The Essays of Douglas Jerrold

by Douglas William Jerrold

And what may be the gracious discipline of this Order of Redemption? Has the new knight sold off all that he had, and given the money to the poor? We have heard of no such broker’s work; and surely the newspaper tongue would have given loud utterance to the penitence of Mammon. What discipline, then, does this Order of Christ compel upon its holy and immaculate brotherhood? What glorifying services towards the heart and spirit of man what self-martyrdom does it recompense? Is it the bright reward of humility—of active loving-kindness towards everything that breathes? Is it that the knighted, beyond ten thousand men, has proved the divine temper of the spiritual follower of Jesus, making his hourly life an active goodness, and with every breath drawn drawing nearer to rewarding Heaven? Surely the Order of the Redeemer—that awful, solemn badge, setting apart its wearer from the sordid crowd of earth—could only be vouchsafed to some hard Christian service—could only reward some triumphant wrestling of the suffering soul—some wondrous victory in the forlorn hope of this dark struggling life. These are our thoughts—these our passionate words; whereupon the herald of the court of Greece—a grave, fantastic wizard—with mildly-reproving look and most delicate speech, says: “You are wrong: quite wrong. The Order of the Redeemer, though by no means the first Order, is a very pretty Order in its way. Six months since we gave it to Captain Jonquil, from Paris; and truly no man more deserved the Order of the Redeemer. He taught His Majesty’s infantry the use of the bayonet: his howitzer practice, too, is a divine thing. Captain Jonquil is a great soldier. Last week the Order of the Redeemer was also bestowed upon Andreas, a great favourite at court—but, if the naughty truth must be told, a pimp.”

Alas! is heraldry always innocent of blasphemy?

On the 13th of June 1843, a grave masque—a solemn ceremony—was held at the court of St James. Heraldry again looked smug and pompous. A knight was to be made of “the most ancient Order of the Thistle.” Let us make a clean breast of our ignorance; we assert nothing against the antiquity of the Thistle; for what we know, it may be as old—ay, as old as asses. But upon the glad 13th of June a chapter was held, and John, Marquis of Bute, and the Right Hon. William, Earl of Mansfield, were elected knights. They of course took the oaths to protect and succour distressed maidens, orphans and widows; to abstain from every sort of wrong, and to do every sort of right.

“The Marquis of Bute then kneeling near the Sovereign, and Mr Woods on his knee, presenting to the Queen the riband and jewel of the Order, Her Majesty was graciously pleased to place the same over the noble Marquis’s left shoulder. His Lordship rising, kissed the Sovereign’s hand, and having received the congratulations of the knights brethren, retired.”

From that moment John, Marquis of Bute, looked and moved with the aspect and bearing of a man, radiant with new honours. He was a Knight of the Thistle, and the jewel sparkling at his bosom feebly typified the bright, admiring looks of the world—the gaze of mingled love and admiration bent upon him. But on this earth—in this abiding-place of equity—men do not get even thistles for nothing. It may, indeed, happen that desert may pant and moan without honour; but in the court of kings, where justice weighs with nicest balance, honour never with its smiles mocks imbecility, or gilds with outward lustre a concealed rottenness. Honour never gives alms, but awards justice. Mendicancy, though with liveried lackies clustering at its carriage—and there is such pauperism—may whine and pray its hardest, yet move not the inflexible herald. He awards those jewels to virtue, which virtue has sweated, bled for. And it is with this belief, yea, in the very bigotry of the creed, we ask—what has John, Marquis of Bute, fulfilled to earn his thistle? What, the Right Hon. William, Earl of Mansfield? What dragon wrong has either overcome? What giant Untruth stormed in Sophist Castle? What necromantic wickedness baffled and confounded? Yet, these battles have been fought—these triumphs won; oh! who shall doubt them? Be sure of it, ye unbelieving demagogues—scoffing plebians, not for nothing nobility browses upon thistles.

We pay all honour to these inventions, these learned devices of the Herald. They doubtless clothe, comfort, and adorn humanity, which, without them, would be cold, naked, shrunk, and squalid. They, moreover, gloriously attest the supremacy of the tame, the civilised man, over the wild animal. The orders of the Herald are tattoo without the pain of puncture. The New Zealander carries his knighthood, lined and starred and flowered, in his visage. The civilised knight hangs it more conveniently on a riband.

We are such devout believers in the efficacy of Orders, that we devote this small essay to an attempt to make them, under some phase or other, universal. We will not linger in a consideration of the Orders already dead; lovely was their life, and as fragrant is their memory. There was one Order—Teutonic, if we mistake not, the Order of Fools. There was a quaint sincerity in the very title of this brotherhood. Its philosophy was out-speaking; and more than all, the constitution of such a chapter admitted knights against whose worthiness, whose peculiar right to wear the badge, no envious demagogue could say his bitter saying. Surely, in our reverence for the wisdom of antiquity, this Order might have resurrection. The Fool might have his bauble newly varnished—his cap newly hung with tinkling bells. Some of us chirp and cackle of the wisdom of the bygone day; but that is only wisdom which jumps with our own cunning; which fortifies us in the warm and quiet nook of some hallowed prejudice. From the mere abstract love of justice, we should be right glad to have the Order of Fools revived in the fullest splendour of Folly. Such an Order would so beneficently provide for many unrewarded public idlers—ay, and public workers.

There was a time when the world in its first childhood needed playthings. Then was the Herald the world’s toy-maker, and made for it pretty little nick-knacks—golden fleeces—stars, ribands and garters; tempting the world to follow the kickshaws, as nurse with sugared bread-and-butter tempts the yeanling to try its tottering feet. The world has grown old—old and wise: yet is not the Herald bankrupt, but like a pedlar at a fair, draws the hearts of simple men after the shining, silken glories in his box. Meanwhile, philosophy in hodden grey, laughs at the crowd, who bellow back the laugh and sometimes pelt the reverend fool for his irreligious humour: for he who believes not in Stars and Garters is unbeliever; to the world’s best and brightest faith, atheist and scoffer.

Is it not strange that a man should think the better of himself for a few stones glittering in his bosom? That a costly band about the leg should make the blood dance more swiftly through the arteries? That a man seeing his breast set with jewellers’ stars should think them glorious as the stars of heaven—himself, little less than an earthly god, so deified? If these things be really types and emblems of true greatness, what rascal poverty besets the man without them! How is he damned in his baseness! What mere offal of humanity, the biped without an Order! And, therefore, let stars be multiplied; and let nobility—like bees—suck honey from Thistles!

We are, however, confirmed in our late failing faith. We are bigoted to Orders. Men, like watches, must work the better upon jewels. Man is, at the best, a puppet; and is only put into dignified motion when pulled by Blue or Red Ribands. Now, as few, indeed, of us can get stars, garters or ribands, let us have Orders of our own. Let us, with invincible self-complacency, ennoble ourselves.