,

And getting photographed with Shakespeare's bust!

"Another book of verses? Who again

Inflicts rhymed doggerel on the sons of men?

'Tis Orient Kipling, the reviewers' boast,

The darling of the Anglo-Indian coast,

Who, on cheap praise and cheaper conquest bent,

Imports slang 'notions' from the soldier's tent,

And crams his lines with 'Tommy Atkins' here

And 'Tommy Atkins' diction everywhere—

'Barrack-Room Ballads!' come, who'll buy! who'll buy!

The precious bargain's low! 'i faith, not I!

For Rudyard's verse, despite his 'boom,' is flat,

Though critics bloat him with 'log-rollers'' fat—

O Rudyard Kipling! Phoebus! What a name

To fill the speaking-trump of future fame!

O Rudyard Kipling, for a moment think

What 'chancey' profits spring from pen and ink!

Thy name already tires the public ear,

One shilling for thy 'Tales' seems monstrous dear;

For though they make a decent show of print

The book as book of worth has 'nothing in 't'.

O Rudyard Kipling! cease to scribble rhymes,

And stick to Arthur Walter of the Times;

As 'Special Correspondent' or 'Our Own,'

But for God's sake leave Poesy alone;

Scratch not the surface of the mystic East

With flippant pen dipped in reporter's yeast,

For India's riddle is a riddle still

In spite of any 'Plain Tale from a Hill,'

The silent griefs of conquered tribes and nations

Are not explained in military flirtations,

Or 'ditties departmental,' trite of style,

(Any 'jongleur' could scrawl them by the mile;)

As 'Light that Failed,' thy race is nearly run,

Thy goose is cooked; thy stuffing's over-done!

"Lo, great 'Thucydides' of Samoa's isle

Relieves his inspiration and his bile,

And o'er the rolling ocean wide and deep

Sends the chef-d'œuvres that make his readers sleep.

The 'Wrecker' comes and ponderously heaves

O'er weary brains its soothing weight of leaves,

And those who never knew that joy before

Yield to the peaceful pleasure of the snore,

And drowse in chairs at clubs in open day,

Just as they drowsed o'er 'classic' 'Ballantrae.'

Hail to 'Thucydides'! and hail the pen

That writes him up above all other men;

For sleep's a blessing, and whate'er may hap

His works ensure a harmless, perfect nap.

"Lo, with what pomp the daily prints proclaim

The rival candidates for Attic fame;

In grim array though Haggard's Zulus rise,

Yet 'Q' and dull Grant Allen share the prize;

Then come the little train of 'Pseudonyms'—

A set of female faddists full of whims—

Who pour their vapid follies o'er the town,

Excusing Vice and sneering Virtue down;

Next see good Bentley's list of writers small:

I wonder where the deuce he finds them all?

Some 'novel new' he issues every week,

A fiction of the kind that housemaids seek—

Mild tales of goose-love, which he thinks may please,

Sure only geese would purchase books like these!

Broughton's half-vulgar, half-lascivious stories,

And Mrs. Henry Wood's posthumous glories;

Here Madam Trollope whirls her small 'Wild Wheel,'

There Mistress Henniker unwinds her reel,

And silly 'fictionists' of no repute

Spring up like weeds to wither at the root.

Excellent Bentley! stay thy lavish hand,

Continuous trash were more than we could stand;

Give us good authors who deserve their name,

And save thy once distinguished firm from shame;

Give prominence to Genius—publish less,

Or rivals new thy 'house' will dispossess,

In spite of folks who think the works of Shelley

Inferior to romances by Corelli.

"Grant Allen hath a 'heaven-sent' tale to tell,

But much he fears its utterance would not 'sell'

Wherefore, to be quite certain of his cash,

He writes (regardless of his 'inspiration') trash;

Practical Allen! Noble, manly heart!

Wise huckster of small nothings in the mart,—

To what a pitch of prudence dost thou reach

To feel the 'god,' yet give thy thoughts no speech,

All for the sake of vulgar pounds and pence!

God bless thee, Allen, for thy common sense!

"Health to 'lang' Andrew! Heaven preserve his life

To flourish on the sacred shores of Fife!

Prosper good Andrew! leanest of the train

Whom Scotland feeds upon her fiery grain;

Whatever blessings wait a 'brindled' Scot

In double portion swell thy glorious lot!

As long as Albion's silly sons submit

To Scottish censorship on English wit,

So long shall last thy unmolested rule,

And authors, under thee, shall go to school;

Behold the 'Savile' band shall aid thy plan

And own thee chieftain of the critic clan.

Kipling shall 'butter' thee, and thou sometimes

Wilt praise in gratitude his doggerel rhymes,

And Haggard, too, thy eulogies shall seek,

And for his book another 'boom' bespeak;

And various magazines their aid will lend

To damn thy foe or deify thy friend.

Such wondrous honours deck thy proud career,

Rhymester and lecturer and pamphleteer,

Known be thy name, unbounded be thy sway,

And may all editors increase thy 'pay'—

Yet mark one caution ere thy next review

Falls heavy on a female who is 'blue.'

