How little did I dream, when writing this, that I should hear the parody quoted through the years up till now almost as often as the original poem! Smifzer was wiser than Tennyson, for he never spoiled the effect of his poem by admitting, like Tennyson in his “Locksley Hall, Sixty Years After,” that it
was a good thing that “spider-hearted” Amy threw him over as she did.
Luckily for us, not a few poets were then living whose style and manner of thought were sufficiently marked to make imitation easy, and sufficiently popular for a parody of their characteristics to be readily recognised. Lockhart’s “Spanish Ballads” were as familiar in the drawing-room as in the study. Macaulay’s “Lays of Ancient Rome,” and his two other fine ballads, were still in the freshness of their fame. Tennyson and Mrs Browning were opening up new veins. These, with Moore, Leigh Hunt, Uhland, and others of minor note, lay ready to our hands, as Scott, Byron, Crabbe, Coleridge, Moore, Wordsworth, and Southey had done to James and Horace Smith in 1812, when writing the “Rejected Addresses.” Never, probably, were verses thrown off with a keener sense of enjoyment, and assuredly the poets parodied had no warmer admirers than ourselves. Very pleasant were the hours when we met, and now Aytoun and now myself would suggest the subjects for each successive article, and the verses with which they were to be illustrated. Most commonly this
was done in our rambles to favourite spots in the suburbs of “our own romantic town,” on Arthur Seat, or by the shores of the Forth, and at other times as we sat together of an evening, when the duties of the day were over, and joined in putting line after line together until the poem was completed. In writing thus for our own amusement we never dreamed that these “nugæ literariæ” would live beyond the hour. It was, therefore, a pleasant surprise when we found to what an extent they became popular, not only in England, but also in America, which had come in for no small share of severe though well-meant ridicule. In those days who could say what fate might have awaited us had we visited the States, and Aytoun been known to be the author of “The Lay of Mr Colt” and “The Fight with the Snapping Turtle,” or myself as the chronicler of “The Death of Jabez Dollar” and “The Alabama Duel”? As it was, our transatlantic friends took a liberal revenge by instantly pirating the volume, and selling it by thousands with a contemptuous disregard of author’s copyright.
For Aytoun the extravagances of melodrama
and the feats and eccentricities of the arena at Astley’s amphitheatre had always a peculiar charm. “The terrible Fitzball,” the English Dumas, in quantity, not quality, of melodrama, Gomersal, one of the chief equestrians, and Widdicomb, the master of the ring at Astley’s, were three of his favourite heroes. Ducrow, manager of Astley’s, the most daring and graceful of equestrians, and the fair Miss Woolford, the star of his troupe, had charms irresistible for all lovers of the circus. In Aytoun’s enthusiasm I fully shared. Mine found expression in “The Courtship of our Cid,” Aytoun’s in “Don Fernando Gomersalez,” in which I recognise many of my own lines, but of which the conception and the best part of the verses were his. Years afterwards his delight in the glories of the ring broke out in the following passage in a too-good-to-be-forgotten article in ‘Blackwood,’ which, to those who may never hope to see in any circus anything so inspiring, so full of an imaginative glamour, may give some idea of the nightly scenes in the halcyon days of Astley’s:—
“We delight to see, at never-failing Astley’s, the revived glories of British prowess—Wellington in the midst of his staff, smiling benignantly on the facetious pleasantries of a Fitzroy Somerset—Sergeant M’Craw of the Forty-Second delighting the élite of Brussels by the performance of the reel of Tullochgorum at the Duchess of Richmond’s ball—the charge of the Scots Greys—the single-handed combat of Marshal Ney and the infuriated Life-Guardsman Shaw—and the final retreat of Napoleon amidst a volley of Roman candles and the flames of an arsenicated Hougomont. Nor is our gratification less to discern, after the subsiding of the showers of sawdust so gracefully scattered by that groom in the doeskin integuments, the stately form of Widdicomb, cased in martial apparel, advancing towards the centre of the ring, and commanding—with imperious gesture, and some slight flagellation in return for dubious compliment—the double-jointed clown to assist the Signora Cavalcanti to her seat upon the celebrated Arabian. How lovely looks the lady, as she vaults to her feet upon the breadth of the yielding saddle! With what inimitable grace does she whirl these tiny banners around her head, as winningly as a Titania performing the sword exercise! How coyly does she dispose her garments and floating drapery to hide the too-maddening symmetry of her limbs! Gods! She is transformed all at once into an Amazon—the fawn-like timidity of her first demeanour is gone. Bold and beautiful flushes her cheek with animated crimson—her full voluptuous lip is more compressed and firm—the deep passion of the huntress flashing in her lustrous eyes! Widdicomb becomes excited—he moves with quicker step around the periphery of his central circle—incessant is the smacking of his whip—not this time directed against Mr Merriman, who at his ease is enjoying a swim upon the sawdust—and lo! the grooms rush in, six bars are elevated in a trice, and over them all bounds the volatile Signora like a panther, nor pauses until with airy somersets she has passed twice through the purgatory of the blazing hoop, and then, drooping and exhausted, sinks like a Sabine into the arms of the Herculean master, who—a second Romulus—bears away his lovely burden to the stables, amid such a whirlwind of applause as Kemble might have been proud to earn.”
Astley’s has long been levelled with the dust; it is many years since Widdicomb, Gomersal, Ducrow, and the Woolford passed into the Silent Land. May their memory be preserved for yet a few years to come in the mirthful strains of two of their most ardent and grateful admirers!
Of the longer poems in this volume the following were exclusively Aytoun’s: “The Broken Pitcher,” “The Massacre of the Macpherson,” “The Rhyme of Sir Launcelot Bogle,” “Little John and the Red Friar,” “A Midnight Meditation,” and that admirable imitation
of the Scottish ballad, “The Queen in France.” Some of the shorter poems were also his—“The Lay of the Levite,” “Tarquin and the Augur,” “La Mort d’Arthur,” “The Husband’s Petition,” and the “Sonnet to Britain.” The rest were either wholly mine or produced by us jointly.