Wallace was such a particularly nice person, did his brother Scots betray him to a certain renowned southern warrior, called Edward Longshanks, who caused him to be hanged and cut into four in London, and his quarters to be placed over the gates of certain towns? They got gold, it is true, and titles, very nice things no doubt; but surely the life of a patriot is better than all the gold and titles in the world—at least, Lavengro thinks so; but Lavengro has lived more with gypsies than Scotchmen, and gypsies do not betray their brothers. It would be some time before a gypsy would hand over his brother to the harum-beck, [365] even supposing you would not only make him a king, but a justice of the peace, and not only give him the world, but the best farm on the Holkham estate; but gypsies are wild foxes, and there is certainly a wonderful difference between the way of thinking of the wild fox who retains his brush, and that of the scurvy kennel creature who has lost his tail.
Ah! but thousands of Scotch, and particularly the Charlie o’er the water people, will say: ‘We didn’t sell Willie Wallace; it was our forbears who sold Willie Wallace. . . . If Edward Longshanks had asked us to sell Wullie Wallace we would soon have shown him that—’ Lord better ye, ye poor trumpery set of creatures, ye would not have acted a bit better than your forefathers; remember how ye have ever treated the few amongst ye who, though born in the kennel, have shown something of the spirit of the wood. Many of ye are still alive who delivered over men, quite as honest and patriotic as William Wallace, into the hands of an English minister, to be chained and transported for merely venturing to speak and write in the cause of humanity, at the time when Europe was beginning to fling off the chains imposed by kings and priests. And it is not so very long since Burns, to whom ye are now building up obelisks rather higher than he deserves, was permitted by his countrymen to die in poverty and misery because he would not join with them in songs of adulation to kings and the trumpery great. So say not that ye would have acted with respect to William Wallace one whit better than your fathers; and you in particular, ye children of Charlie, whom do ye write nonsense-verses about? A family of dastard despots, who did their best, during a century and more, to tread out the few sparks of independent feeling still glowing in Scotland; but enough has been said about ye.
Amongst those who have been prodigal in abuse and defamation of ‘Lavengro’ have been your modern Radicals, and particularly a set of people who filled the country with noise against the King and Queen, Wellington and the Tories, in ’32. About these people the writer will presently have occasion to say a
good deal, and also of real Radicals. As, however, it may be supposed that he is one of those who delight to play the sycophant to kings and queens, to curry favour with Tories, and to bepraise Wellington, he begs leave to state that such is not the case.
About kings and queens he has nothing to say; about Tories simply that he believes them to be a bad set; about Wellington, however, it will be necessary for him to say a good deal of mixed import, as he will subsequently frequently have occasion to mention him in connection with what he has to say about pseudo-Radicals.
CHAPTER X—PSEUDO-RADICALS
About Wellington, then, he says, that he believes him at the present day to be infinitely overrated. But there certainly was a time when he was shamefully underrated. Now what time was that? Why, the time of pseudo-Radicalism, par excellence, from ’20 to ’32. Oh! the abuse that was heaped on Wellington by those who traded in Radical cant—your newspaper editors and review writers! and how he was sneered at then by your Whigs, and how faintly supported he was by your Tories, who were half ashamed of him; for your Tories, though capital fellows as followers, when you want nobody to back you, are the faintest creatures in the world when you cry in your agony, ‘Come and help me!’ Oh! assuredly Wellington was infamously used at that time, especially by your traders in Radicalism, who howled at and hooted him; said he had every vice—was no general—was beaten at Waterloo—was a poltroon—moreover a poor illiterate creature, who could scarcely read or write; nay, a principal Radical paper said bodily he could not read, and devised an ingenious plan for teaching Wellington how to read. Now this was too bad; and the writer, being a lover of justice, frequently spoke up for Wellington, saying, that as for vice, he was not worse than his neighbours; that he was brave; that he won the fight at Waterloo, from a half-dead man, it is true, but that he did win it. Also, that he believed he had read ‘Rules for the Manual and Platoon Exercises’ to some purpose; moreover, that he was sure he could write, for that he the writer had once written to Wellington, and had received an answer from him; nay, the writer once went so far as to strike a blow for Wellington; for the last time he used his fists was upon a Radical sub-editor, who was mobbing Wellington in the street, from behind a rank of grimy fellows; but though the writer spoke up for Wellington to a certain extent when he was
