“Ah, then, Master Squire Mullins, isn’t it mighty strange that my poor ould landlord (Heaven preserve his noble Lordship!) shou’d lie covered up in the bed all this time past?—I think, plase your honour, that it would be well done to take his Lordship (Lord bless his honour!) up to Crow-Patrick, and hold him up there as high as could be—just to show his Lordship a bit to the Virgin. For I’m sure and sartin, plase your honour, if God Almighty hadn’t quite forgot his Lordship, he would have taken him home to himself long and many a day ago.”
The relation of this anecdote appears to have been ominous, as my Lord the son was also carried off to his forefathers (if he could find them) a few months after the first edition of this work was published.
The eccentric traits of the genuine Irish character are certainly wearing fast away; and if some contemporary of by-gone persons and customs did not take the trouble of recording those traits, they would be considered (if related in future times) as ridiculous fabrications.
DEATH OF LORD ROSSMORE.
Strictures on Dr. Johnson—His biographer, Boswell—False definitions and erroneous ethics—Superstition—Supernatural appearances—Theological argument of the author in favour of his peculiar faith—Original poetry by Miss T * * *—The author purchases Lady Mayo’s demesne, County Wicklow—Terrific and cultivated scenery contrasted—Description of the Golden Belt of Ireland and the beauties of the above-mentioned county—Lord Rossmore—His character—Supernatural incident of a most extraordinary nature, vouched by living witnesses, and attendant on the sudden death of his Lordship.
It is not pleasant to differ essentially from the general opinions of the world, and nothing but a firm belief that we are right can bear us up in so doing. I feel my own fallibility poignantly, when I venture to remark upon the celebrated personage yclept “the great moralist of England.”
To criticise the labours of that giant of literature I am unequal: to detract from his ethics is not my object. But it surely savours not of treason to avow that parts of his Lexicon I condemn, and much of his philosophy I dissent from.
It is fortunate for the sake of truth that Boswell became Johnson’s biographer; for, as the idolaters of China devoutly attach a full proportion of bad qualities to the object of their adoration, so in like manner has “Bozzy” shown no want of candour as to the Doctor’s failings; and if he had reflected on the unkind constructions of this wicked world, his eulogiums would probably have been rendered less fulsome, and his biography yet more correct.—It could not be more entertaining.
The English language had been advancing gradually in its own jog-trot way from the days of Bayley to those of Johnson: it travelled over a plain smooth surface and on a gentle ascent. Every body formerly appeared to understand each other tolerably well: words were then very intelligible, and women, in general, found no difficulty in pronouncing them. But the great lexicographer soon convinced the British people (the Irish are out of the question) that they had been reading, writing, and spouting in a starved, contracted tongue, and that the magnificent dapimibominus’s of the Grecian language were ready in polysyllables to relieve that wretched poverty under which ours had so long languished.
This noble revolution in letters has made a progress so rapid, that I found in one essay of a Magazine, a few months ago, no fewer than twenty words which required me to make as many references to our great Lexicon.