Our curate's daughter, on the contrary, after a long and close survey of this interesting scene, could only discover that life on the banks of the Ohio, in the twentieth year of their settlement, was neither as pleasant, nor as graceful, nor as elegant, nor as clean, nor as convenient as it is in an English village; and this discovery she communicated to the world in two volumes, 12mo, with sixteen illustrations, very much to the satisfaction of many English readers. This worthy and gifted lady, mother of worthy and gifted children, was utterly baffled in her attempts to account for the rudeness of Western life. Provisions, she says, were abundant in Cincinnati, as many as four thousand pigs being advertised sometimes by one man. The very gutters of the town ran blood—the blood of cheap innumerable swine. But "the total and universal want of manners, both in males and females, is so remarkable that I was constantly endeavoring to account for it." The people, she thought, had clear and active intellects; their conversation was often weighty and instructive, occasionally dull, but never silly. What an unaccountable thing, then, it was that these dealers in the pig and slayers of the bear, these subduers of the wilderness and conquerors of Tecumseh, should not bow with courtly grace, and converse with the elegance and ease of Holland House! "There is no charm, no grace, in their conversation," she laments. "I very seldom, during my whole stay in the country, heard a sentence elegantly turned and correctly pronounced from the lips of an American."
Such a thing it is to be brought up in an island! Her volumes, however, are to this day entertaining, and not devoid of historical value. There is here and there a passage which some of us could still read with profit, and her misinterpretations are not much more insular and perverse than those of Dickens. No one, indeed, yet knows much of this mystery of transplanting, in which lies hidden the explanation of America.
Her first caricature, entitled "Ancient and Modern Republics," is in two scenes. An Ancient Republic is represented as a noble Greek, crowned with flowers, reclining upon a lounge, one hand resting upon the strings of a lyre, and the other gracefully holding up a beautiful cup, into which a lovely maiden is squeezing the juice from a luxuriant bunch of grapes. A Modern Republic figures as a Western bar-room politician, with his hat over his eyes, his heels upon the table, a tumbler in his hand, a decanter within reach, and a plug of tobacco at its side. We have next a picture of a "Philosophical Millinery Store" at New Orleans, in which Mrs. Trollope delineated an astounding event—"My being introduced in form to a milliner!" She, a curate's daughter, introduced to a maker of bonnets, who actually proved to be a gifted and intelligent lady! A "Cincinnati Ball-room" reveals to us twenty-two ladies sitting close to the walls, the floor vacant, and all the men gormandizing at a table in the next room, leaving the ladies to a "sad and sulky repast" of trash in plates held on their laps. Then we are favored with a view of a young lady who is making a shirt, but is ashamed to pronounce the name of the garment in the presence of a man, and calls it pillow-case. Whereupon he says, "Now that passes, Miss Clarissa! 'Tis a pillow-case for a giant, then. Shall I guess, miss?" To which she sweetly replies, "Quit, Mr. Smith; behave yourself, or I'll certainly be affronted."
Another picture represents some ladies about to enter a gallery of art at Philadelphia, in which were exhibited several antique statues. The old woman in attendance says: "Now, ma'am, now! this is just the time for you. Nobody can see you. Make haste!" Mrs. Trollope stared at her with astonishment, and asked her what she meant. "Only, ma'am," was the reply, "that the ladies like to go into that room by themselves, when there be no gentlemen watching them." Another picture presents to us an American citizen of "the highest standing" returning from market at 6 A.M. with a huge basket of vegetables on one arm and a large ham carried in the other hand. A still more marvelous picture is given. Mr. Owen, father of Robert Dale Owen, challenged debate on his assertion that all the religions ever promulgated were equally false and pernicious. A clergyman having accepted the challenge, the debate was continued during fifteen sessions. But what amazed Mrs. Trollope was that Mr. Owen was listened to with respect! Nothing was thrown at him. The benches were not torn up. Another marvel was that neither of the disputants lost his temper, but they remained excellent friends, and dined together every day with the utmost gayety and cordiality. All this must have seemed strange indeed to the doting daughter of a State Church whose belief was regulated by act of Parliament.
Probable Suggestion of the Fat Boy of the "Pickwick Papers." (Seymour's Sketches, 1834.)
"Walked twenty miles overnight; up before peep o' day again; got a capital place; fell fast asleep; tide rose up to my knees; my hat was changed, my pockets pick't, and a fish run away with my hook; dreamt of being on a polar expedition and having my toes frozen."
A famous contemporary of John Doyle and Mrs. Trollope was Robert Seymour, who will be long remembered for his co-operation with Charles Dickens in the production of the first numbers of "Pickwick." Nothing can be more certain than that this unfortunate artist, who died by his own hand just before the second number of the work was issued, did actually suggest the idea which the genius of Dickens developed into the "Pickwick Papers." While Dickens was still in the reporters' gallery of the House of Commons, Seymour had attained a shop-window celebrity by a kind of picture of which the English people seem never to be able to get enough—caricatures of Londoners attempting country sports. It appears to be accepted as an axiom in England that a man capable of conducting business successfully becomes an absurd and ludicrous object the moment he gets upon a horse or fires at a bird. It seems to be taken for granted that horsemanship and hunting belong to the feudal system, and are strictly entailed in county families. But as a man is supposed to rank in fashionable circles according to his mastery of those arts, great numbers of young men, it seems, live but to attempt feats impossible except to inherited skill. Here is the field for such artists as Robert Seymour, "For whose use," as Mr. Dickens wrote, "I put in Mr. Winkle expressly," and who drew "that happy portrait of the founder of the Pickwick Club by which he is always recognized, and which may be said to have made him a reality." Perhaps as many as a third of the comic pictures published at that period were in the Winkle vein.