shamefully underrated, and once struck a blow for him when he was about being hustled, he is not going to join in the loathsome sycophantic nonsense which it has been the fashion to use with respect to Wellington these last twenty years. Now what have those years been to England? Why the years of ultra-gentility, everybody in England having gone gentility mad during the last twenty years, and no people more so than your pseudo-Radicals. Wellington was turned out, and your Whigs and Radicals got in, and then commenced the period of ultra-gentility in England. The Whigs and Radicals only hated Wellington as long as the patronage of the country was in his hands, none of which they were tolerably sure he would bestow on them; but no sooner did they get it into their own, than they forthwith became admirers of Wellington. And why? Because he was a duke, petted at Windsor and by foreign princes, and a very genteel personage. Formerly many of your Whigs and Radicals had scarcely a decent coat on their backs; but now the plunder of the country was at their disposal, and they had as good a chance of being genteel as any people. So they were willing to worship Wellington because he was very genteel, and could not keep the plunder of the country out of their hands. And Wellington has been worshipped, and prettily so, during the last fifteen or twenty years. He is now a noble fine-hearted creature; the greatest general the world ever produced; the bravest of men; and—and—mercy upon us! the greatest of military writers! Now the present writer will not join in such sycophancy. As he was not afraid to take the part of Wellington when he was scurvily used by all parties, and when it was dangerous to take his part, so he is not afraid to speak the naked truth about Wellington in these days, when it is dangerous to say anything about him but what is sycophantically laudatory. He said, in ’32, that as to vice, Wellington was not worse than his neighbours; but he is not going to say, in ’54, that Wellington was a noble-hearted fellow; for he believes that a more cold-hearted individual never existed. His conduct to Warner, the poor Vaudois, and Marshal Ney, showed that. He said, in ’32, that he was a good general and a brave man; but he is not going, in ’54, to say that he was the best general, or the bravest man the world ever saw. England has produced a better general—France two or three—both countries many braver men. The son of the Norfolk clergyman was a braver man; Marshal Ney was a braver man. Oh, that Battle of Copenhagen! Oh, that covering the retreat of the Grand Army! And though he said in ’32 that he could write, he is not going to say in ’54 that he is the best of all military writers. On the contrary, he does not hesitate to say that any Commentary of Julius Cæsar, or any chapter in Justinus, more especially the one about the Parthians, is worth the ten volumes of Wellington’s Despatches; though he
has no doubt that, by saying so, he shall especially rouse the indignation of a certain newspaper, at present one of the most genteel journals imaginable—with a slight tendency to Liberalism, it is true, but perfectly genteel—which is nevertheless the very one which, in ’32, swore bodily that Wellington could neither read nor write, and devised an ingenious plan for teaching him how to read.
Now, after the above statement no one will venture to say, if the writer should be disposed to bear hard upon Radicals, that he would be influenced by a desire to pay court to princes, or to curry favour with Tories, or from being a blind admirer of the Duke of Wellington; but the writer is not going to declaim against Radicals, that is, real Republicans, or their principles; upon the whole, he is something of an admirer of both. The writer has always had as much admiration for everything that is real and honest as he has had contempt for the opposite. Now, real Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, a much finer thing than Toryism, a system of common robbery, which is, nevertheless, far better than Whiggism [368]—a compound of petty larceny, popular instruction, and receiving of stolen goods. Yes, real Republicanism is certainly a very fine thing, and your real Radicals and Republicans are certainly very fine fellows, or rather were fine fellows, for the Lord only knows where to find them at the present day—the writer does not. If he did he would at any time go five miles to invite one of them to dinner, even supposing that he had to go to a workhouse in order to find the person he wished to invite. Amongst the real Radicals of England, those who flourished from the year ’16 to ’20, there were certainly extraordinary characters, men partially insane, perhaps, but honest and brave—they did not make a market of