Grub-street doth whisper that a 'ladye faire'

Intends to snatch thee by the brindled hair

And stab thee through thy tough reviewer's skin

With nothing more important than a pin—

A case of 'table turned' and 'biter bit';

Heaven save thee, Andrew, from a woman's wit!

"What marvel now doth Afric's zone disclose?

A solemn book of rank blasphemous prose,

Writ by a Mistress Schreiner, who elects

A Universal Nothing as her text;

Whereat the Athenæum, doddering soul!

Whimpers about the 'beauty of the whole,'

And shrieks, in columns of hysteric praise,

How such a work all nations should amaze:

'Nothing has ever been or e'er will be

Like Dreams'—produced by the blasphemous She;

So writes the Athenæum to the few

Who still pay threepence for a bad review,

And watch the hatching of the little plots

Conceived and carried out by Mr. Watts.

Charles Dilke! Come forth from Mrs. Grundy's ban,

And show thyself to be the 'leading' man,

With one strong effort snap thy social fetter

And get thy prosy journal managed better!

"Great Oscar! Glorious Oscar! Oscar Wilde!

Fat and smooth-faced as any sucking child!

Bland in self-worship, crowned with self-plucked bays,

Sole object of thine own unceasing praise,

None can in 'brag' thy spreading fame surpass,

And thou dost shine supreme in native brass.

Thou hast o'erwhelmed and conquered dead Molière

With all the mots of Lady Windermere;

Thou hast swept other novelists away

With the lascivious life of 'Dorian Gray.'

Thine enemies must fly before thy face,

Thou bulky glory of the Irish race!

Desert us not, O Wilde, desert us not,

Because the Censor's 'snub' 'Salome' got,

Still let thy presence cheer this foggy isle,

Still let us bask in thy 'æsthetic' smile,

Still let thy dwelling in our centre be;

England would lose all splendour, losing thee!

Spare us, great Oscar, from this dire mischance!

We'll perish ere we yield thee up to France!

"Wise Hardy! Thou dost gauge the modern taste:

Hence on man's Lust thy latest book is based—

A story of Seduction wins success,

Thus hast thou well deserved thy cash for 'Tess.'

Pure morals are old-fashioned—Virtue's name

Is a mere butt for 'chaff' or vulgar blame,

But novels that defy all codes and laws

Of honest cleanness, win the world's applause,

And so thy venture sails with favouring winds,

Blest with approval from all prurient minds.

"See where at Horsham, Shelley's muse is crown'd!

Two Parsons and a Justice on the ground!

What glorious homage doth 'Prometheus' win!—

Yet sure if ever parted ghosts can grin,

Wild laughter from the Styxian shores must wake

At such tame honours for the dead bard's sake;

An Edmund Gosse doth make the day's oration,

Oh, what a petty mouthpiece for a Nation!

And William Sharp, face-buried in his beard,

Thinks his own works should be as much rever'd

As Shelley's, if the world were only wise

And viewed him with his own admiring eyes;

And Little (Stanley) doth with Gosse combine

To judge the perish'd Poet line by line,

Granting his 'lyrics' admirably done,

(Though they could match him easily, each one,)

But, on the whole, he filled his 'mission' well;

'Agreed!' says Chairman Hurst, J.P., D.L.!

"O Shelley! my companion and my friend,

Brother in golden song, is this the end?

Is this the guerdon for thy glorious thought,

Thy dreams of human freedom, lightning-fraught?

No larger honours from the world's chief city,

Save this half-hearted, slow and dull 'Committee'?

Where Names appear upon the muster-roll

But only Names that lack all visible soul;

Conspicuous by his absence, Tennyson,

The Horsham 'In Memoriam' doth shun;

Next, Henry Irving's name doth much attract

(That 'glory' of the stage who cannot act)

But even he, the Mime, keeps clear away

From personal share in such a 'got-up' day,—

And not one 'notable' the eye perceives,

Save the Methusaleh of song, Sims Reeves;

Alas, dear Shelley! Hast thou fallen so low?

And must thy Genius such dishonour know?

Is this the way thy Centenary's kept?

Better go unremembered and unwept

Than be thus 'celebrated' in a hurry,

And get 'recited' by an Alma Murray!

"Now hold, my Muse, and strive no more to tell

The public what they all should know full well;

Zeal for true worth has bid me here engage

The host of idiots that infest the age

And spin their meagre prose and verse for hire,

Libelling genius if it dare aspire.

Let harmless Barrie scrawl a Scottish tale

And English ears with 'dialect' assail,

Let William Archer judge, and bearded Sharp

Condemn his betters, enviously carp

At living bards (if any), one and all,

Such is the way of versifiers small;

Let Morris whine and steal from Tennyson,

The poet King, whose race is nearly run,

Let Arnold drivel on, and Swinburne rave,

And godly Patmore chant a stupid stave,

Let Kipling, Caine, and Hardy, and the rest,

And all the women-writers unrepressed,

Scrawl on till death release us from the strain,

Or Art assume her highest rights again;

Let Henley, to assert his tawdry muse,

Damn other bards by scurrilous reviews,

Feeding with rancour his congenial mind,

Himself the most cantankerous of his kind;

Let Andrew Lang undaunted, take his stand

Beside his favourite bookstalls, secondhand;

Let 'Pseudonyms' appear in yellow pairs,

Let careful Stannard sell her 'Winter' wares,

Let Watts 'puff' Swinburne, Swinburne bow to Watts,

And Shakespeare be disproved by Mrs. Potts;

Let all the brawling folly of the time

Find vent in vapid prose and vulgar rhyme;

Let scribblers rush into the common mart

With all their mutilated blocks of art,

And take their share of this ephemeral day

With Collins and her 'Ta-ra-Boom-de-ay';

And what their end shall be, let others tell;

My time is up and I must say farewell,

Content at least that I have once agen

Poured scorn upon the puny writing men

That chaffer for the laurel wreath of fame,

And think their trash deserves a lasting name.

Immortal, I behold the passing show

Of little witlings ruling things below,

And smile to see, repeated o'er and o'er,

The literary tricks I lash'd before,

And lash again, with satisfaction deep;

And other 'rods in pickle' I shall keep

For those who on my memory slanders fling,

Envying the songs they have no power to sing!

"Gods of Olympus! Comrades of my thought,

Where is the fire that once Prometheus brought

To light the world? It warmed my ardent veins,

And still the nations echo forth my strains;

Greece still doth hold me as her minstrel dear

And decks with fragrant myrtle boughs my bier—

England forgets—but England is no more

The England that our fathers loved of yore—

A huckster's stall—a swarming noisy den

Of bargaining, brutal, ignorant, moneyed men—

England, historic England! She is dead,

And o'er her dust the conquering traders tread,

Crowning with shameful glory on her grave,

Some greasy Jew or speculating knave;

While blundering Gladstone, double-tongued and sly,

Rules; the dread 'Struldbrug,'[2] who will never die!

"Thus far I've held my undisturbed career

Prepared for rancour—spirits know not fear!

Catch me, a Ghost, who can! Who knows the way?

Cheer on the pack! The quarry stands at bay;

Unmoved by all the 'Savile' logs that roll—

I stand supreme, a deathless poet-soul—

Careless of Lang's resentment, Gosse's spite,

Swinburne's small envy, Arnold's judgment trite,

Henley's weak scratch, or Pall Mall petty rage,

Or the dull Saturday's unlessoned page—

Such 'men in buckram' shall have blows enough,

And feel they too are 'penetrable stuff,'

And by stern Compensation's law shall be

Racked on the judgment-wheel they meant for me!

"Adieu! Adieu! I see the spectral sail

That wafts me upwards, trembling in the gale,

And many a starry coast and glistening height

And fairy paradise will greet my sight,

And I shall stray through many a golden clime

Where angels wander, crowned with light sublime;

When I am gone away into that land

Publish at once this ghostly reprimand,

And tell the puling scribblers of the town

I yet can hunt 'boomed' reputations down!

Yet spurn the rod a critic bids me kiss,

Nor care if clubs or cliques applaud or hiss,

And though I vanish into finer air

The spirit of my Muse is everywhere;

Let all the 'boomed' and 'booming' dunces know

Byron still lives—their dauntless, stubborn Foe!"

Enunciating the last two lines with tremendous emphasis, the noble Ghost folded up his scroll. I noticed that in the course of his reading he frequently repeated his former self, and borrowed largely from an already published world-famous Satire; and I ventured to say as much in a mild sotto voce.

"What does that matter?" he demanded angrily. "Do not the names of the New school of literary goslings fit into my lines as well as the Old?"

I made haste to admit that they did, with really startling accuracy of rhythm.

"Well, then, don't criticise," he continued; "any ass can do that! Write down what I have read and publish it—or——"

What fearful alternative he had in store for me I never knew, for just then he began to dissolve. Slowly, like a melting mist, he grew more and more transparent, till he completely disappeared into nothingness, though for some minutes I fancied I still saw the reflection of his glittering laurel wreath playing in a lambent circle on the floor. Awed and much troubled in mind, I went to bed and tried to forget my spectral visitor. In vain! I could not sleep. The lines recited by the disembodied Poet burned themselves into my memory as he had said they would, and I had to get up again and write them down. Then, and not till then, did I feel relieved; and though I thought I heard a muttered "Swear!" from some a "fellow in the cellarage," I knew I had done my duty too thoroughly to yield to coward fear. And I can only say that if any of the highly distinguished celebrities mentioned by the ghost in his wrathful outburst feel sore concerning his expressed opinion of them, they had better at once look up a good "medium," call forth the noble lord, and have it out with him themselves. I am not to blame. I cannot possibly hold myself responsible for "spiritual" manifestations. No one can. When "spooks" clutch your hand and make you write things, what are you to do? You must yield. It is no good fighting the air. Ask people who are qualified to know about "influences" and "astral bodies" and other uncanny bits of supernatural business, and they will tell you that when the spirits seize you you must resign yourself. Even so I have resigned myself. Only I do not consider I am answerable for a ghost's estimate of the various literary lustres of the age:—

"Byron's opinions these, in every line;

For God's sake, reader, take them not for mine!"